Week 4

This week I am beginning to teach the literature of the world lit class. I have to figure out how to incoporate the grammar workbooks as we continue to read Epic of Gilgamesh. There is a lot of material to cover in a short period. Mrs. Moore says that students generally need less extrapolation as we get further into the test, but students will need a lot of help. We'll do the vocabulary online, and we've got another project near the end of the unit. In between, good chunks of reading and note-taking.

We are seeing performances in theater classes starting tomorrow as students do our version of Show and Tell. Friday, I will begin the pantomime unit. I will also have my first university supervisor date. I should be fine. I do have some work to do to build the unit on improvisation. I am still debating how to frame my major assessment, which should be a group paper or presentation. Maybe I should make it a presentation so that we can give students more time to get comfortable in front of an audience.

My other objective? Figure out how to get around the school's block on YouTube. I thought an embedded video would work, but evidently it won't. I'll get it soon enough.

? e at this stage. Per the curriculum maps, student should know a dangling modifier at this stage; our students are struggling with prepositions.

? Long day of professional development meetings on curriculum mapping. According to the numbers, the seniors are testing well below where we want them to b

Week Three

I am learning quickly that one has to be flexible in order to be a good teacher. Otherwise, one would go bonkers.

Next week we have testing at my school, which throws a sizable monkey wrench into my lesson plans even though my seniors aren't subjected to this round of tests. We have four different schedules next week, with varying class lengths and homerooms. If the teachers can't keep it straight, how can the students be expected to? And when do we have time to teach the material on which the students are being tested?

Mrs. Moore helped remind me today that our school, whiLe it is overall pretty good, is still a public school and does have its issues that accompany that designation. A number of students do engage in 'extracurricular' activities, including using girlfriends as mules to bring in weapons and conducting business transactions during passing periods. It's rougher elsewhere, but that doesn't mean there aren't elements on our school campus. I don't think I'm that naïve, but it is still surprising to hear more specifics. Despite the fact that all involved are kids, they are applying standard economic priciples of supply and demand. But that doesn't make it right. Where there's money, they'll find a way.

Remediation

Remediation. This is a word not discussed much in my university teacher educationi program, but I am learning quickly that, in Chicago, it is a fundamental art for teaching. We are doing grammar with my seniors, and clearly more remediation is necessary. We are doing sentence diagrams, and it is evident that some students know their parts of speech, and some just aren't there. I'm not sure if language itself is an issue, though many might be surprised to know that my Spanish-speaking kids have a good grasp on grammar. Students from other language backgrounds, however, seem to be having more challenges. It's a small sample size, to be honest, and I'd gather that many of my strugglers have only known English.

I am looking forward to working through the literature. I think the students will respond well to the activites planned. I know I'm ready for more multi-modal instruction, as this direct instruction bores me--I can only imagine how the students are feeling.

Next week, I will be remediating more grammar. Scary thought, that these kids are seniors and are struggling to identify how artcles should used. Grading has been interesting, and I'm now giving serious thought to peer grading. Mrs. Moore says we'll do that with the literature, but I don't know that I will use it for grammar. Organization and time management are essential, and I'm doing a reasonable job with it so far. But it will have to be better when I'm actually assigned my own class.

Week Two begins

I solved one of my biggest problems from last week: shoulder/hand pain. Thanks to all the books for World Lit (teacher's editions, to boot), I have been moving from place to place like a Christmas tree. Over the weekend I invested $25 in a rolling laptop carrier that holds textbooks nicely. Thank you, Target! Now I am rolling everywhere, which should, at the very least, keep my shoulders and hands from completely going out on me.

I have now begun doing grammar lessons for World Lit. As I've said before, these kids are seniors, but grammar practice is part of the curriculum. And we're talking basic parts of speech, not more complicated phrases. I have now done a couple of lessons in each section, and I should feel honored that Mrs. Moore has confidence in me to do the lesson. We talked through the lesson plans for tomorrow, and I think I'm getting a handle. I just have to keep my seating chart handy while I continue to memorize their names.

My biggest challenge facing me now is the unit planning. I have to bone up on Epic of Gilgamesh to help teach that, and I am solely responsible for The Iliad. For my theatre classes, I will be tagteaming for awhile with Mr. Scott (again, not his. real name) before taking on a unit on improvisation. Thankfully, I already have Katie McKnight's book that she did with Second City, and my background is decent on improv in general. I plan to deviate from focus on theatre games that Mr. Scott has typically done and incorporate a deeper understanding of improv as part of Chicago's fabric and the use of improv in developing characters. Should be fun.

Tomorrow night I have my first university seminar meeting as part of the coursework for student teaching. I just hope class.doesn't go too late, and that we cover relevant material.

