While the circumstances have changed, there are still those days that I, much like Alexander, want to move to Australia. (Please read this book if you haven't already). Yesterday was undoubtedly one of the worst days I've had since being here. So we are currently one month into the school year and I've been waiting for it to get easier. While I think we're making progress the problem is that middle schoolers are, by definition, jerks. Basically I got my face spit in by one boy while another was swinging a condom filled with water around the room. It was just complete chaos. Three teachers that had to come into the room to get the situation resolved. Then, I got super sassed by one girl who didn't get the grade she wanted, making me feel as though I failed her as a teacher. Thinking that would be the worst of it, in the next class I had two boys come into my class, who not only weren't in my class, but turns out they don't even go to my school. I'm a novelty so I'm used to saying hello to kids I don't know and getting stared but this was taking it to a whole new level. After the two boys, I use this term loosely as they were HUGE, left one of the girls pantomimed that they were either using drugs or drug dealers. Seriously? Where am I? That whole day left me feeling like I wasn't prepared in any way to be a teacher. Who cares about teaching a class to the different learning styles of children when you have the visual learner swinging a chair at the audial learner?
Today was shaping up to be just as bad as the day before. Then I decided to do something drastic. You know how if a dog bites you, you're supposed to bite him back to show him who's boss? Wait are you supposed to do that? I have no idea if that's right, but I did try that with my cat once and we were both just confused and I was left with a mouthful of hair. Umm moving on.... Well, I metaphorically bit back today. I went Bruce Banner on this kid and he had no idea what to do. It was unreal, I couldn't believe it worked. Then the girl who sassed me brought in all of her homework including some extra credit so I bumped up her grade. Seeing her get a better grade all these kids asked what they could do for a better grade. They were actually asking me what to do for homework. I think the best part of my day was with this boy, Julian, who rarely comes to class and lives at the local orphanage. He kind of hung around afterwards and I asked him if he wanted to study English. He initially said no, but after a while longer I said that I wanted to help him and that I'm here for him so he finally smiled a whole bunch and said yes.
Talking to a friend (shout out to Betsy) getting her Master's in Education last night, she reminded me that no one is ever prepared to teach. The only way to learn is by doing. My classes will get easier, I will get better, and all the bad days will be eclipsed by those really good moments.
No comments:
Post a Comment