Today, my cooperating teacher was out because she had some personal matters to take care of during the school day. Since the kids were virtual today, though, we did not need to get a substitute teacher for the class, and I could just teach the class from home. Whilst the co-teacher was there for part of the day, she was not there for an hour in the first class and an hour in the second class. As for the other hours she was in the classroom, she took some of the students into a breakout room while I stayed with the rest of the class in the main room on Zoom.
Of course, my students noticed that I was the only teacher present; in fact, one of my students pointed out that I could be a “real” teacher today. I laughed and asked what he meant because I have been a “real” teacher every day minus the first few days with this class and have managed all of the responsibilities including lesson planning, grading, and communication. This student then proceeded to mention that it was like I was genuinely a “real” teacher today due to the fact that “now you’re the only one so you have to make smart decisions without help”. This student’s statement simultaneously made me chuckle and think about what it honestly means to be a teacher on my own. Up to this point, I have had two other teachers constantly monitoring me and offering suggestions as needed. In other words, they were there to fall back on, but one day I would be alone in a classroom without someone else to make “smart decisions” with. It has been a challenge for me to feel confident enough in myself that I can be a teacher on my own next school year after I graduate this May, but today I had to prove to myself whether I could truly do this. Throughout the day, there were times when students were off task, dealing with technology issues, and downright ignoring me because they likely walked away from their computers. On the contrary, I dealt with each issue as it came, and God gave me the confidence level that I needed to make the choices I needed to. I am sure I will have more times when I doubt myself as an educator, but today I proved to myself that I can “make smart decisions without help”.
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“Don’t let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example for the believers in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith and in purity.” ~ I Timothy 4:12
Communication with parents is one of the most terrifying things for a novel teacher and especially a student teacher. What if a parent asks a question I don’t know the answer to? What if I stumble over my words? What if they look down on me because I’m young? What if they get angry? These are all thoughts I am sure most new teachers have had at some point in their first years of teaching. For any new teachers out there, I am by no means an expert, but allow me to tell you something you may or may not already know: interacting with an angry parent is inevitable, but HOW you deal with an angry parent is not. In other words, conflict is going to happen whether you like it or not. I loathe conflict; some people avoid conflict because it is so petrifying to them. Dealing with parents is a different arena for me, too, because I am most afraid of learning how to speak my mind in a loving professional manner, without allowing parents to walk all over me or make false claims about me or my classroom. The reality is, at some point, teachers are going to face false claims against who they are as a person. Lucky for me, I guess I got that out of the way on the front end of my teaching career because of a recent interaction with a parent. One mom decided to reach out to my CT (cooperating teacher), my co-teacher, the AP (assistant principal), and the principal of my school to “report” my co-teacher, CT, and me for allegedly threatening children and calling them names. Now, I do not want to go into too much detail to protect the anonymity of all those involved, yet I also promised to be honest on this page (as much as I can be professionally anyway). Of course, none of these claims were actually true, and the mom seemed to be taking out her frustration on some of the best teachers in the school (my CT and co-teacher). Of all the teachers and student teachers to accuse, this mom attacked the teachers that the administration knew would never intend any harm toward students and who cared more than a lot of other teachers do. Not only this, but these two women are my mentors as teachers and watched me like a hawk (as they should), so they had my back as well. The situation was honestly so bizarre, and I have been running the situation through my head for multiple days now. My chronic migraines have also been acting up, and the stress from the situation is probably not helping my overall well-being. Despite the chaos of it all, I know I can rest in the fact that I am doing what God wants me to do, my teachers have my back, and now I see just how important it is to work at a school where the administration has your back too. Even though the human mind was not designed to multitask, teaching is a job that requires a lot of multitasking, especially teaching in a pandemic. Concurrent teaching, specifically, involves teaching students in the classroom simultaneously while teaching students virtually on Zoom. I had heard from multiple people that concurrent teaching is extremely difficult. Because of this belief, I was extremely nervous for the first day of concurrent teaching. Not only this, but I had not met any of my students in person yet. To be honest, concurrent teaching was much easier than I expected. Of course, there was a lot of technology to manage, and it’s extremely exhausting. However, it is not quite as difficult as I anticipated.
When the kids finally arrived in the classroom, it was awkwardly silent. I’m not the kind of person who is typically uncomfortable with silence, but I could sense that the students were nervous, even though they claimed they weren’t nervous. I loved getting to have students in person and getting to know some of my students who were more talkative in person than they were on Zoom. This past week, my cooperating teacher (CT) went out of town on Thursday and Friday while I stayed to teach concurrently for my second week. The students are only in person on Thursdays and Fridays, and my CT just so happened to go out of town those days this week. With it only being my third and fourth day of concurrent officially, I was nervous to see how the dynamic would be without my CT there. Surprisingly, I had so much fun with the kids, and I felt myself relaxing a lot more. I’ve appreciated the relationships I’ve developed with my students and how some of the quietest kids are coming out of their shells. On Thursday, I had a student who was going to fail my class because he had missed weeks of school and his mom honestly didn’t care if he passed, so I had a heart to heart with him. I asked him to be honest with me about whether he wanted to pass not only my class, but also the 8th grade. He told me he did, and I told him I knew he did because when he came back to school he caught up on two weeks of work in a day. That showed me he wanted to do well. I also told him that I know P.E. stinks and I hated it too, but he needed to show up to gym class to pass. Since then, he’s now passing all his classes, ACING gym, and he told me on Thursday that my class is his favorite class and the best class in the school. On Friday, I learned from my co-teacher, when she took some of the class to one room and I had the other half, that the kids genuinely loved my class and me as a teacher. I was honestly surprised because I thought they went with my co-teacher because they didn’t like me. However, my co-teacher said they were sad to learn I wasn’t actually a teacher and would be leaving in April. We have a child with a rough past who also said it was his favorite class he has ever taken. Honestly, I felt so touched because I didn’t think I was that good of a teacher. At the end of the day, though, what matters is that my students feel like they’re learning and they get excited to come to class every week. I may feel like I’ve got a lot to learn still, and I do, but I am so excited to be a teacher. |
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AuthorKelsey Hayes is a student teacher finishing up her Senior year at Regent University. Through this blog, Kelsey Hayes will share the raw, honest truth about teaching and how both its joys and challenges motivate her to continue pursuing teaching. Archives
April 2021
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