Three Days in

I may very well have seen something yesterday that I might never see again in my whole teaching career. I reached my second section of World Lit with Mrs. Moore and was surprised to see Dr. A, the school's principal, in the room. He regaled the class with stories--I get the feeling he does that often. He asked the students, mostlu seniors, if they were excited at the prospects of graduating. One student (I'll call him James) said he wasn't sure he'd be able to, and Dr. A asked James to put his name on a card, along with his homeroom info, and he'd see what he could do.

After Dr. A finally left, James told Mrs. Moore that he had written down his friend's name. When she pressed, he said he was only kidding. Turns out that he wasn't. Today, Dr. A made a return trip, since James had sent him on a wild goose chase. He was not pleased. He took James into the hall, and when James returned, his mood definitely changed.
Dr. A spoke briefly with Mrs. Moore, who later told me that James was going to be suspended.

Here, a student made a really, really bad decision that could affect his life significantly. Dr. A may have been able to grease the wheels to get James closer to graduation. You can bet he won't be receiving any favors now.

First Day

It was nothing and everything like I expected.  Even riding the bus, I was impressed with the sheer numbers of students on the way to my high school. And I followed them, figuring they must know that the road that was blocked the other day must now be open. They were right. I checked in at the main office after navigating my way past the hordes of students going through metal detectors, learning the room number for the world lit teacher, Mrs. Moore (as stated previously, all names have been changed to protect identities). She gave me a short list of books to obtain from the English department head, Mr. Stevens—I just had to track him down. Mrs. Moore let me know I’d be working with her 2nd and 7th periods.

Mr. Stevens was not in the English office, nor in the adjoining journalism lab. I had seen someone who I thought had to be Mr. Stevens at the student teacher orientation, but I didn’t have a chance to talk to him then. Today, I had to find him. I circled the library and the halls surrounding his office, helping to direct lost students to their rooms even though I barely had any idea how the rooms were numbered myself—trust me, I must have gone passed the library and main office at least three times before I figured out which way took me to Mrs. Moore’s classroom! I decided to visit the teacher’s lounge and then cycled back to Mr. Stevens’ office. Again, no sign of him anywhere. Finally, I thought maybe I should be heading back to Mrs. Moore’s room, even though homeroom was still going on, when I spotted Mr. Stevens in the hall. Thankfully, he was able to inform me of my schedule, which includes three theater classes (Three! We didn’t have much more than that at the Academy, which was a performing arts magnet school!) and two sections of world literature for seniors. And then Mr. Stevens took me into this cavernous closet known as the home for English textbooks, which reminded me of the stockrooms when I worked retail. Mrs. Moore had requested the teacher’s edition for me, along with a workbook version of the text, and Mr. Stevens was undaunted by the challenge. Soon enough, he had excavated the lone teacher’s edition and told me that it was my lucky day and, with no uncertain terms, DO NOT LOSE THIS OR ELSE! The book is almost as heavy as my two-year-old—how can I possibly lose it?

He then guided me to the 1st period theater class, which, as luck would have it, is being covered by a sub this week. At least the sub is permanent sub for the high school, but the sub knows next to nothing about theater. Nor was he particularly good at distributing the syllabus, as he gave all of the students the one for a different class. I read the syllabus and took attendance, despite knowing that the sub should probably be doing that, since he’s being paid and I’m only forking out a large sum for the privilege. I figured it was a good way to learn the students’ names faster. Given how he was functioning, I have a much better chance of learning their correct names this way…

A new chapter is about to begin

Tomorrow I start my first day of student teaching. In the interests of student privacy, I will avoid naming the school, and all names of people will be changed to protect identities and ensure confidentiality. This blog is about my experiences and growth as I enter the world of teaching.

According to one of the assistant principals, I will be teaching World Lit and Theatre. I am ecstatic, as this is an opportunity to take advantage of undergrad experiences at Roosevelt University, where I obtained a BA in theatre. As far as World Lit, most of my reading this summer was comprised of international stories, whether in Germany (The Reader), Iran (Reading Lolita in Tehran) or Afghanistan (The Kite Runner). I have obtained short stories and sudden fiction (aka short short stories) by Latin American authors, and I also picked up some Holocaust-inspired works. It is an area in which my palette is wide open, as my world lit in high school was eons ago and still mostly Western works. Maybe I will be able to share some of my experience with Asian drama, especially the Japanese formats of kyogen and noh.

It should be an exciting day as I meet students, teachers and faculty, and start to familiarize myself with what will essentially be my home for the next ten weeks. New commutes, longer days (when adding in some part time work and the seminar classes tied in to the teaching), fewer off days will be challenging, as will having a reduced income, but I think my wife and I are as prepared as we can be and should get through it well. It helps having a flexible employer who will allow me to go back to full time when I am done until I am eventually hired for a teaching position.

Please stay tuned for what should be some interesting experiences as I try some new lesson plans and take the plunge into the next chapter of my life.