Ramblings on teaching, kayaking, dieting, sports, music, life in the South, life in the West, and life in general. Don't like it? Continue downriver and find another port...
Saturday, September 08, 2012
So much fail
Today's weigh-in (clothed): 229.2
Things just are not going as I had hoped. We've been in school for 2 1/2 weeks, and I'm really not enjoying it this year. Instead of teaching just English, as I have done for the eight+ years I was in my own classroom, I am "teaching" four periods of a class called Academic Success. It's pretty much a glorified study hall. The kids who are doing poorly in their other, academic classes end up taking the class. It's a chance for them to get assignments done at school. They are expected to bring their assignments and books with them and work the whole period, and they are awarded points for doing so. They also must keep in regular contact with their teachers, especially those whose classes are not going so well for them. And each grading period they get points for their grades in their other classes.
It seems like a great idea, but the "teacher" of such a class has to be kind of a hard-ass, which I am not. I am not good at, nor do I enjoy, riding kids to force them to do their work. I have always looked at it as, it's their choice to do it or not do it. That isn't a good attitude for me to take. I need to be a lot tougher with the kids, which I hate doing. I always felt like I motivated kids in my classes to do their work because they enjoyed the class. There really isn't anything to enjoy in the Academic Success class, and I'm certainly not teaching. Then, in the one English class I have, I'm not bonding with the kids. As a matter of fact, I don't really like many of them. The girls are OK, and a few of the boys, but there are a lot of obnoxious boys in there. I think I was spoiled by my single-sex classroom.
I haven't lost any weight; I haven't been able to motivate myself to work out. I just don't have the energy to get up and go. I need thinks to change, and soon.
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