I totally came through in the clutch today and averted disaster with my "nice" master teacher. I stayed up till 2am last night, which doesn't sound like much except that I would have been asleep by 8 if not for schoolwork, and got up at 7 this morning to bust out my unit objectives, final essay topics, and enduring understandings (which I actually had from Nelson's class last semester and modified slightly). It came together when I decided to have them read story #3 before story #2 since #3 is crazy long, so they can read it over spring break. I feel like these stories could go in either order. I got to school early and typed that up so that I had that on her desk when she got out of her class. I did a good, thorough job on this (though doing it in a few hours the night before is not ideal, obviously). I left her that plus a note requesting that we move our meeting back to later in the day, as I had a meeting with a student and some other prep to do for my other class. I knew that she'd have been upset about that if I hadn't shown her anything at that point--she'd have assumed something absurd, like I was doing it at the last minute or something--but since I'd given her the file with the note, I knew she couldn't say too much.
She was fine with switching the meeting, and I told her straight up that I didn't have for her the level of detail she wanted, and that I felt like in order to have had that I would have had to really stay up all night and sacrifice my classes today, but that I feel like I have more done now than I did at the start of Black Boy, so she couldn't say shit. Well, I left that last part out. She was ok with it.
As for the second part, the daily breakdown of what I'd be teaching, well, I hadn't done that at all yet! I needed my whole prep period to print stuff for my other class, so I wasn't sure what I was going to do about that, but in my other class the students peer-reviewed one another's papers for the whole class, so I did something that I hardly ever do--my own work while students are working on something else. There wasn't anything else for me to do in class anyway, as they were all on their own and working well. So, I busted out my calendar--and I actually did it in the last 10 minutes of class as well as for five minutes or so after class--literally while I was walking to my meeting with her! But it was fine, and she was happy with it, and I have lived to teach another day.
She's observing me tomorrow, and I feel like if that goes well, then she will be off my back. I feel pretty much prepared for tomorrow, so we'll see...
Wednesday, March 28, 2007
Monday, March 26, 2007
Master teacher ridiculousness and crying again at school
Things are going very well with my "mean" master teacher, but now, for episode 2 where I had to clean myself up from crying before teaching as a result of a meeting with my master teacher, it was an incident with the "nice" master teacher. (I wish I could just give names, as I don't like referring to her that way at this moment.)
Thursday she had asked me to show her a "rough outline" of my plans forthe new book I'm starting in my 10th grade class. This is obviously quite a vague term, and apparently I misunderstood what she meant by this. Thursday what I had for her was a layout on a lesson-planning calendar of when I would be teaching each story in the book, the assessments for the unit, and a brief summary of the focus of each class this week. As far asI could tell, she was fine with what I had for her.
On Friday, after my class, I approached her to let her know that, based on the class that day--our first discussing this book--that I was going to reevaluate my plans for this week, which I felt were too sophisticated since the students had more trouble with the reading than I had anticipated. She had previously mentioned the idea a while back that I might choose to not teach all 5 stories in the book, and I had asked for her feedback on cutting 1 or 2 of the stories. She disagreed with cutting the story that I had been thinking to cut but seemed to be ok with me making that choice myself.
Fast forward to this morning. When I arrived at school, there was a note from her that she wanted to meet me after class today. In our meeting today, she told me how upset she was that I did not have a full unit plan for her on Thursday, and that she now sees what the other master teacher was talking about in the beginning of the semester. She said that based on what I showed her Thursday she wanted to rescind the overall positive evaluation she had sent in the day before, and that the plan I gave her Thurs as well as the conversation I had with her on Friday about cutting certain sections to be able to do a closer analysis of the parts we read gave her the impression that I am not prepared to teach this book. She further said that she didn't want to have to "defend her position" to me about why she thinks certain stories are important to teach, and that she feels that I ask her questions whenever I want but that when she asks me to have things for her, I do not.
I was extremely shocked and blindsided by this conversation as well as so many of the specifics in it. First of all, she had asked for a "rough outline," and then she freaked out (days later) because I didn't give her something more specific. This seems like a very clear misunderstanding of her not being precise with me about what she wanted and me assuming I knew what she wanted. What I gave her was a somewhat rougher outline than what I had shown her for the previous book I taught, but what she told me today that she wants--a full unit plan with daily objectives and the lessons spelled out for every day for the rest of this unit--is way more specific than I ever gave her for the previous book. When I explained this, she argued this point, pointing out a couple things that I gave her about that book, but I absolutely never gave her what she is asking for now, and I feel very confident with the job I did in teaching that book. The implication seemed to be that I am unprepared to teach this book because I don't have what I had for the other book prepared, but that is simply not the case. I feel I am no less prepared for this book than the previous one. Anyway, the fact that I know she feels I did a good job with the last book seemed to be a distant memory or somehow totally irrelevant since I didn't have the fleshed-out unit plan for her on Thursday that I didn'teven *know* she wanted. In addition, she also didn't say anything to me at the time on Thursday or Friday, so I don't understand how this just came up over the weekend. Shouldn't you tell someone at the time that whatthey're giving you is not what you wanted?
I let her know that I have not ever seen a unit plan modeled for me by her or any professional teacher--I just did one for one of my classes, discussed them a little in class--and that all I had seen from her when I had asked to see some of her plans last semester was her calendar layout, which is what I gave to her.
