August 10, 2007
Teaching - Day One
Who allowed me to become a teacher?
I arrived at school this morning about 45 minutes early. I realized that I needed to copy syllabi, copy in class work, and copy homework. Miss Georgia in the front office prefers to make the copies – so I entrusted her with my job. Needless to say – I got 2 out of 3 things copied correctly. Homeroom was horrible.
Day One:
Who allowed me to become a teacher?
I arrived at school this morning about 45 minutes early. I realized that I needed to copy syllabi, copy in class work, and copy homework. Miss Georgia in the front office prefers to make the copies – so I entrusted her with my job. Needless to say – I got 2 out of 3 things copied correctly. Homeroom was horrible. Luckily, the school had enough sense to use the teachers who do not have a homeroom to help the new teachers out a bit. “Mr. Gravitt, where is room 170? “ “Well kid…to tell you the truth, I have no clue.” That went over well. Every student in that school seemed to think I should know how to get to the trailers. No. They are outside somewhere…just look for them. They are big! After homeroom I had my plan period. Hadn’t I planned enough? Why do I need this addition 25 minutes? I quickly realized that I only printed 3 out of my 5 classes’ worth of syllabi (not counting the 1 class that was messed up). First period plan went by faster than I would have ever imagined. The day got better after plan – my German III/AP students arrived. Finally I found some people to whom I could speak German. That is what I was trained to do – and I wasn’t able to do it until almost noon on day one! That class period went by way too fast. I realized that last year (would have been German II for some, and German III for others) they only got about ¼ of the way through the textbook. This means they are one year behind! And they expect to take the AP Exam? Hah…think again. In that class I also have one senior who needed German II to graduate – but because of the unchanging band schedule – couldn’t take it in the normal slot – just to add another dimension to my day. He was pleasant though – and we found a common bond through trombone playing.
After my glorious second period came the most dreaded period of the day – Arts & Humanities. I was not trained to teach Arts & Humanities – I assumed with my relatively strong background in music and theatre I would be fine teaching it. Think again! The students were rude – they kept telling me that they wanted to switch to a different class. I kept making hall passes to usher them to the Guidance office. If they don’t want to be in my class, I don’t want them there. I scuffled through A&H (my personal short hand) only to realize that I have yet another section of it! And this time – it lasts ninety minutes!!! What will I ever do for ninety minutes? It turned out that I talked for about the first thirty minutes, they ate lunch, and they sat for the next hour. It just so happened that the air conditioner stopped working my room classroom – so it was hot, stuffy, students were complaining about the heat, I was sweating, and I was hungry (I decided that I would take the 25 minute lunch period to plan for the rest of the day).
German two was next. Even though this class should be something I enjoy – I do not! There is one student who is taking German II for the third time – my goal is to have him pass! I never want to see him again! He blurted out the F-word, the S-word, and the D-word all in two sentences. What am I going to do with this kid? I found out also that this class got about ¼ of the way through their German I text – which means…you guessed it, one year behind! I surely have my work cut out for me.
After German II, the glorious German I students came. In my classroom that seats 30, I had 38 students. The school originally had 42 registered for German I (this is what happens when the high school doesn’t talk with the ninth grade school). They say some of them will eventually drop out of my class. I began instantly using the wonderful technique of TPR (thank you Susan!). This strategy worked perfectly, because I had 8 students sitting on the floor – why not do a standing activity? I breezed through the first day’s worth of words – and they all left the class saying, “Auf Wiedersehen Herr Gravitt!” I knew my day was complete.
Posted by Lucas at August 10, 2007 05:03 PM