Teaching Moments

Teaching brings me some great moments, and some not-so-great moments. I thought I'd share one of each for today.

The great moment. Even though this happened to a good friend of mine, I promised her I'd post it, and it was sure a great moment for me.

It is her second year of teaching math, and since the quarter just ended and she handed out a bunch of grades, she thought she should get graded too. So she had her kids write an anonymus grade for her, and tell her what they liked/didn't like about class and what she could do to improve etc as long as it was contructive and realistic. (things like less homework and more playtime didn't make the cut as realistic. Shocker.)
So as she is paging through her grades she see's lots of A's and "you're a great teacher!" etc, as she should (you know you deserve it and don't even try to be bashful about it!). But she gets to one page where she is given a solid B and this explanation: "you are a good teacher, but nothing exceptional."
She shared this with me and another seasoned collegue, and we thought it was just hilarious. :) So now we're keeping track of our non-exceptional moments and laughing whenever we get a chance. We like to take advantage of the ridiculous to keep ourselves sane.

a not-so-great moment. I have one student who no matter what I do gives me a rather unpleasant attitude, and it can become quite a disruption to the other students. Today she wanted to leave to go to the bathroom, so I let her, then she came back and insisted she be allowed to leave again to get notes from her locker. This would have wasted a significant amount of time for her, so I said no, live with it for today. She should have been more prepared for class.

She decided to argue, and eventually I chewed her out for the attitude, told her to get her stuff and she couldd come in at luch for a detention.

She came in and I gave her two options, study for tomorrows quiz (I don't need to I know it all, waste of time) or clean my white-boards (they're just going to get dirty again, I don't see why I have to do this). I calmly explained to her that I wasn't here to argue with her, but she knew her options. She was so stubborn. I just wish she would learn to help herself. She eventually cleaned the whiteboards, but I expect I may have to see her a few more times at lunch before things improve. It makes me very sad for her, becasue the only one that suffers from her silly teenage pride is her. I jut wish there was a way to tell her that....


Don't worry everyone, the good moments outweigh the not-so-good, and I still love my job. Even if we're all just good teachers, nothing exceptional. :)