I will give her a beautiful unit plan by Wednesday--and I feel like that is something that I should have ideally had laid out before--but I am just exhausted at this point and really just feel like I want to throw something together to get her off myback, which is SO not the point, I know, but that's how I'm feeling.
The idea of saying she felt like she wanted to undo her positive recommendation of me based on this was offensive to me, not to mention absurd. She's observed me probably 15 times and met with me formally more than that and informally almost everyday, and based on this she has shifted her entire impression of me? Please.
When she said that she feels like I don't have the things that she asks me for I was completely shocked. I asked her what she was referring to, but she had no specifics. She referred back to me not being prepared for my meetings with the ohter master teacher (though she had asked me for something very different for those meetings), but there were *no* meetings that this teacher had asked me for something that I didn't have--well, none that I can remember and none that she said in response to that question. She mentioned that last Thursday I didn'thave a lesson plan for her while she was observing, but I hadn't realized she was observing that day so I hadn't printed anything out for her. And that was her only explanation of her saying something as harsh as that she generally feels I don't have the things she asks me for. It seemed like she was making this broad statement and somehow trying to build a case against me based on this thing on Thursday. I was really shocked and frustrated and angry at that point. Where did this even come from?
I know she and the other teacher meet occasionally, and I saw them meeting this morning. I wonder if they've decided to switch good cop-bad cop roles or something?
It's perfectly legit to ask me for a unit plan--I have no explanation for why I don't have one except that I'm freakin' tired. But do not to ask for a rough outline if you want a unit plan with unit goals and daily objectives tied to those goals.
Finally, I was shocked by her saying that she was bothered by my asking her opinion about which story to potentially leave out. She felt that this showed a lack of preperation on my part, but I had already given this a good amount of thought and wanted her opinion, assuming she wouldn't mind spending the time with me to offer that. I thought she would actually have input--you know, like mentorship?--to offer since she's taught this book 7 or 8 times, and I was curious about her thoughts on it. The idea that she felt she had to "defend her position" was ludicrous to me--I thought the conversation was very clearly me asking her her opinion, my offering ideas about other ways to introduce the ideas that seemed most important, and her offering her opinions about that. I did somewhat argue against her reasoning but in the spirit of two peers discussing a text--not in terms of her having to justify herself to me, as she interpreted it. I apologized to her for giving her the feeling that she needed to defend her opinion and told her that was completely not my intention for that conversation. Meanwhile, I told herthat I had no idea that she would have interpreted this in this way and that, frankly, I no longer would approach her to ask her opinion about such things. I thought when I said this, she would back up and say something like, "Well, feel free to ask my opinion," but she did not. Fine.
I am really furious and upset about this. This is now the second time that I have beenin the position of cleaning myself up right before class after crying witha master teacher. Some of that is me getting emotionally involved, but the blanket statements and generalizations this teacher was making about me in a waythat suggested that everything I'd ever done was undermined by my not having this thing for her on Thursday that I had misunderstood was just so frustrating. She carried herself in a much more professional way with me than the other master teacher did in terms of not yelling, using professional language, giving me a writeup of what she wants for Wednesday, yet I feel terrible about having to work with her at this point. I feel like I no longer trust her and want as little to do with her as possiblefor the rest of the semester. Her using vague language, resulting in me giving her something other than what she wanted, resulted in her losing confidence in me and thinking about me in an entirely different way and speaking to me as if I'm an incompetent slacker is just not right, especially given that she has been seeing me teach all semester and has given me very positive evaluations throughout. I'll give her the things she wants, but I will no longer see her as any kind of resource for me.
I'm just sick of feeling completely unappreciated and getting torn apart for everything I do that could be better and getting virtually no positive reinforcement, compliments, or support from these teachers. I do get lots of positive reinforcement from my students, who I know appreciate me in the way that students appreciate teachers they like, but to feel hassled and stressed and criticized all the time by supervisors is just not the environment I want to be in.
In class tonight, we had a guest speaker: a principal speaking about applying for teaching jobs. He pointed to our recommendations from our master teachers as key. Lovely. Who wants a fucking teaching job after this anyway?
I left class early after the break knowing I couldn't sit still for this discussion any longer. Yanan gave me a long hug when I explained I'd be leaving early and she saw the tears in my eyes.
Thursday she had asked me to show her a "rough outline" of my plans forthe new book I'm starting in my 10th grade class. This is obviously quite a vague term, and apparently I misunderstood what she meant by this. Thursday what I had for her was a layout on a lesson-planning calendar of when I would be teaching each story in the book, the assessments for the unit, and a brief summary of the focus of each class this week. As far asI could tell, she was fine with what I had for her.
On Friday, after my class, I approached her to let her know that, based on the class that day--our first discussing this book--that I was going to reevaluate my plans for this week, which I felt were too sophisticated since the students had more trouble with the reading than I had anticipated. She had previously mentioned the idea a while back that I might choose to not teach all 5 stories in the book, and I had asked for her feedback on cutting 1 or 2 of the stories. She disagreed with cutting the story that I had been thinking to cut but seemed to be ok with me making that choice myself.
