My Fourth Day

Oh goodness was today a disaster for sooo many different reasons. But let me start at the beginning.

First there was an assembly about staying in school and being drug free. The Harlem Ambassadors came today to talk to the students. The Harlem Ambassadors are similar to the Harlem globetrotters, but they also spread good messages to students. You must be drug free at all times and have a college degree to play with the Harlem globetrotters. They have a game at McNary High School tonight at 7. Some students won free tickets to the game. The students that I was sitting around were actually pretty well behaved. I had to tell some students to quiet down. I think that the students in front of me did not like sitting near a teacher so they moved up the bleachers. They also could have moved up because they wanted to win a free ticket though. I think this assembly went better than the other one I observed. I think the main difference was that this assembly was early in the morning while the other was at the end of the day. Students were still somewhat sleepy and in the school mode when they had the assembly after the second period of the day. When the assembly was at the very end of the day students just wanted to leave and start their weekend.

So now onto my fourth period. Students weren't really copying down their learning targets. Which is another reason why I hate that they have to copy down their learning targets. Just more transition and seems pointless to me. Anyways I started in the warmup. I think it went well. We had disagreement on the first one, but I used it as a teaching moment. I called on the more advanced student who is getting all the material easy and had him explain his thinking. I think he is used to knowing the answer and not really explaining. I want to get him to teach and explain more. I then had the students glue in a decimal place sheet into their journals. While they were doing that I talked about my own math journal from college. I told them I am trying to get them to learn the skills so that they know how to keep an organized journal in high school. I told them they can use this journal to study for tests in high school and beyond. This led to some questions about college which I answered quickly then moved along. I worked on two problems on the book next. Except several students did not have a book. They started asking to go to their locker and I knew I had to let them. Then 5 or 6 more students asked to either get water or go to the bathroom. I started excusing the first few, but then stopped to say that since lunch is right before this period that they should do it then. Some students went back to their seat others tried to take advantage of it throughout the period. I was bombarded with students to asking to leave and I just don't know how to say no. I lost control at this point and knew I couldn't get it back. I excused one student to go to the bathroom and he was gone for about 10 minutes. It was much too long. My cooperating teacher went to go get him. He must have been trying to skip class. That was hard to deal with. I had noticed that he would often ask to be excused and take a long time to get back. It was hard to go on at this point.

Then near the end of the class as I was trying to give directions a student had gotten his pencil stuck in the pencil sharpener. Since I didn't want to talk over the sharpener I had the student unplug it. That got the class real distracted. Then the student did not have a pencil and tried to fix the machine.

I started them on the homework after this, but forgot and ran out of time to have the students write down the assignment. I know they won't do the assignment so I will make sure the students get this weeks assignment done on Friday after the quiz. I think I am approaching homework and assignments with a high school frame of mind. However I don't know how homework should work for a middle school. This makes me think that I am really just cut out for high school even more.

I tried to get students who were talking to much to move into a new seat, but of course complained. I just can not be firm enough and it is so hard for me. I let them sit next to each other and get a second chance, but they ended up passing notes instead of talking. I asked for the note and she did not give it to me. She eventually tore it up and threw it away. I wonder what was on it and if the student was talking about me. I had another student not even realize they needed their journal until the period was almost over. I said in my head damn should have caught that earlier. At least the student who for two days in a row forgot his binder has started to bring it more often.

It was a tough day and I had trouble just getting through the period. I can't handle the students. I don't know if I have their respect and I don't know how I can do that when I am only here for a few weeks. It takes time to build respect. I also don't know how to be firm with the students. Plus I can't make quick decisions on my feet or else I will lose control like I did today.

I hope it gets better from here. Thankfully I can rest tomorrow. Then on top of having a bad day I am mulling over what I am going to cover next week. Plus trying to schedule something interesting or worthwhile when my adviser visits. I am afraid of what my adviser will say about my teaching. I keep thinking that he will say I am doing too much lecturing. I know I am, but I am trying to not radically change what the students are used. I have been doing some things different, but not too different. I hate direct instruction and the lecturing I am doing, but I don't think my students can handle anything else. I also don't want to reinvent the wheel and introduce new things this far into the year. Plus I am only here for a few weeks.

I don't know if I want to start a new unit and move into multiplying decimals at the end of next week. It will be hard. I want to use next week to do more activities, practice, and word problems on estimating and adding/subtracting decimals. Then start multiplying decimals after thanksgiving. However I don't know if this will coincide with my supervising teachers plan. Then of course I will have to make sure to have a good lesson plan for when my adviser comes as well which adds more stress to the whole planning thing.

So to sum everything up I am having bad days in the classroom and have upcoming pressure from grad school causing me to just give up hope. I feel like I am not becoming the teacher that I want to be right now. I have often imagined what kind of teacher I want to be and I am not it right now. I now it is a learning process and that the first few years of teaching I will be a bad teacher. It is just hard on me. I am going to enjoy my time off and relax a little with a good book. This will get my mind off everything for a little bit. Then I will type up Friday's test and ponder over next weeks calendar a little.

So this week is almost over and I don't know how I will get through next week which brings even more challenges. For one it will be my first full week and for two my adviser is coming to visit. Oh man this is going to be a loooooong unit on decimals.