Some Late Reflection

To introduce the Lord of the Flies unit that I taught during my long term sub position, I asked students to consider the age of responsibility, as responsibility is a common theme in the novel. I first asked students to think of a time when they were told that they could not do something because of their age and to reflect in a blog post about how that situation made them feel. Then students were given a list of responsibilities and privileges and asked to assign what they felt was an appropriate age to each. For example, one privilege students were given was getting a driver’s license. They then had to decide what the age at which one receives a driver’s license should be and explain why they selected that age. After all students had assigned each responsibility or privilege an age, we discussed the actual ages at which they were earned and whether the students felt that those ages were fair and/or realistic. This prompted lively discussions with both sections of classes that I taught this lesson to.

Student responses to both the blog prompt and the class discussion were well thought out and indicated to me that the students were engaged with the material. Considering I had never taught these students before this lesson, I was unsure how it would turn out and whether it would be successful or not, but by the amount of time spent discussing the age of responsibility, which actually carried over to the next class, I felt confident in my execution of the lesson plan. My goal with the lesson was to find a way to introduce one of the themes of the novel in a way that made it relevant and engaging to my students. By connecting it to their personal lives, my students felt that they could relate to the characters as we continued to discuss responsibility, ethics, and leadership throughout the course of the novel.

Observations

Last week I had the opportunity to be observed teaching twice. Both observations took place during the same class period, just on two separate days. The first observation was on Tuesday with my student teaching supervisor and the second observation was on Thursday with Ken Templeton, from Great Schools Partnership. Ken works with the school district, in a sort of mentoring role. For example, when the freshmen team meets during lunch, he will eat with us and listen to our comments, concerns, etc., and he tries to find ways to help the team improve. After the initial wave of panic subsided when I found out he would be observing me and not H, I realized how valuable of an opportunity it would be for me, to have someone who doesn't really know me observe me. He asked me what areas I would like him to focus on, and because of the class dynamics I asked for him to focus on my classroom management skills/techniques. 

Because I had already been observed teaching that group of students once, it was nice to have a second observation to compare to the first observation, especially for classroom management purposes. 

Frustration

Today's only half over and I already feel like it was a failure. H came in this morning, but wasn't feeling well, so she left before classes even started. Not a big deal at all, really, but I think today the students could have used her presence in the classroom. They do fine listening to me and acknowledging me as their teacher, but they still try to push boundaries when she's not around. That, coupled with today being a Monday, made it worse than usual.

On top of the students being a little rowdy, I felt like I didn't put enough preparation into the day's lesson, so I felt as though my instruction wasn't very effective. The topic is generally a harder one for students to grasp, and I feel like I should have spent more time getting ready for the lesson so that I could have taught them better. Period two went better as far as my instruction, but the class behavior was much worse. The difference between the two classes makes it hard to figure out what changes I could implement to make the lesson run better next time. I know I need to spend more time explaining everything, but I don't know how I would explain anything differently.

The end of the quarter is this week, and it is definitely causing me to feel overwhelmed, especially since I just had students turn in a big project that now needs to be graded. By Friday. And I have to work on my TWS. And plan a bridal shower. And I don't even know what else. But I'm going to get through it all one foot in front of the other.

Routine or Comfort?

I'm definitely feeling as though I've slipped into a routine here--not a bad one or a good one, necessarily. I think what it really is is that I'm feeling more comfortable now. I know all of my students and I'm starting to recognize their habits, I know their work ethic and what to expect from them, which is something I never fully experienced during practicum. When I have students do a free write, they are completely honest and open with what they say. I hope it's because they are comfortable with me, but I think some of it has to do with them still thinking H is the one reading them. I say this because there have been some comments about me that I don't think were necessarily intended for me. It wasn't anything bad, one student called me arrogant, and one student said he wished H would take her class back, so it's not like I feel threatened or fear for my safety or anything like that. Since then though, at least one of those students, possibly both have had different attitudes toward me, so I hope that their comments were mostly based on situations pertaining to those class periods.

I've also realized how much I dislike doing whole class instruction all the time. SpringBoard is actually pretty good about varying instructional techniques, but sometimes it calls for whole class instruction, and I feel, with my larger classes especially, as though they stare at me like I've got three green heads or something. I much prefer when they're working in small groups or individually so that I can circulate and check in and have conversations with them. I also like having students come in to see me before school, during break/Connections, during my preps, and after school because I get the one on one and small group time with them still, but outside of class. Having the more personal interactions with students helps me to get to know them better and build more of a relationship/rapport with them, which is important because I'm only here for part of the semester compared to the entire year. It's going to make the transition to MB in a few weeks hard...

Seniors Take Two

Friday I subbed for H for the second half of the day. That meant I was alone teaching the seniors. They've started to warm up to me, but they are still standoffish at times, so I was a little concerned at how the period would go. H left me a list of what each senior should be working on and where they were in their process. I knew I would have an ed tech for support, but she doesn't really do any discipline, which is the area I had the most concern about.

The seniors seriously impressed me. They (mostly) worked on their assignments the entire time, and I only had to have one conversation about discipline. I almost think that not having H there at all helped. I also tried not to hover as much, and only checked in with each of them occasionally. Having different students working on different assignments at different times is tricky, especially with this group, but it also allowed me to float around and talk to more of them than I would have been able to if I had done whole class instruction with them.

I ended up actually really enjoying subbing for the seniors. After class ended, I'm pretty certain that I had a huge smile on my face. I was so proud of how well-behaved they were, especially compared to their normal behavior. They all also got a lot of work done in class, when normally they waste a lot of time because they are "waiting" for H to conference with them, even though they usually have something else they could be working on. I felt as though I actually was able to accomplish something with them, which I hadn't been expecting.

Parents

This week has been the week for dealing with parents. I think there needs to be a class on how to communicate with parents. I'm not having any particular issues, in fact, most of the parents I've dealt with have been nothing but supportive of their children. However, from what I've seen, it seems as though these parents are teaching their children learned helplessness. None of the students have come to see me about their work. For the most part, I've only dealt with the parents. I'm thankful that the parents are showing interest and supporting their children in their academics, but I wonder whether the students are really benefiting from it. Yes, they're freshmen and need a little push here and there, but if mom and dad keep track of their grades for them, how do the students learn responsibility? What incentive does the student have other than getting his parents off his back about grades? At that point, the student is no longer doing the work for himself, but rather for the parent. As a teacher, how do you handle situations like this? I want to teach my students to be autonomous, but if their parents are constantly intervening or doing things for them, what can I do to counteract them? Is it my place to? 

Frustration

How do you work, or co-teach, with an ed tech who is constantly undermining you and your mentor teacher?