Fast forward to this morning. When I arrived at school, there was a note from her that she wanted to meet me after class today. In our meeting today, she told me how upset she was that I did not have a full unit plan for her on Thursday, and that she now sees what the other master teacher was talking about in the beginning of the semester. She said that based on what I showed her Thursday she wanted to rescind the overall positive evaluation she had sent in the day before, and that the plan I gave her Thurs as well as the conversation I had with her on Friday about cutting certain sections to be able to do a closer analysis of the parts we read gave her the impression that I am not prepared to teach this book. She further said that she didn't want to have to "defend her position" to me about why she thinks certain stories are important to teach, and that she feels that I ask her questions whenever I want but that when she asks me to have things for her, I do not.
I was extremely shocked and blindsided by this conversation as well as so many of the specifics in it. First of all, she had asked for a "rough outline," and then she freaked out (days later) because I didn't give her something more specific. This seems like a very clear misunderstanding of her not being precise with me about what she wanted and me assuming I knew what she wanted. What I gave her was a somewhat rougher outline than what I had shown her for the previous book I taught, but what she told me today that she wants--a full unit plan with daily objectives and the lessons spelled out for every day for the rest of this unit--is way more specific than I ever gave her for the previous book. When I explained this, she argued this point, pointing out a couple things that I gave her about that book, but I absolutely never gave her what she is asking for now, and I feel very confident with the job I did in teaching that book. The implication seemed to be that I am unprepared to teach this book because I don't have what I had for the other book prepared, but that is simply not the case. I feel I am no less prepared for this book than the previous one. Anyway, the fact that I know she feels I did a good job with the last book seemed to be a distant memory or somehow totally irrelevant since I didn't have the fleshed-out unit plan for her on Thursday that I didn'teven *know* she wanted. In addition, she also didn't say anything to me at the time on Thursday or Friday, so I don't understand how this just came up over the weekend. Shouldn't you tell someone at the time that whatthey're giving you is not what you wanted?
I let her know that I have not ever seen a unit plan modeled for me by her or any professional teacher--I just did one for one of my classes, discussed them a little in class--and that all I had seen from her when I had asked to see some of her plans last semester was her calendar layout, which is what I gave to her.
I will give her a beautiful unit plan by Wednesday--and I feel like that is something that I should have ideally had laid out before--but I am just exhausted at this point and really just feel like I want to throw something together to get her off myback, which is SO not the point, I know, but that's how I'm feeling.
The idea of saying she felt like she wanted to undo her positive recommendation of me based on this was offensive to me, not to mention absurd. She's observed me probably 15 times and met with me formally more than that and informally almost everyday, and based on this she has shifted her entire impression of me? Please.
When she said that she feels like I don't have the things that she asks me for I was completely shocked. I asked her what she was referring to, but she had no specifics. She referred back to me not being prepared for my meetings with the ohter master teacher (though she had asked me for something very different for those meetings), but there were *no* meetings that this teacher had asked me for something that I didn't have--well, none that I can remember and none that she said in response to that question. She mentioned that last Thursday I didn'thave a lesson plan for her while she was observing, but I hadn't realized she was observing that day so I hadn't printed anything out for her. And that was her only explanation of her saying something as harsh as that she generally feels I don't have the things she asks me for. It seemed like she was making this broad statement and somehow trying to build a case against me based on this thing on Thursday. I was really shocked and frustrated and angry at that point. Where did this even come from?
I know she and the other teacher meet occasionally, and I saw them meeting this morning. I wonder if they've decided to switch good cop-bad cop roles or something?
It's perfectly legit to ask me for a unit plan--I have no explanation for why I don't have one except that I'm freakin' tired. But do not to ask for a rough outline if you want a unit plan with unit goals and daily objectives tied to those goals.
Finally, I was shocked by her saying that she was bothered by my asking her opinion about which story to potentially leave out. She felt that this showed a lack of preperation on my part, but I had already given this a good amount of thought and wanted her opinion, assuming she wouldn't mind spending the time with me to offer that. I thought she would actually have input--you know, like mentorship?--to offer since she's taught this book 7 or 8 times, and I was curious about her thoughts on it. The idea that she felt she had to "defend her position" was ludicrous to me--I thought the conversation was very clearly me asking her her opinion, my offering ideas about other ways to introduce the ideas that seemed most important, and her offering her opinions about that. I did somewhat argue against her reasoning but in the spirit of two peers discussing a text--not in terms of her having to justify herself to me, as she interpreted it. I apologized to her for giving her the feeling that she needed to defend her opinion and told her that was completely not my intention for that conversation. Meanwhile, I told herthat I had no idea that she would have interpreted this in this way and that, frankly, I no longer would approach her to ask her opinion about such things. I thought when I said this, she would back up and say something like, "Well, feel free to ask my opinion," but she did not. Fine.
I am really furious and upset about this. This is now the second time that I have beenin the position of cleaning myself up right before class after crying witha master teacher. Some of that is me getting emotionally involved, but the blanket statements and generalizations this teacher was making about me in a waythat suggested that everything I'd ever done was undermined by my not having this thing for her on Thursday that I had misunderstood was just so frustrating. She carried herself in a much more professional way with me than the other master teacher did in terms of not yelling, using professional language, giving me a writeup of what she wants for Wednesday, yet I feel terrible about having to work with her at this point. I feel like I no longer trust her and want as little to do with her as possiblefor the rest of the semester. Her using vague language, resulting in me giving her something other than what she wanted, resulted in her losing confidence in me and thinking about me in an entirely different way and speaking to me as if I'm an incompetent slacker is just not right, especially given that she has been seeing me teach all semester and has given me very positive evaluations throughout. I'll give her the things she wants, but I will no longer see her as any kind of resource for me.
