But really I'm just exhausted. Who would've thought that kindergartners would have so much energy? Oh wait...
Anyways, general impressions of teaching so far as I round out my first month:
I still have no idea what I'm doing.
But the good news is I'm getting more and more practiced at pretending I do, and people seemed to be partially fooled. Gotcha!
In all seriousness, I do think things are going well so far. My manager says that if King Teacher (the principal) doesn't tell you you're bad, you're doing well, so fingers crossed for that.
Although if my zaniest antics keep taking place EXACTLY when King Teacher is watching, we might have a problem. Like last Friday, I taught the kids the hokey pokey. Seems simple enough, but since they don't exactly know their rights from their lefts it was a little challenging.
Quote of the day: "Teacher, what is... 'hokey... pokey'?"
Anyways, we're doing the hokey pokey and we get to the part where you put your whole body in and "shake it all about" when King Teacher looks in. It may or may not have looked like I was encouraging the children to make fun of grand mal seizures.
So there's that.
And yesterday I was gesturing while holding the white board marker and it flung across the room. Guess who saw?
King Teacher. Of course.
And it's not only me who seems to pull out the big guns when K.T. comes around-- today, one of my elementary students, William, was being especially rowdy. He always sits somehow wrong- one foot on his knee, legs crossed in the seat, one time I caught him with his feet on the table whenever my back was turned.
Well today I walk in, set down my basket, and pull out the attendance sheet. Somehow in those maybe 10 seconds, he flings himself from his seat entirely and is writhing around on the floor when I look up.
Obviously the second I look up I start yelling, and as I'm yelling at William the entire class goes silent and looks at the door.
Oh no. Please, anything but:
The inevitable. King Teacher. He all but did the "I'm watching you" fingers and eyes hand gesture at William before he walked away.
Meet the Parents reference-- love it!
Yay for looking incompetent!
Luckily the rest of that particular class went really well and when he came back the students were all sitting nicely, raising their hands, and speaking in complete sentences, so when he came back I looked a little less foolish.
The things I consider victories these days...
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