Monday, September 12, 2016

My First Week (+ 1 Day) 2016

Recently I began my twelfth year of teaching (not counting the 1 ½ I taught part-time). I’ll admit to not being exactly thrilled to start a new year, for several reasons. I’ll share two:
1.     Last year took a lot out of me. My faithful readers know I have lupus. Last year exhausted me both mentally and physically. I spent pretty much all of June simply resting and trying to recover…it didn’t really help. I am currently trying to get back on my infusion instead of being stupid and trying to do without it.
2.     I did not prepare for this year like I normally do. Usually I have most to all of my year planned on Google Calendar by the time school starts. This year I had the first day planned—that was it. However, I did spend the summer researching and really thinking about myself, my privilege, and changing my curriculum. My problem was I felt overwhelmed by the myriad of issues I could cover. There’s so much going on in the world, so much that needs changing.

So, teachers reported back, and our “welcome back” speech didn’t feel welcoming. It felt the opposite…but I was determined to keep a good attitude for my students.

We did get some much-needed time in our classrooms. I appreciated the quiet so I could putter around and put finishing touches on my room. It was ready before we reported back, but I find it calming to spend time in my classroom—and I hope my students feel the same.

Students came back on a Friday, which was weird. Really weird. Once again, I welcomed students to their junior year and AP Language, and said, “Let’s read a story.” Just like last year, we read “Examination Day” by Henry Seslar. I always get such odd looks from the students. After finishing the last line, I asked students to turn to a neighbor and discuss why in the world their AP teacher would start the year by killing off a child. I gave them a couple minutes to ponder, then we talked as a class.

I stressed the importance of thinking for themselves, of taking risks, or opening their minds. We talked about who is easier to control: dumb people or intelligent people. I told them I had to desire to control them. I wanted them to question everything, even me.

From there we looked at “Pretty Good” by Charles Osgood and a satirical letter, thanking a teacher for focusing so much on test scores. I used these to further the conversation about grades, learning, thinking, etc. We finished the hour with a class bingo just to get the students up and moving.

Several throughout the day remarked I was the only teacher who welcomed them to the new school year, who talked about grades, and who wanted to give them room to make mistakes.

During the next week, we did some assessments so I could gage what they learned/knew/remembered from last year. Our pre-AP program (at least for 9th and 10th grade) is much too weak, so I had a good idea where students would be. Our department lacks alignment, so we don’t know who’s covering what literary terms as which grades, students aren’t really doing research papers, they aren’t doing much writing, and are doing little analysis or other AP prep.  
We began the week with a “Who Am I?” five-slide presentation. I asked for their name and a picture and a slide each telling me their likes, dislikes, strengths, and weaknesses. These presentations really helped me begin putting names with faces!

We did a “pre-test” of literary terms and basic essay format, then went over it as a class so I could see what I needed to review or teach.

We finished the week with students blogging over a topic of their choice. I simply wanted to assess their content and voice/style. There were some weak and skimpy blogs and some truly beautiful work. In fact, I posted one of them as a guest blog. (Caution: the student wrote eloquently and honestly about rape, providing some mature and healthy talk about the subject. You can find it here: http://www.jennwillteach.com/2016/09/guest-blog-real-talk-about-rape.html)


Overall, they did well, and I already see much potential in this group. We shall see as the year progresses….

1 comment:

  1. Thank you for those descriptions. It was really great to add here more of those materials.

    ReplyDelete