I'm just sick of feeling completely unappreciated and getting torn apart for everything I do that could be better and getting virtually no positive reinforcement, compliments, or support from these teachers. I do get lots of positive reinforcement from my students, who I know appreciate me in the way that students appreciate teachers they like, but to feel hassled and stressed and criticized all the time by supervisors is just not the environment I want to be in.
In class tonight, we had a guest speaker: a principal speaking about applying for teaching jobs. He pointed to our recommendations from our master teachers as key. Lovely. Who wants a fucking teaching job after this anyway?
I left class early after the break knowing I couldn't sit still for this discussion any longer. Yanan gave me a long hug when I explained I'd be leaving early and she saw the tears in my eyes.
Monday, March 19, 2007
Just when I feel like things are under control...
It's kind of a dramatic subject line, but I am shocked by the extent to which taking a day off from work on a weekend or even for a few hours one evening results in backing myself into a corner with a ridiculous amount of work to do in a short time. I have a presentation to do for my class Wed that I have not done the reading for, which I'd be ok with except that it's a presentation with another person who I need to coordinate with and whom I told I would have comments for by today. I have two classes to do a bunch of prep for for tomorrow. I have grading I haven't done yet that I slacked on this weekend since I didn't have a lot of pressure to get them done but that I should really hand back by tomorrow. I have like 8 other things to do for my classes this week, too, that I can barely allow myself to think about. I guess I just feel like it never stops, and that I feel so much stress around it all because each day just brings a whole lot more work.
On the bright side, class today went well. I just want to go to sleep now but I have hours' worth of work to do. Ugh. 8 more school days till spring break.
On the bright side, class today went well. I just want to go to sleep now but I have hours' worth of work to do. Ugh. 8 more school days till spring break.
Sunday, March 18, 2007
Using precise language
Using precise language is critical in good writing as well as in good--well, even just decent--teaching.
I've been thinking recently about my students' writing, and one of the flaws I see is that their language is often not very precise. They'll sometimes write things like, "Richard is always rebellious" when, in fact, he's not *always* rebellious--as they know. Or they'll say "everyone" does such and such when in fact it is just most people who are doing such and such. Even worse, several have written theses such as "Racism led Richard to become a more mature person" when "mature" really does not say what they mean. When pressed, they admit that "mature" just kind of gets at age; they eventually explain verbally the more specific things they mean, such as that he begins to think for himself and make his own decisions, which says so much more than that he is "mature." In another brutal example, I had a couple of students write in their character analysis of Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird that he is "fatherly." One student actually wrote that "Atticus is fatherly in situations that involve Scout and Jem"! The fact that he is their father makes this not the biggest insight or revelation. When pressed, they'll say that they define fatherly as loving or wise or respectful or fair--all of which say so much more than "fatherly."
Meanwhile, I shot myself in the foot Friday when using imprecise language myself. In my 10th grade class, they are working on an essay that is due this week. The homework I assigned them was to "revise their essay" and to "work on their essay" (I wrote one thing on the overhead and said the other), but in neither case did I explicitly add "and bring in your revised draft on Monday." OOPS! This sucks because I'd like for us to do more peer review Monday, yet I know some of the students won't have brought their paper simply because I didn't assign them to! They could have done the homework to revise their essay and yet not bring it in. Ugh. So, after deliberating about whether to call all 31 of my students to tell them to bring in their draft, thanks to Tomas, I am going with a Plan B to work on grammar revision and giving them one extra day to work on their essays. They better be good. And I better learn--and teach--the lesson to be precise in saying what we mean.
I've been thinking recently about my students' writing, and one of the flaws I see is that their language is often not very precise. They'll sometimes write things like, "Richard is always rebellious" when, in fact, he's not *always* rebellious--as they know. Or they'll say "everyone" does such and such when in fact it is just most people who are doing such and such. Even worse, several have written theses such as "Racism led Richard to become a more mature person" when "mature" really does not say what they mean. When pressed, they admit that "mature" just kind of gets at age; they eventually explain verbally the more specific things they mean, such as that he begins to think for himself and make his own decisions, which says so much more than that he is "mature." In another brutal example, I had a couple of students write in their character analysis of Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird that he is "fatherly." One student actually wrote that "Atticus is fatherly in situations that involve Scout and Jem"! The fact that he is their father makes this not the biggest insight or revelation. When pressed, they'll say that they define fatherly as loving or wise or respectful or fair--all of which say so much more than "fatherly."
Meanwhile, I shot myself in the foot Friday when using imprecise language myself. In my 10th grade class, they are working on an essay that is due this week. The homework I assigned them was to "revise their essay" and to "work on their essay" (I wrote one thing on the overhead and said the other), but in neither case did I explicitly add "and bring in your revised draft on Monday." OOPS! This sucks because I'd like for us to do more peer review Monday, yet I know some of the students won't have brought their paper simply because I didn't assign them to! They could have done the homework to revise their essay and yet not bring it in. Ugh. So, after deliberating about whether to call all 31 of my students to tell them to bring in their draft, thanks to Tomas, I am going with a Plan B to work on grammar revision and giving them one extra day to work on their essays. They better be good. And I better learn--and teach--the lesson to be precise in saying what we mean.
Counting the days until spring break--but not in a bad way
Only 9 school days left until spring break!
