2001-09-20
Good day - starting the scarlet letter and tolerating freshmen, posted at 3:24 p.m.
Epiphany in Baltimore has moved to epiphanyinbaltimore.blogspot.com Today was a good day.It's rare that I have felt confident of my teaching abilities at the end of a day lately, because I end with my freshmen, and I don't think I've been doing a good job with them. Part of me thinks that there is a window of oppotunity with some groups of kids, and if you miss it, then it's crummy from there on in. I think I loosened up far too quickly with them, and now they're just so damn loud and unruly. The first day of school - the freshmens' first day of high school - they were silent, obviously a bit scared. Upon that, I told myself that I should try to be nicer and get them to open up a bit more. Mistake. They're opened *way* up. I can't get them to shut up.
But today was good. These kids are extremely intelligent, and today they reminded me of that instead of reminding me how loudly they can talk. Earlier today, I had sketchy plans for today's class - start on the vocab component of the course, talk a bit about the summer reading "Annie John", etc. Then, I got the idea, just a bit before class, that the kids should read the short story "Marigolds" today. I have it on CD, and they have shown great listening skills when it's someone/something other than me talking. The story fits perfectly into the coming of age unit we're about to start with "To Kill a Mockingbird," and its Depression-era setting fits perfectly with the just-completed "Of Mice and Men."
The kids devoured the story, loving it. The ensuing discussion afterwards was the best discussion we've had all year. They made connections with "Of Mice and Men" and our concurrent study of characterization. There were only a few moments that the kids were being rude. It was great.
I think I'll now start to look at every class period with these freshmen as a window of opportunity, rather than the year as a window of opportunity that has passed. There are already a lot of things I will do differently when I teach freshmen again next semester, but I think the year is salvagable. I no longer am dreading tomorrow. I gotta make up a quiz tonight, that's all.
And, compared with the freshmen, my two classes of sophomores are cake. It's so great to teach material that I know really well, since I read/taught almost all the major works last year. We started "The Scarlet Letter" today, and the kids seem into it. I actually even find myself enjoying the story. I ended up reading the first two chapters orally today to the classes, explaining with almost every sentence, and I'm feeling pretty hoarse.
But it was definitely a good day.
I got elbowed in the chin today at basketball and my jaw is aching. And I really suck at basketball, still. Today it was actually pretty stressful, because I seem to have regressed since the last time.