Today was the second day back in the classroom.
I look back on the last six weeks of recovery as a time to process. I did NOT find it a profitable time, as in getting things done. I wasn’t mentally sharp enough to make stuff or write much. Even reading —I usually get through a lot of books in a time like that, but I just didn’t have the energy. The stacks of books were touched, but not enough.
Still, a quiet time of processing is profitable. Things come into focus, decisions are made subconsciously. Time just rolls on and change happens.
Healing is change. I went from pain to healed, fogginess to more clarity.
There is nothing so constant as change.
I came back to school more cognizant of my abilities and desires as a teacher. As I age my authority grows. Kids who have known me for years are listening to me. I can still have “bad” days when they seem disrespectful and difficult to manage. It lies in the poor discipline they have received since birth (some of them), or congenital issues, or they are just having a bad day.
There is a spirit in each classroom. I can sense it. Keeping a lid on bad behaviors is a challenge, constant, as a teacher. If some are allowed the escalation is remarkable. It spreads like wildfire.
I have my management techniques, but I think the spirit of the room is the most important to consider. I can completely fail on a given day.
If the students don’t respect you, you’ve lost.
I try to keep control by limiting noise. As a substitute teacher, spending only a day with the students, I always feel they can handle silence for one class period or even a day. I don’t demand silence from the little ones, but from 5th grade up it is part of my program.
Respect is such an issue in today’s classroom. I don’t think there is any teacher who does not see this. It’s a chronic problem. I am always writing notes to teachers about the lack of it in certain students. They already know, but it is the only way I can “control” a student who is acting badly. “I am writing this down for your teacher.,.,.”
That can help unless the student has escalated. Then there is nothing to do but call in back-up. That has happened several times over my years of teaching.
Disrespect happens. It happens a lot.
This is a problem throughout our culture. Kids (at least in public school, which I am qualified to generalize) seem to have lost their ability to see adults in a way that shows deference. Adults have had to resort to being “a friend.”
Teachers need to appeal for good behavior.
This is so backwards from historical educational culture. Perhaps some may see this as progression. Sadly, the structure of classroom education isn’t conducive to appeals from the teacher for good behavior. Enforcement is difficult.
Personality and emotion can really have an effect on the spirit of the classroom. The teacher can’t be the same person every day any more than anyone. We bring our ups and downs to the space. It’s dynamic. It has effect.
I have thought in the past that teaching is really acting. It seems that the teacher must put on a performance the entire day.
Acting, performing, getting a point across; this is the state of current education. The time for learning is minimal, but the brain is constantly learning. It’s learning something.
Our brains are vacuums. The space must be filled by the minutes we exist.
It is a challenge to fill those minutes productively.
I’m reflecting on productivity as I come out of my “house arrest.”
I want to do things better, progress.