I remember counting the days like that when I was in high school, but it never would have occurred to me that my teachers almost certainly did the same thing (and not just to plan accordingly).
This weekend has been the first weekend in a very long time--actually, maybe in the 7 weeks that I've been teaching--that I haven't felt stressed to the point that I felt like spending time not doing schoolwork could have crisis-level consequences. I had hardly any grading to do this weekend (just some short stuff, which I haven't actually finished yet) and I did most of the planning I needed to do laying in bed when I woke up at a ridiculously early hour on Saturday morning after going to sleep just 4 hours earlier. Getting very little sleep led to a somewhat lazy weekend, though I did some good leafletting at the peace rally today and did an hour-long interview with someone who is writing a book about AR activism and is interviewing activists for his book, which I'm really excited about. It wasn't much, but I feel really good that I did some activism this weekend now that I had a bit of time free.
I also started getting excited for spring break today! My wonderful friend Faith let me know recently that she is going on a vipassana retreat in Yosemite and offered me her car while she is away, provided that I drive her there and pick her up. At first I didn't think it was workable because the retreat starts in the middle of the week, but I realized today that it's during my spring break and so will work out perfectly! My week and a half off should be a great combination of catch-up time at home for the first half and relaxing and fun and adventurous time for the second half, possibly with Spanky, possibly with Luke. Fun!
In other news, I went to my master teacher's St. Patrick's Day party, which went great. My other master teacher was there, and she and I spent most of the time together talking--some talk about my class and getting her feedback on stuff as well as some more general teacher talk/advice from her and some non-school-related stuff. (I learned that she's totally against the war and Bush & Co., whihc is awesome, but she doesn't ever talk about it in class.) It was so interesting to go to the "mean" master teacher's house and see her boyfriend and her friends and her life in general, which I'm not exposed to at school. She's really a pretty cool person--except for the massive amounts of criticism she dishes out as well as the massive amounts of meat she dishes in; wonder if these are related....?
I remember counting the days like that when I was in high school, but it never would have occurred to me that my teachers almost certainly did the same thing (and not just to plan accordingly).
This weekend has been the first weekend in a very long time--actually, maybe in the 7 weeks that I've been teaching--that I haven't felt stressed to the point that I felt like spending time not doing schoolwork could have crisis-level consequences. I had hardly any grading to do this weekend (just some short stuff, which I haven't actually finished yet) and I did most of the planning I needed to do laying in bed when I woke up at a ridiculously early hour on Saturday morning after going to sleep just 4 hours earlier. Getting very little sleep led to a somewhat lazy weekend, though I did some good leafletting at the peace rally today and did an hour-long interview with someone who is writing a book about AR activism and is interviewing activists for his book, which I'm really excited about. It wasn't much, but I feel really good that I did some activism this weekend now that I had a bit of time free.
I also started getting excited for spring break today! My wonderful friend Faith let me know recently that she is going on a vipassana retreat in Yosemite and offered me her car while she is away, provided that I drive her there and pick her up. At first I didn't think it was workable because the retreat starts in the middle of the week, but I realized today that it's during my spring break and so will work out perfectly! My week and a half off should be a great combination of catch-up time at home for the first half and relaxing and fun and adventurous time for the second half, possibly with Spanky, possibly with Luke. Fun!
In other news, I went to my master teacher's St. Patrick's Day party, which went great. My other master teacher was there, and she and I spent most of the time together talking--some talk about my class and getting her feedback on stuff as well as some more general teacher talk/advice from her and some non-school-related stuff. (I learned that she's totally against the war and Bush & Co., whihc is awesome, but she doesn't ever talk about it in class.) It was so interesting to go to the "mean" master teacher's house and see her boyfriend and her friends and her life in general, which I'm not exposed to at school. She's really a pretty cool person--except for the massive amounts of criticism she dishes out as well as the massive amounts of meat she dishes in; wonder if these are related....?
Thursday, March 15, 2007
Ugh. If it's not one master teacher it's another.
Today my "nice" master teacher observed me, as my evaluation form is due this week (actually it was due yesterday, and I'd procrastinated telling my teachers that because I was hoping to stabilize things with the mean master teacher, which I have, before she filled out my evaluation, and I knew the two of them would talk if I gave one of them the form). I knew I shouldn't have mentioned the form to her yesterday because then she would observe me today, and I hadn't worked out exactly what I was doing today and didn't want her to observe me. She's observed me maybe 10 times so far, and she's been really happy with how those classes have gone.
I spent a long time yesterday thinking through exactly what I wanted to do, and I wanted it to be something good especially bc I was being observed. Really, that's just SO stupid. It totally distracts from the point of teaching--to make a difference for the students--and turns it into trying to impress some teacher based on something or other that doesn't necessarily correlate to what I see as "making a difference for the students."
Anyway, last night I came up with what I thought was a good idea. For homework last night they had to bring several copies of their essay drafts in for their small group to peer review for homework tonight. For today I wanted to give them practice looking critically at writing and focusing on body paragraphs in an analytical essay, as they are working on essays for Black Boy. (I'm so bummed that we're done with that book, by the way, as it's just been so wonderful to reread and teach. The Woman Warrior, another really good book, is next.)
In our English class at State, we always talk about giving students samples of good writing to model their writing after. I was kicking myself for not making a copy of any of the good essays or writings some of my students did, so I decided to write something myself. I didn't want to write something about the book, as I thought that would be less interesting for them and might just give them a freebie in terms of imitating the content of what I wrote in their essay.
