Guide to Student Teaching #3

I am in my third week at TSHS, and I have just realized today how very difficult this job is. I am grateful that I have compiled two solid weeks of bliss and amusing anecdotal experiences, but today, Thursday, I felt the true weight of this profession. I ended up crying in the bathroom during 8^th period today. It was terrible.

            My 7^th period Honors-leveled sophomores broke me, just a little bit. After one week of observing them, I wasn’t convinced that they were “Honors” material, but I accepted the school’s label. In my second week, I taught them, and I assigned them a “postcard” project, which required them to write a postcard from the perspective of a character from the short story “The Most Dangerous Game” or the novel Lord of the Flies. I felt my lesson was engaging and relatively challenging, but the work submitted showed a clear disdain for the assignment. Honestly, the postcards and accompanying illustrations were pitiful, especially for students who had been labeled as high-achieving.

            Two postcards in particular caused me alarm. One had an approximate total of 10 words, one of which was a curse word. The illustration was minimal, and the student had not bothered to put his name on it. The other postcard showed a clear understanding of narrative style, consistency of voice, and understanding of the story, but the student had chosen a character without a textually-supported voice. He wrote a postcard from the perspective of a hunting dog, and he wrote it in the style of slave dialect (Massa, please…etc.). Reviewing these postcards was incredibly uncomfortable until I grew suspicious of the intentions behind them.

            Today, Thursday, I addressed the postcard project, and set some firm rules about what was acceptable and what was not. In respect to the curse word, I explained that there were not any characters from the novel that expressed an expletive once for every ten words they spoke. For the slave dialect, I articulated how it might be misconstrued as offensive, or even as self-hate. The students I addressed glared at me and challenged my statements. Perhaps I had embarrassed them? Regardless of my initial feelings, the class seemingly listened to my reprimands and warnings.

            As I moved on with the lesson on imagery and symbolism I realized that the class was not paying attention, and that they were exhibiting behaviors to indicate that I was not being respected as an authority on the subject. I attempted some classroom management techniques I had observed from my CT, but I very quickly broke down, put my lesson plan away, and bluntly asked the class, “What am I doing wrong? Please tell me what can make this class more interesting for you.”

            I used verbal, written, and visual strategies (“tell me”; “write a suggestion”; “can I see a show of thumbs-up or thumbs-down?”) to acquire feedback, but I received a series of neutral responses. The only nods I observed were in response to me stating, “This is YOUR education. Take ownership of it. Let me know how you want to be taught.” My CT offered a few comments, but remained outside of my attempt to gain insight and build a line of communication with the students. Later, she gently reminded me not to take anything personally. That is a hard lesson to learn, particularly when students understand how to use subtle manipulation to disrespect an authority figure. I knew something was wrong, but I couldn’t put my finger on it until after the period was over.

            I spent the first 10 minutes of 8^th period in the bathroom, crying. I felt as if I had failed to motivate, engage, and challenge the class. I felt as if I had failed them. Although my CT reassured me that this scenario was typical and to be expected, and that I needed to push forward with my plan regardless of students’ misbehavior, I made a deliberate decision to change my initial plans and begin looking for ways to truly offer challenges for these students to meet.

            My new plans include more rigorous vocabulary assignments, more complex in-class activities, and more rigid writing tasks. My rationale is: if the students are not engaged, they must need work that is requires more thought. I am sincerely nervous about tomorrow’s lesson, but I am confident that the modifications I have made will challenge these students, and engage them in a true literary and academic discussion, hopefully.

            I am optimistic about the lesson, but this week also revealed new administrative challenges, mainly gathered from observing the faculty meeting this week. I was informed that I needed to have an electronic gradebook, and that the form the required gradebook took was inconsequential to the administration. I am currently attempting to fulfill this requirement using a spreadsheet application (Google spreadsheets), but I am struggling with how to incorporate specific features (running totals, class averages, assignment types, etc.). I have procured a physical gradebook, and I am keeping detailed daily records, but I am not assured that I am keeping the records the administration wants.

            I am wary of tomorrow, Friday. I desperately want to find a way to teach the novel Lord of the Flies, in a way that is fresh and exciting for the students, but I also understand that, since many of them were required to read the novel in an earlier class, they will not put forth the effort and enthusiasm my current lesson plans necessitate. Teaching students who have varying degrees of knowledge is hard.

            I have altered the plan for the next literature unit, but I am highly aware that these plans may need to change based on how students respond to the next few lessons. The administration has requested more “differentiated instruction” and several new policies be implemented, all of which seem to fall under the category of “classroom management”. I have ideas and solutions germinating, but I will need to wait and see how students respond to classroom policies first.

            I am scared of tomorrow, but I am also very excited. All I want, for the moment, is to NOT be another version of one of the teachers I hated in high school. For tomorrow’s lesson I will be introducing the students to Socratic Seminar. My CT and I believe that these students will respond positively to an activity that allows them to self-regulate a literary discussion. We have observed some small victories and progress from the implementation of Literary Circles, so a Socratic Seminar might help to scaffold skills in forming questions and thoughtful responses based on textual evidence. I hope that this method will simultaneously draw out responses from the quieter students and help the more outspoken students choose when and what they would like to say.