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I can’t believe how quickly time is flying by. It happens every year, and I know that I’m not the first person to feel this. We all feel it (especially with each added year).
When I first started teaching (in 1998), I was at school early in the morning and was one of the last, if not the very last person to leave. I was overwhelmed and never felt like I was caught up. My first year of teaching was a great year, though. I had the usual challenges of a first-year teacher, but at the end I felt that it had been a successful one. I’ve not had that feeling since. Each consecutive year brings more and more disappointment in myself and frustration that my students are not learning from me. I know that they are. I am a good teacher. I know I am. I have a passion for education. I try to think of creative ways to teach. I make sure that we get some fun art and stuff in to break up the drill and practice and problem solving and reading and writing. I know my job, and I do it well. My students like me, and we have a lot fun in class. I truly believe they know that adore them and love teaching.
Then I get a class like I have right now. I continuously doubt myself as a teacher and I’m frustrated that I can’t get everything in that I need to teach. I can’t seem to get the kids to understand that their constant interruptions and distractions are not only keeping them from their work but it keeps me from mine. If I am constantly stopping and re-directing students to the task, the lesson becomes choppy and the students who really need to hear me are easily confused because of all the stop-and-start lessons. It’s frustrating. I feel myself losing control of my temper. I am completely at my wit’s end with some of my students. I adore them, but do they have any respect for authority at all? Do they have any respect for their peers at all? Most importantly, do they have any respect for themselves? Apparently not. I am so grateful for the students that I have who are always on task, listening, quietly working and not creating some kind of conflict in the classroom.
In the past few weeks I have found myself reverting back to the trend of my first year of teaching. I am going into work extra early and staying far too late. I’ve been starting my day at 7:30 or so and staying at school until 6-7:00 P.M. (School is 9:30 – 3:30.) I’ve been re-organizing my room so that I can be the most prepared and efficient. I’ve begun writing up detailed lesson plans for myself so that I can try to follow it more closely, hoping to get more done. (I usually only get about half of my lessons done each day.) I also prep myself each day with the usual self-motivating words:
Be consistent. If a student breaks a rule, take a token. No need to raise my voice or blood pressure. Just implement the consequence.
Send a student to another classroom to work if they are completely out of control. I do not have to deal with the constant distractions and defiant interruptions.
If a student doesn’t their homework for the 65th day straight, take a deep breath, set aside another piece of homework for them to do at recess time. Make a call home. I can only do so much. My influence and control terminates at 3:30 P.M.
Move right along in lessons. If all the students aren’t done, move along. I can’t wait for each and every student to complete each and every task. It’s impossible, and it does little good for the kids who do always finish.
Yeah, yeah. The list goes on and on. I have these little pep talks with myself every day. I try each day to successfully meet each aforementioned goal. Sometimes I do. Sometimes I don’t. I want these students to succeed. I want each and every one of them to learn and to improve their skills. They have, too. As I sit here typing, I think about the kids when they began this year. I don’t think there is one child in my classroom (except the one who does NO work at all) who hasn’t improved in some way. That’s a success, right? We still have more than half of year to step it up and get things done. I am learning to temper my words. I am becoming more and more consistent, which is important in a classroom. I am improving all the time, too.
I guess the year isn’t all bad! Heh. Sometimes I just have to vent to see that things really are going well.
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