So, I wrote an outline for an analytical essay, as well as one full body paragraph and the conclusion, about Britney Spears. My thesis was that "Britney Spears' celebrity status has led to her emotional breakdown, to her drug use, and to her becoming an unfit mother." I wrote a really well-written analytical paragraph using quotes, using the formal structure of context and commentary, etc., and we went over that today in class. The kids were cracking up laughing and were totally engaged. As I read it aloud to them while they read it on the overhead, we identified topic sentences, context, commentary, etc., and we talked about whether the topic sentences relate to the thesis, whether the paragraph proves the topic sentence, and whether I successfully proved my thesis. I asked them afterwards if they found it helpful, and just about the whole class was emphatic in raising their hands and nodding. One kid said, ""helpful and interesting." Later, I met with a student to help her on her paper, and she mentioned a couple things that she realized about how to restructure her essay based on the Britney example I showed them, which was really gratifying.
Anyway, I spent a really long time preparing for that and thinking it through. The only problem was that it took a little more time than I had figured it would, which meant that I didn't do something else that was in the lesson plan that I gave my master teacher before class. In retrospect, I really just underestimated how long that would take, which is a very common thing for me--in lesson planning and in life, as some of you can attest--and this is something I know I need to work on. I just find it so hard to teach classes that are just 40 minutes; if a discussion goes in an interesting direction or if there are unanticipated questions or if you just think of something you want to take a few minutes to talk about, it totally affects what you've got planned since the class is so short.
O.K. So after classes she observes, my master teacher and I usually meet to debrief in the English office. Today I had a student come to the office with me right after class to ask me for help on her essay. I was working with her and then, after a few minutes, the teacher came over to where the student and I were, and I could see she was waiting. I stopped with the student for a minute and asked the teacher if she wanted to talk to me, and she said in a very annoyed way that we were supposed to have our meeting now. (It's not like we have a formal meeting--or that I was kicking my feet up or sneaking off to (god forbid) eat lunch or something--I was helping a student.) I asked the student to come back, and she did, but the tone the teacher took with me was just so unnecessary.
In our meeting, she talked about timing, and some of the feedback she gave was good, but she didn't give me any compliments about the class, which I felt overall went really well for what we did--whereas she was upset about what we didn't do that was in the lesson plan. I felt like she was so melodramatic about it--like some huge disaster had occurred because the lesson didn't go just as I'd planned it. Ugh. I knew that it didn't go as I'd planned it, and I was a little frustrated about it, but overall it wasn't something I was going to feel bad about until I heard her reaction.
I have to just mention that this teacher, while she's always been very nice, is the most BORING teacher I have observed. Her classes are painful, and when Yanan (my classroom mgmt teacher) observed one day she said the same thing. While I respect her for being organized and hard-working, I'm not sure how much I really want to listen to her advice anyway.
Whatever. This is so stupid. I just have felt crappy all day because of this interaction, which has gotten me to think about whether I'm just too sensitive or taking things too personally or worrying too much about the approval of these teachers. I guess I just feel like I'm working my ass off and keeping my students engaged and working really hard, yet the two people who are in the positions to critique my work don't seem to acknowledge any of that, and in fact my interactions with them too often result in me feeling bad about things.
That just got me to think of something: I have been meaning to tell my 10th graders how amazed I am at how hard they've worked in this class all semester and to acknowledge them for that. I'm going to do that tomorrow.
As Tomas sweetly told me today, this is all great experience and it doesn't have to be perfect--which is a really key point to keep in mind. I guess there's some part of me that aims to please--or at least not to disappoint--and that part of me is feeling a bit frantic and demoralized.
For now, I need to plan out next week's lessons for the meeting with my mean master teacher (the one whose St. Patrick's Day party I'm scheduled to go to on Sunday...depending on how that meeting goes).
I feel like it's like 3 am, but it's not quite 10. That feeling has gotten old.
I spent a long time yesterday thinking through exactly what I wanted to do, and I wanted it to be something good especially bc I was being observed. Really, that's just SO stupid. It totally distracts from the point of teaching--to make a difference for the students--and turns it into trying to impress some teacher based on something or other that doesn't necessarily correlate to what I see as "making a difference for the students."
Anyway, last night I came up with what I thought was a good idea. For homework last night they had to bring several copies of their essay drafts in for their small group to peer review for homework tonight. For today I wanted to give them practice looking critically at writing and focusing on body paragraphs in an analytical essay, as they are working on essays for Black Boy. (I'm so bummed that we're done with that book, by the way, as it's just been so wonderful to reread and teach. The Woman Warrior, another really good book, is next.)
In our English class at State, we always talk about giving students samples of good writing to model their writing after. I was kicking myself for not making a copy of any of the good essays or writings some of my students did, so I decided to write something myself. I didn't want to write something about the book, as I thought that would be less interesting for them and might just give them a freebie in terms of imitating the content of what I wrote in their essay.
