Oh Glorious Day Off!!
Yes, there is no school today, no bratty kids to attempt to mentor, no 5am alarm, no real schedule until my private students start arriving at 4:00, so I slept in until I was well rested (8:30), & have been sipping many short steeping with this lovely lovely tea, truly one of my favorite Black teas from YS. I have quite a bit of desk work to do this morning, a few errands to run (maybe), & then NaNoWriMo! Hopefully I’ll get caught up to where I’d like to be!
Now for more tea :)
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Yay! I’m so glad you don’t have to deal with spoiled brats today. I could never be a teacher. :P
I love teaching students when they want to learn, & I especially enjoy teaching one on one. It really is wonderful to get to know each student, with their strengths & weaknesses, their talent & potential, and guide them along their growing edge. Its very gratifying :)
Teaching classes of 10 kids in the city is frustrating, because there might be a few students in each group who actually want to learn, but then there are also at least 2 or 3 who live to disrupt, & have been allowed to get attention through disruptive behavior, so that is their mode of operation. Sometimes I can help them to see that there are other ways to be acknowledged, & when that happens I get to watch them begin to blossom, & I love that. I have one young lady on the cusp of this realization, going back & forth between old behaviors meant to elicit anger, yelling, etc on my part (which do transfer a lot of energy in her direction, but which I refuse to participate in, as I don’t want to validate those kinds of behaviors) & actually playing her harp, for which I give ample approval & validation. When she’s acting out & not on task & demanding attention, my comment is something along the lines of, “When you’re ready to calm down, practice, & be patient, I will be glad to work with you. Until then, I’ll work with somebody else.” She usually gets even louder & more outrageous, sometimes for the rest of the class period. But we are starting to have some good days :)
She is one of 5 kids in her class that act like that…
In another class I have 2 more just like her, only they aren’t coming around at all :(
And my 6th grade class is full of kids like that…sigh…
My mother is an elementary school teacher, and the stories are always horrendous… It’s pretty clear that a lot of parents do not know how to discipline their children these days. I’m sure it’s heavily age dependent as well, and I would never be one to choose to be around young children…
I hope you continue to help them all move in the right direction. Changing the world, one child at a time! :P
As the say, it takes a whole village to raise a child ;)
But the ones who really pay attention will learn no matter what. Even some the seem not to pay attention deep inside really are.
agreed.
Sixth grade is a rough age—they’re too young or too old to belong anywhere. Around spring break, my fifth graders start showing those tendencies…with the group I’m teaching this year (most Sundays are like driving a dogsled pulled by manic Dobermans), the ride promises to be wild. Gotta love their uh, enthusiasm!
I wish some of them knew what an inside voice was…
May not work with your bunch, as they are older; but sometimes with mine, I’ll just start whispering to someone who is listening—takes a minute, but when they figure out they are missing something, they’ll settle down to eavesdrop.
Yay! I’m so glad you don’t have to deal with spoiled brats today. I could never be a teacher. :P
I love teaching students when they want to learn, & I especially enjoy teaching one on one. It really is wonderful to get to know each student, with their strengths & weaknesses, their talent & potential, and guide them along their growing edge. Its very gratifying :)
Teaching classes of 10 kids in the city is frustrating, because there might be a few students in each group who actually want to learn, but then there are also at least 2 or 3 who live to disrupt, & have been allowed to get attention through disruptive behavior, so that is their mode of operation. Sometimes I can help them to see that there are other ways to be acknowledged, & when that happens I get to watch them begin to blossom, & I love that. I have one young lady on the cusp of this realization, going back & forth between old behaviors meant to elicit anger, yelling, etc on my part (which do transfer a lot of energy in her direction, but which I refuse to participate in, as I don’t want to validate those kinds of behaviors) & actually playing her harp, for which I give ample approval & validation. When she’s acting out & not on task & demanding attention, my comment is something along the lines of, “When you’re ready to calm down, practice, & be patient, I will be glad to work with you. Until then, I’ll work with somebody else.” She usually gets even louder & more outrageous, sometimes for the rest of the class period. But we are starting to have some good days :)
She is one of 5 kids in her class that act like that…
In another class I have 2 more just like her, only they aren’t coming around at all :(
And my 6th grade class is full of kids like that…sigh…
My mother is an elementary school teacher, and the stories are always horrendous… It’s pretty clear that a lot of parents do not know how to discipline their children these days. I’m sure it’s heavily age dependent as well, and I would never be one to choose to be around young children…
I hope you continue to help them all move in the right direction. Changing the world, one child at a time! :P
As the say, it takes a whole village to raise a child ;)
But the ones who really pay attention will learn no matter what. Even some the seem not to pay attention deep inside really are.
agreed.
Sixth grade is a rough age—they’re too young or too old to belong anywhere. Around spring break, my fifth graders start showing those tendencies…with the group I’m teaching this year (most Sundays are like driving a dogsled pulled by manic Dobermans), the ride promises to be wild. Gotta love their uh, enthusiasm!
I wish some of them knew what an inside voice was…
May not work with your bunch, as they are older; but sometimes with mine, I’ll just start whispering to someone who is listening—takes a minute, but when they figure out they are missing something, they’ll settle down to eavesdrop.