I can't believe I've been a teacher for almost a month. Every time a student asks to go to the bathroom or calls me Ms. Silverman (or any variation thereof... I've gotten Ms. Silv, Ms. S, Silverman, Goldman [really]...) I think to myself - how the heck am I in charge here? And I have to do this for, like, years?! Oh goodness.
But despite typical self-doubt and stress over everything, school is going well. While getting to my Northwestern classes is a huge pain, the commute is definitely the hardest thing about it. It's probably an awful thing for our country, but I am so happy that studying education is a piece of cake.
This week, I've been covering college-level economics with four of my classes. I'd say that about half of them get it now, which is pretty good considering that the normal high rate of absence has been compounded by the testing we have had on and off for two weeks. Later this week, those classes will be doing a cost-benefit analysis of the Three Gorges Dam in China, complete with online research, "jig saw" methodology (oh fancy teaching terms), and a group presentation.
My Life Science class just finished up the basics of the Periodic Table, so this week is a creative group project on their favorite element; they can either do a comic strip, short skit or personal essay from the point of view of an element while getting across key physical and atomic properties. I think they may hate me for bringing English into Life Science, but so it goes. We have an inspection from our charter network in a week, and we need to have student artwork on the walls. As if 20-year-olds need to be motivated by their peers' fingerpaintings... we're doing real science here, people!
I'm on the fence about giving exams. I want them to test what they have learned, and I don't want to give it all to them in one go via a final exam. Maybe success on a cumulative project, like the Three Gorges Dam, is enough to evaluate their knowledge of economic decisions or atomic theory? At least I was able to do some "backwards design," and made the exams last week, so most of the material I have taught has been with the final assessment in mind. Even if I didn't give any tests, my students would still complain about everything under the sun, so perhaps I should just force them to suck it up.
Unfortunately, I have lost my temper with two periods in the last week and have given (after many threats) a pop quiz on the material. Many students were really upset about this. To compensate, I talked to them about respect for each other - mostly, I was getting upset because even students sitting in the front could not hear me or learn with their classmates talking - and bargained that if they worked well together, I would put the same question on the exam as extra credit. I really don't like associating assessment with punishment though... but it is so hard not being able to ask my few impossible students to get the heck out of my room or give them detention!
In all seriousness, I don't think I've ever done something this difficult before (or possibly ever will again). Being a first-year teacher is a constant stress, from differentiating my classroom material to dealing with behavioral issues to creating engaging lessons to upholding state standards to tying material to a clear objective to creating fair assessments to trying to find time to breathe... I honestly work 10 hours a day. So far I have been able to keep all of my grading at school, but I don't have a kitchen table in my apartment yet, so I have been lesson planning in my bed (so depressing).
More students have expressed appreciation for my teaching methods or interest in the subject material than absolute disdain, so I will take that as a victory. My goal is to get a few "we love you!"s in the end-of-school yearbook.
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