So, I wrote an outline for an analytical essay, as well as one full body paragraph and the conclusion, about Britney Spears. My thesis was that "Britney Spears' celebrity status has led to her emotional breakdown, to her drug use, and to her becoming an unfit mother." I wrote a really well-written analytical paragraph using quotes, using the formal structure of context and commentary, etc., and we went over that today in class. The kids were cracking up laughing and were totally engaged. As I read it aloud to them while they read it on the overhead, we identified topic sentences, context, commentary, etc., and we talked about whether the topic sentences relate to the thesis, whether the paragraph proves the topic sentence, and whether I successfully proved my thesis. I asked them afterwards if they found it helpful, and just about the whole class was emphatic in raising their hands and nodding. One kid said, ""helpful and interesting." Later, I met with a student to help her on her paper, and she mentioned a couple things that she realized about how to restructure her essay based on the Britney example I showed them, which was really gratifying.
Anyway, I spent a really long time preparing for that and thinking it through. The only problem was that it took a little more time than I had figured it would, which meant that I didn't do something else that was in the lesson plan that I gave my master teacher before class. In retrospect, I really just underestimated how long that would take, which is a very common thing for me--in lesson planning and in life, as some of you can attest--and this is something I know I need to work on. I just find it so hard to teach classes that are just 40 minutes; if a discussion goes in an interesting direction or if there are unanticipated questions or if you just think of something you want to take a few minutes to talk about, it totally affects what you've got planned since the class is so short.
O.K. So after classes she observes, my master teacher and I usually meet to debrief in the English office. Today I had a student come to the office with me right after class to ask me for help on her essay. I was working with her and then, after a few minutes, the teacher came over to where the student and I were, and I could see she was waiting. I stopped with the student for a minute and asked the teacher if she wanted to talk to me, and she said in a very annoyed way that we were supposed to have our meeting now. (It's not like we have a formal meeting--or that I was kicking my feet up or sneaking off to (god forbid) eat lunch or something--I was helping a student.) I asked the student to come back, and she did, but the tone the teacher took with me was just so unnecessary.
In our meeting, she talked about timing, and some of the feedback she gave was good, but she didn't give me any compliments about the class, which I felt overall went really well for what we did--whereas she was upset about what we didn't do that was in the lesson plan. I felt like she was so melodramatic about it--like some huge disaster had occurred because the lesson didn't go just as I'd planned it. Ugh. I knew that it didn't go as I'd planned it, and I was a little frustrated about it, but overall it wasn't something I was going to feel bad about until I heard her reaction.
I have to just mention that this teacher, while she's always been very nice, is the most BORING teacher I have observed. Her classes are painful, and when Yanan (my classroom mgmt teacher) observed one day she said the same thing. While I respect her for being organized and hard-working, I'm not sure how much I really want to listen to her advice anyway.
Whatever. This is so stupid. I just have felt crappy all day because of this interaction, which has gotten me to think about whether I'm just too sensitive or taking things too personally or worrying too much about the approval of these teachers. I guess I just feel like I'm working my ass off and keeping my students engaged and working really hard, yet the two people who are in the positions to critique my work don't seem to acknowledge any of that, and in fact my interactions with them too often result in me feeling bad about things.
That just got me to think of something: I have been meaning to tell my 10th graders how amazed I am at how hard they've worked in this class all semester and to acknowledge them for that. I'm going to do that tomorrow.
As Tomas sweetly told me today, this is all great experience and it doesn't have to be perfect--which is a really key point to keep in mind. I guess there's some part of me that aims to please--or at least not to disappoint--and that part of me is feeling a bit frantic and demoralized.
For now, I need to plan out next week's lessons for the meeting with my mean master teacher (the one whose St. Patrick's Day party I'm scheduled to go to on Sunday...depending on how that meeting goes).
I feel like it's like 3 am, but it's not quite 10. That feeling has gotten old.
Tuesday, March 13, 2007
Beat
I had a moment today in Nelson's class where I just felt like giving up. He was telling us about our first big project for the course, and I have to say that as focused as I was last semester on doing well in my classes, I really feel somewhat broken and just cannot bring myself to even think about my classes this semester. I have done hardly any reading for any of my classes; I actually hadn't even bought a single book until today. I just feel like my student teaching is way more than a full-time (unpaid) job in and of itself, and I even resent having to go to classes 3 hours a days, 3 daysa week, when I really want to spend that time preparing or recuperating. Nelson's class actually is valuable (unlike the other 2), and I think the project we're doing is valuable too, but my plate is already full and I'm just beat. I stayed up till 4am Sunday night finishing grading (my own fault, I know) and, after 4 hours' sleep that night, slept for 11 hours last night and still woke up feeling exhausted. I managed to go for a 20-minute jog this am, about the first exercise I've done in weeks if you don't count carrying a ridiculously heavy bag to and from MUNI each day. (Today I walked home from Van Ness when I just missed the bus.)
I did do something for my own amusement in class today that I think the kids liked too.
We are working on creating an outline and composing a formal essay, and so I wanted us to come up with an outline in class together. I explained that a thesis is a one-sentence answer to the question posed and, for our sample question, I chose the question, "Characterize your English teacher. Take a stand on whether or not you think she is a good teacher." I told them that, for the sake of my ego, they have decided to take the stand that yes, she is a good teacher. (And, for this assignment, I explained, there's no need to address the counterargument.) I asked them for some reasons they might give to justify their thesis statement that I am a good teacher, and I warned them not to all raise their hands at once. I kind of played it all up, so everyone was laughing--perhaps me hardest of all, though I know how to play it cool. I took two answers to form the topic sentences for our body paragraphs--one was that I explain things well so they understand what I'm saying (who knew?) and the other was that I care about them (sweet! I do and was glad they (or at least one of them) think that.). Anyway, it was fun to choose that as an example, and I know the kids paid attention to it.
