Fallacy

The belief is that when a student teacher works with a seasoned teacher, that seasoned teacher can sit in the teachers' lounge, drinking coffee and reading the newspaper all day long. That assumption is made even among teaching staff. Ah, would that were so. The idea is to give the student teacher the "real" teaching experience, not to overload her and break her spirit, so although I do have a very strong teacher candidate this semester, my days are still filled with teacher obligations.

I teach four different courses, three as single sections and two sections of the fourth course. That's not a typical load. Most teachers teach two courses with multiple sections of each, and once in a while three courses. This is the third or fourth year in a row I've had this assignment, given to me because I'm a long-time teacher and my department chair (who teaches AP and honors 11th grade, two sections of each) feels I can handle it well. Most times I can because I've taught the courses many times before. However, this year includes that "class from hell" in the mix. More on that later.

All honors sophomores read The Kite Runner unless the parents will not sign the permission slip to do so. (Yes, even at high school age there are some pieces of literature that a parent here and there will consider their child too sensitive to read.) Since the book was brought into the curriculum, one student per year has had to have a separate book and curriculum running collaterally with the class's reading of The Kite Runner. It's hard enough to guide teenagers through a book assigned to them with class discussion, journal writing, assessments and films, but to run two concurrently in one class is a real challenge. Expecting Gina to run both lessons at the same time would be an abnormal load for a student teacher, so here's one of my continued obligations: take the one student who can't read TKR and work her curriculum with her.

One of the senior students in British Lit (one whose attendance for the past two years has been horrible due to anxiety, willfulness, and an encyclopedia of real and perceived medical conditions) received special permission from the Superintendent to miss two weeks of school to accompany her mother to China. The family adopted a Chinese boy, and the Chinese government finally gave the okay for them to come pick him up. Fine. As requested, we provided photocopies of the materials in the girl's textbook, asked her to bring her vocabulary workbook, gave her the lessons for the two weeks, and kept the homework web page up to date for her to access while she was away, at their request. Then came the notification that the Chinese government had presented a situation requiring a longer stay. The girl returned after more than three weeks away, having read the play that was sent with her but not having done any vocabulary work or a research paper that requires at least five citations (modern version of footnotes), and she's now a week behind (a whole unit) in the textbook because those pages weren't given to her before she left. And then, after being present for three days, she's absent again, having handed in none of the catch-up work requested of her. So today, Day 2 of parent/teacher conferences, guess who's the only appointment. It looks like this child will be my responsibility, too, while Gina keeps her focus on the class as a whole.

There's a child in one of the honors sophomore English classes who was abused when she was younger, who has lost more than 100 pounds through surgery, and who has great difficulty relating to people. She is extremely demanding while also being emotionally volatile. The girl was not recommended to this level by last year's teacher because her basic skills are poor (she was coded and used Special Education services last year but the coding was ended this year), but she wants to be a writer (oh, if I had a nickel for every student who professes that desire!) and she refuses to attend any classes taught by the other sophomore English teacher. In class she refuses to peer edit with anyone but two girls whom she sees as sympathetic to her because she's known them since first grade, and when she agrees to read her writing aloud as the class is requested to do, if the students don't all praise her or applaud, she makes snide comments. The girl was out for two and a half weeks following surgery, and despite her promises to keep up with her work which was accumulated and given to her ahead of time, she did none of it: no reading of TKR, no vocabulary, no research. Now she has gone to the director of guidance to essentially demand the same services - extra time, extra help, one-to-one tutoring - while she complains about the work level and expresses the need to stay in the honors class. Guess whose job it is to work one-to-one with this lovely child during her study hall time to try to urge her to do her work (she'll do one task on her list and then stop, saying she's tired, and then will pull out her own leisure reading book as I'm on my way out the door) and to help her study for her quizzes, even though that's her own responsibility and something that honors students typically do on their own or with a peer.

There are more (Gina didn't understand the deadline for having grades uploaded so I had to take two of her classes to give her time to do them; I still teach the class from hell, etc.), but I need to stop whining. I'm not sure why so many exceptional occurrences are happening this year, but I keep thinking next year will be better because it has to be. Then again, maybe that's a fallacy, too.