For this next year, I volunteered to teach four freshmen-based comp. 1 classes, and I will also be teaching comp. 2B and Cultural American Lit. I have not taught a literature class yet, and I’m kinda nervous to have so much freedom in teaching this class since I’m the only one in the school who is…not to mention that it has only been taught a couple of years before me.

I have made individual goals for myself in the upcoming school year and softball and Musical seasons. It is vital that I stay organized since I also signed up for another graduate class during school and softball. My number one goal is to reflect on what has been happening in my classroom and on the softball field at least once a week so as to make myself better as a teacher/coach and also so I won’t drive myself crazy.

Today we had a double header. I was disappointed in my JV teams because we lost pretty bad, but I feel like I am more disappointed in myself because I didn’t get them to that point that they need to be at. I plan on working them a lot harder this next week and really getting to the nitty gritty of why we played like we did. I’ll let you know how that goes.

If you have any suggestions on teaching graphic novels or culturally relevant up-to-date books, let me know!

Kiley

Good news! I got my evaluation for being a first-year teacher, and my principal told me that I’m way ahead of most new teachers (and he added that he has seen LOTS of new teachers in his time). He told me that it was one of the best compliments he could give me, and thus I am totally stoked.

There are so many ideas running through my head on how to teach different things, and there never seems like enough time to teach them. I’m just glad I get to experiment each semester for years to come to see which are the most affective.

Comp 1 students are reading Cowboy Ethics and Romeo and Juliet.

Comp 2A students are reading Raisin in the Sun.

Comp 2B students are reading Julius Caesar.

I love most of my students so far. I have a lot of great classes, and I try to make it fun for all of them. There is however one student who loves to take advantage of me. I’m her softball coach, so she thinks she can do this. I’m not sure if I can put up with anymore of her mocking, negative attitude though. I’ve found that it’s very hard as a coach to “punish” your players because you get to meet the parents and it’s so hard to tell them what their kid is doing is wrong. It’s also difficult as a younger looking teacher. The looks I recieved when I first met students’ parents at freshmen orientation and parent teacher conferences were priceless. “You’re teaching our child?” “You look like a highschooler yourself!” I hate to say it, but I almost with I were older looking just to get a little more respect from the parents.

As I’ve said before though, I absolutely LOVE my students and teaching. I can only imagine how much easier it will get next semester when I have a lot of my lessons planned out already. (I know I have some that I want to switch around already too.) I’m also glad softball season is over. It was fun to do, but I was really running behind on my work, and I wasn’t giving 100% to my students in the classroom. Now my students have absolutely no reason not to show up to complete work before or after school. I’m afraid that that’s why all of my students are doing poorly. They can’t get their work turned in. I’m not even talking about on time here. I’m talking “in” in general. The puzzling part is that I let them work on it in class, and I give them enough time to get everything finished…yet half they class doesn’t even turn it in. It’s sooooo confusing to me.

As a teacher, I know realize how important school was. I didn’t take it seriously as a high school student either, and I think this helps me relate better to these students who don’t get their work in. I struggle to give these students extra attention and to help them to realize I know how they feel and that I was right where they were in high school, yet it still doesn’t do any good.

I’m sorry; I don’t mean to complain. I’m trying to sort out my feelings and how I can better run my classroom. I love this job, but sometimes it’s truly hard. Not because students won’t listen or do their work, but it’s hard for me because I’ve had to realize that perhaps I CAN’T save every student. I dreamed that I would. I can try as hard as I can, but without them trying as well, there’s not much I can do.

I’ll keep trying though. I’ll never give up on any student. It really is hard though. I think I’ve even found a few gray hairs from all this.

I hope everyone’s Halloween was amazing! I was a superhero with two of my friends, and it was pretty darn awesome.

Comp 1 is watching Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds after reading the short story “The Birds.”

Comp 2A is writing discrimination poetry and watching The Long Walk Home after reading “from Montgomery Boycott”

Comp2B is creating a one-page project of anything (containing a theme statement and three supporting quotes) from the short story “Marriage is a Private Affair.”

Keep Strong!

KileyK

Teaching thusfar has honestly been truly fantastic. The school I teach at contains block scheduling with an every other day kind of thing. I coached softball for the first six weeks, and to tell ya the truth, it was tremendously difficult to both coach and be a first year teacher. I perservered through it though, and now it feels like I have a lot of extra time.

There are a lot of new things here that I’m not used to teaching. Vocabulary for instance. I’ve never taught it before, and to be honest I don’t remember ever specifically learning vocabulary every week. We teach it though. In fact, I’m supposed to be teaching twenty words a week, but I’m only teaching ten words around every other week. I almost got in trouble last week for doing this, but I’m finding my students’ test grades to be extremely better. I’m also seeing the words starting to be used in the students’ papers and in every day socializing. I’m loving it!

I feel like I’m only treking through this year. There is so much I want to do with the teens, but I’m spending all of my time writing up vocab packets or grading papers. It’s difficult to plan everything as exciting as I want to. This may not be good for my first students as a first year teacher, but I look forward to next year already since I already see new things that I want to fix within my lesson plans and also since I know I’ll have a tremendous amount of time for new, more extravagent ideas.

I’m sad that I haven’t gotten to volunteer much with theatre yet this year. I have a feeling that this also will get better though. I am also excited for summer since I hope to audition for the community theatre.

In Comp. 1 students are brainstorming Narrative ideas.

In Comp. 2A students are beginning their Classification outlines.

In Comp. 2b studnets are finishing the STARS research paper.

I’m currently starting to read Julius Ceasar for the first time!

Have a solid night!

Kileyk