[Note: this is a post I started writing in March. It's now mid May. The point? Teaching is a job that challenges me to the point of being overwhelmed most days, but I think I'm getting better.]
One thing I think is strange as a new teacher is how my mind expands and becomes creative, open, daring and innovative during holidays (even on weekends until about 3:25 on Sunday afternoon), then for some reason becomes closed and more narrow-thinking during school days.
That might be too harsh, but it’s true in a way. During the recent Christmas-New Year holidays I enjoyed thinking about how I would improve my lessons this year. I reflected on the lessons of my first year and knew that there was a lot of room for improvement. The best lessons of my first year had certain common elements. They were simple and prepared, so I was relaxed before the lesson started. They started with a story or a mystery or something that the students already knew. They involved something fun or unexpected or a challenge of some kind. The aim of the lesson was obvious to the students. The aim was achievable, so the students left the lesson possessing something that they didn’t have before the lesson.
The bad lessons were bad in various ways. I wasn’t prepared enough or I was over-prepared. Rather than fun and learning, the aim of the lesson was focused more on filling time or keeping students from misbehaving or just getting through the day. Those lessons were often boring and I knew they were boring, but at the time I didn’t feel I had the energy or experience or creativity to think of something better.
So during my holidays I imagined that this year, my second year of teaching, was going to be so much better and easier. I would simply do more of the good lessons and skip the bad. I couldn’t understand the state of mind I’d been in during my first year when on a few occasions I was worried thinking “what can I teach these kids that will be fun and worthwhile?” During my holidays, everything about my subject (Japanese) seemed interesting and fun. It would be easy to teach this year.
No surprise that this hasn’t happened as I imagined it would. What happened to the lessons I had in mind during the holidays where I envisaged the students singing and dancing and laughing and having a great time?
— [Mid May 2012 now] —
Two snippets of note:
- The first few minutes of a class. Tension and unrest palpable enough to charge a deep-cycle battery. I wondered whether getting the kids to do pushups with me would raise the uncontrollable tension or lessen it. I decided to try it out. “Guys, you have two choices. You are either doing pushups with me now or you are counting in Japanese as me and the others do pushups. Put your hand up if you choose pushups. OK. Put your hand up if you choose counting in Japanese.” It was mostly chaotic but seemed to be a pleasant surprise for some students. Overall, I’d say it did help them to settle down.
- Had to look after a year 12 chemistry class. Decided I would try to find out what they were studying and see if I could get a Khan Academy online video to match their level. None of the students had heard of Khan or his academy, so I gave a brief intro of Khan and of how he was trying to develop an innovative way to teach. At the end of a video on “reactions in equilibrium,” I asked the students if the level of the video was too easy, too hard or just right (I didn’t understand much of it myself), but they replied “just right.” It seems inevitable that this kind of teaching will become widespread.
