I take a few moment to reflect on where I find myself.
I am back in the district where I spent 15 ½ years before retiring in 2012 (and then coming out of retirement elsewhere). It is in many ways a very different place. Let me put it this way — in my entire teaching career, in this district and elsewhere, the only time I was required to submit lesson plans was when I was being formally observed. During my 20 years I have won several teaching awards, received multiple commendations, had a strong record of student performance on external tests even though I am focused more on my students than on test scores, and — most important of all — earned the respect of my colleagues, superiors and especially of most of my parents and students.
Now I am supposed to do detailed lesson plans for EVERY lesson — I have three preps spread out over an A day / B day schedule, so for 180 instructional days, that would be 270 Lesson plans (3 x 90). It is actually a bit less than that, given things like mandatory test days, but that gives some sense of the time commitment (the simplified version of a Lesson Plan is 4 pages, the full version is 6 pages). It is not clear to me how this does anything to help my students. And the format of how I must do these plans is NOT how I teach, and certainly not appropriate to a college level class (one of my preps is an Advanced Placement course in Government & Politics).
Actually, it is not quite that bad — I do not have to have the FULL LP in advance except for formal observations, where I have to have a pre-conference, and for informal observations the full observation can be submitted afterward. But it does give a sense of the anal retentiveness.
Oh, and the rules have changed with respect to emergency lesson plans — we are now required to submit 5 per course, rather than the 3 I had before. Remember, I have 3 preps. In theory that would be 15, which are due by Friday. Fortunately I can use only slightly different forms for the regular and the AP Gov classes, so that will be only 10.
I have some more observations.
The Friday before Labor Day, the last day of teacher prep week before classes, my schedule changed. My AP Microeconomics class had been dropped. After a conversation with my principal, where I reminded her I had majored in music and only lacked an elementary methods course to be certified in the subject, she decided to give me a course in Music Survey (which will allow students to more easily fulfill their distribution requirements for graduation). It may take until the end of next week before they have changed enough schedules to have a meaningful class, but it enables me to use my brain in a different way, and actually will be less stressful that teaching an AP Econ course (there were only 4 students, the school system had not ordered books…..).
I have made SOME connections with my students. I have begun to make phone calls home (although for once I am not doing any this weekend), I am having some students greet me by name in the hall (I can recognize their faces, but having seen them in class only once or twice cannot yet respond with their names). My predecessor in AP Gov had coached Mock Trial (which I have done before) and several of my students asked if I would take that on. I might, except I got asked to be the assistant coach of girls soccer (I have several students on the team), which has gotten off to a very slow start because the head coach was not in school. After some discussion, I agreed to do that, and will have the first practice tomorrow, with the first game postponed because we must have two weeks of practice first under Maryland rules.
I actually will not do that much teaching this next week. For my 5 government classes, I must do a baseline knowledge test, which for my three regular government classes takes two 90 minute periods, and for my AP classes probably one. That covers much of my prep for Monday (2 AP Gov classes and one regular class), and Tue-Thur (two regular government classes). My lessons for AP on Wed and Friday will include how to take notes, and some introductory material to government. That leaves just three music lessons, on top of the emergency lessons.
We had assemblies on Friday for code of conduct and discipline, which meant that I had one government class with almost no time, and since I need to keep the classes in the same prep in the same place I filled the class time for the other with discussions about news (largely the hurricane and how it involves government, followed by a writing exercise to see how they write).
The rhythm of teaching is all encompassing, if done right. It leaves a lot less time for other things. That is one reason I have not been here — or on social media — all that much recently.
But because I teach government and politics, I do make time to stay aware of what is happening, and as has been my practice in the past, plan to shape what we do to try to connect it as much as I can with what is actually happening.
Of the students I have seen (some on my rolls have not yet appeared), only one is Caucasian. The others are heavily Black and Latino, with a couple of other minority groups also represented. The school tends to have a high mobility rate (traditionally around 1/3 of student body either comes or goes during the school year), so continuity of instruction could be a problem. We’ll see.
My primary task, at least from my perspective, is to get to know my students (names of course, but other info as well) as quickly as possible, and to begin to establish routines, trust, relationship.
Most do not believe I am 71. I don’t look it, but at times I feel it. My wife worries that soccer may be too much, and I have not coached since 2007. I will no longer work out with the players, nor “ref” scrimmages (if we even have enough players to have them — a possibly very real issue), so that will possibly help. And at the end of the school day I am not inclined mentally to be focused on academics, so dealing with students in a different context may actually help.
This is a very different school than where I spent most of my career. There are things I will need to adjust. As of now, I am looking forward to it, if for no other reason than it is a possibility to make a difference in the lives of young people.
Wish me well.
Peace.