Last week, I officially took over on Friday as the teacher for my 8th grade English class, and this week was my first week of doing everything as the teacher. I’m going to be honest - this last week I have had some of the hardest days I have ever had in a long time. Wednesday, I had what I would call an “Alexander” day. Have you ever heard of “Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day”? That was this Wednesday for me. How do I know this?
From the moment I first rushed to my car in the morning and proceeded to dump my cup of cranberry juice all over my car, keys, phone, breakfast, and lunch, I knew this was going to be a rough day. It didn’t help that I started my morning moving much slower than usual because there is something about virtual teaching that is just mentally and emotionally EXHAUSTING. From the kids being overwhelmed by the amount of work and the teachers not being able to change that much because of the tight pacing schedule with the pandemic, my kids and I are just tired. No joke, I went to bed one night at 9pm and slept until around 8am, since we did not start school until later that morning, and my body just crashed. Anyway, my morning only got crazier when I got to my school and my CT (cooperating teacher) asked for my lesson for the next day. My CT advised me the week prior to only plan through Wednesday because plans change constantly and to wait until Wednesday to plan for Thursday and Friday, so you can understand my confusion and internal panic when she asked about the lessons for the next day. After the fact, I realized the panic she probably felt was because our co-teacher was getting observed the next day and wanted to have more input on the lesson plan than was originally communicated. As the day went on, I only felt like a bigger failure as a teacher when I realized that I assigned way too much work in the amount of class time. I could tell from the moment I said, “If you don’t get this done” and “if you don’t finish this other assignment or this one, then you can just finish it for homework tonight”. Yikes. EPIC fail on my part. I gave these kids way too much work for one day, and I could tell by the silent treatment they were giving me. Not only did I frantically plan the rest of the week’s lesson on a piece of notebook paper, but I also felt like I failed my students for the day. Some people would argue that because I care so much about not failing my students that it is what makes me a good teacher. I am absolutely not a good teacher, but I do care. I am an imperfect human being who is trying to balance still being a fulltime college student to now being a fulltime teacher and a newlywed. Wednesday night, I ended up staying up until 11:30pm lesson planning for the next day because I had class after school at my university, and then I had dinner before I got to working. The next day, I had students wondering why their late work wasn’t graded yet and why I hadn’t responded to their messages; it was in that moment that I had a choice. I could lash out at my students and tell them to chill, or I could be real with my students. I decided to be real with my students and let them know that I am human too. I let them know something along the lines that I am also a student who ended up planning the lesson for Thursday late the night before, so I had to choose what I did. I would get to their assignments, but I had to prioritize what needed to get done while also making sure I got enough sleep to teach them the next day. I could go on and on about the other events that plagued my “Alexander” day - like the fact that our class got Zoom bombed TWICE, which essentially means we were dealing with hackers or maybe other students from the school getting into our class, impersonating students, and disrupting the class with inappropriate chats and annotations. Since then, we have had to put a lot of restrictions on the Zoom, and this makes it difficult for students to be able to do breakout rooms and such. What matters, though, is that there is some sense of safety back in the classroom again, despite me having to kick out impersonators every day this week now. There are not enough words in the English language to describe how truly exhausting and just HARD this week has been. At the end of the day, I still wouldn’t trade this job for the world. I may be paying my university to do student teaching, but I still call it my job. Sometimes this job drains me on every possible level, but that does not stop me from reaching out to students and messaging each student who gave me class feedback to get more of their suggestions to improve our classroom. In reality, this isn’t my classroom, and it isn’t my CT’s; this classroom belongs to the teachers AND the students. It is challenging to make the classroom fun while keeping up with the pace of this COVID school year, but I am going to do whatever it takes to help my students become better learners and better people.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Details
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
Categories |