Meanwhile, I totally screwed up in handing their papers back at the end of class as I had not put them all in order before class, leaving me fumbling through papers with not enough time left to hand them all back, so class ended on kind of a frantic note and I felt bad about it. I felt like the counterargument was rearing its ugly head, in fact, but whatever. Final grades were due today, and that took me a long time.
Also, I gave 2 students Ds today. Ugh. That sucked. And one student I love got a C+ and I heard him be disappointed about that. I actually graded him a little generously at the end to boost him up a teeny bit to get him to a C+ from a C. (My master teacher showed me how she manipulates grades this way--without any shame or guilt.) He's an ELL student and his writing is pretty bad, but he's really a sweet kid.
O.K. I'm shocked that I'm still awake after 10:00, as I was sure I'd fall asleep as soon as I came home.
I know if I go to sleep now then I will be even more frantic in the morning than I would be otherwise (which is still frantic) because I'm not totally prepared, but I'm going to do it anyway.
g'night, friends....
I did do something for my own amusement in class today that I think the kids liked too.
We are working on creating an outline and composing a formal essay, and so I wanted us to come up with an outline in class together. I explained that a thesis is a one-sentence answer to the question posed and, for our sample question, I chose the question, "Characterize your English teacher. Take a stand on whether or not you think she is a good teacher." I told them that, for the sake of my ego, they have decided to take the stand that yes, she is a good teacher. (And, for this assignment, I explained, there's no need to address the counterargument.) I asked them for some reasons they might give to justify their thesis statement that I am a good teacher, and I warned them not to all raise their hands at once. I kind of played it all up, so everyone was laughing--perhaps me hardest of all, though I know how to play it cool. I took two answers to form the topic sentences for our body paragraphs--one was that I explain things well so they understand what I'm saying (who knew?) and the other was that I care about them (sweet! I do and was glad they (or at least one of them) think that.). Anyway, it was fun to choose that as an example, and I know the kids paid attention to it.
Meanwhile, I totally screwed up in handing their papers back at the end of class as I had not put them all in order before class, leaving me fumbling through papers with not enough time left to hand them all back, so class ended on kind of a frantic note and I felt bad about it. I felt like the counterargument was rearing its ugly head, in fact, but whatever. Final grades were due today, and that took me a long time.
Also, I gave 2 students Ds today. Ugh. That sucked. And one student I love got a C+ and I heard him be disappointed about that. I actually graded him a little generously at the end to boost him up a teeny bit to get him to a C+ from a C. (My master teacher showed me how she manipulates grades this way--without any shame or guilt.) He's an ELL student and his writing is pretty bad, but he's really a sweet kid.
O.K. I'm shocked that I'm still awake after 10:00, as I was sure I'd fall asleep as soon as I came home.
I know if I go to sleep now then I will be even more frantic in the morning than I would be otherwise (which is still frantic) because I'm not totally prepared, but I'm going to do it anyway.
g'night, friends....
Sunday, March 11, 2007
1/3 of the way done!
This is amazing, but I realized on Friday, the last day of the marking period, that I'm 1/3 of the way done with this insanity called student teaching--where you work your ass off to just survive and not make a complete fool of yourself while hopefully teaching your kids something or other, take classes (most of which are a complete, excruciating waste of time--Nelson's C&I being the obvious exception, and, perhaps less obviously, I'm not just saying that), try to figure out how to plan lessons and units, create assessments, grade those assessments, not lose any papers or your mind for that matter, make sense of all the feedback you get from all over the place, deal with being observed and hear about all the things you could have done better, and do it all without getting a penny.
Meanwhile, despite all the insanity of this semester, I really have had a great time.
There have been some amazing developments with my master teacher that I have been neglectful about addressing here, but I will soon. (Grades are due tomorrow! Ahhh!) The short version is that we're friends now and that I'm invited to her St. Patrick's Day party on Sunday! This is in part a tribute to my university supervisor and to my nice master teacher, the department head, and another teacher who overheard the inappropriate way my master teacher spoke to me. I have to say that I am proud to take a considerable amount of the credit myself, though, if I really think about it. I feel like I controlled my emotions really well and behaved really professionally and appropriately at times when not doing so might have been the more likely response. I worked really hard and finally just told her straight up how I felt but did it in a way that was really respectful and non-aggressive. (All those nonviolent communication classes may have taught me something.) Anyway, I feel good to have stuck it out.
More updates once grades are done!
Meanwhile, despite all the insanity of this semester, I really have had a great time.
There have been some amazing developments with my master teacher that I have been neglectful about addressing here, but I will soon. (Grades are due tomorrow! Ahhh!) The short version is that we're friends now and that I'm invited to her St. Patrick's Day party on Sunday! This is in part a tribute to my university supervisor and to my nice master teacher, the department head, and another teacher who overheard the inappropriate way my master teacher spoke to me. I have to say that I am proud to take a considerable amount of the credit myself, though, if I really think about it. I feel like I controlled my emotions really well and behaved really professionally and appropriately at times when not doing so might have been the more likely response. I worked really hard and finally just told her straight up how I felt but did it in a way that was really respectful and non-aggressive. (All those nonviolent communication classes may have taught me something.) Anyway, I feel good to have stuck it out.
More updates once grades are done!
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