That whole "being a teacher" thing...

I've been living in Choluteca for just over a month now, and it's been quite a bit different from what I'd expected.  My class has 29 of the most talkative, energetic 5th graders that I've ever met -- quite a bit different from my class of 1 in Catacamas.  I'm not sure how to deal with this.  When I was student teaching, my kindergarteners were really antsy and mischevious, and I initially had a hard time with classroom management.  After several weeks, though, I figured out how to manage the behavior better and teach successfully.  It's been over a month here, and I still haven't figured out what I need to do differently.  I know that this is an exceptionally rough group of kids; the teachers that they had for 2nd, 3rd, and 4th grade have all talked with me about how exceptionally challenging they are to work with and have told me stories about some of the weird little mischevious things they did in their classes.  They, too, said that they sometimes felt like they couldn't teach because they were trying to get them quiet the whole time.  I've watched the class as their other teachers work with them (like Spanish, Art, Music, and PE), and they really do give all of the teachers a hard time.  One of the other teachers, though, has some sort of handle on it.  She can at least get the room quiet enough to teach her lessons.  I have class periods where, because of my continual stopping to quiet them down, it takes so long to just get through the previous day's homework that I barely begin my lesson, and I have to push the rest of it back to the next day.  I've tried mirroring that teachers' methods, but it doesn't work for me.  I follow the school's discipline system; I write their name on the board and give them checks each time they do something they shouldn't.  When they get 3 checks, I send them to the office to get demerits.  They don't care, though.  They care when they've accumulated enough demerits that they get a note sent to their parents, but it doesn't have much of an immediate effect for most of them.  I feel bad for feeling this, but sometimes it's nice to just get the most distracting students out of the room for 10 minutes so I can teach the ones who want to listen.  I've tried the methods that they taught us in college: clapping and having the students respond with claps, counting down, standing quietly and waiting, writing names on the board without stopping my lesson, using a reward system.  None of it has worked.  I've found myself resorting to exactly what I was taught not to do and just shouting to get their attention.  This is stupid, though, because it doesn't work any better than anything else.  It's all just very frustrating, and I'm not sure what to do.

I had parent-teacher conferences today, and they went pretty well.  I had a translator for most of the time, but I did have to talk to a couple of the parents without any help.  One problem, though, was that the parents that I wanted to talk to the most were the ones who didn't come.  It was mostly the ones whose children get fantastic grades and listen well in class.  Who doesn't want to go to school and hear from the teacher that their child is wonderful?  Still, the experience was really positive.  Because of my mounting frustration with classroom management, I've really just started to pray for the end of the year to come quickly so I can have some peace.  I teach my lessons (when I can), go through the homework, give tests, and move on.  Basically, I've been turning into exactly the type of teacher that I've never wanted to be.  I've been really self-focused.  I think about how crappy I feel after a particularly bad day at school, and I haven't been stopping to reflect on how all of this effects my students -- not just the quiet and attentive ones, but all of them.  Talking with the parents today, two of them in particular, was really a slap in my self-centered face.  Having their teacher leave them so unexpectedly 3/4 of the way through the year was really stressful for them.  Not only do they miss her, but they have a brand new set of expectations and a new teaching style to get used to.  Two of the students apparently have a hard time understanding my English -- I'd only realized that one did.  One usually understood the old teacher, but frequently doesn't understand me because I talk faster and without an accent.  I hadn't realize that she had trouble understanding me.  The other used to acutally get Spanish support from the teacher -- something that I can't really do.  Most of the class has been receiving lower grades as they make this adjustment, and one mom shared with me that her son is really stressed out about it.  From their behavior and attitude in class, I'd thought they just didn't care.  My attitude and actions seriously affect my students, and I need to turn my focus to what is best for them.  I'm not here to give homework and tests until the end of the year; I'm here to teach.

Please keep my class in your prayers.

Slight Change in Plans

So quite a bit has changed since my last post.  Those two students I had?  One dropped the program after 2 weeks because she missed her old school.  The other got expelled 3 weeks after that.  Since I didn't actually have a class to teach anymore, the administration moved me to another one of their schools in a different city, Choluteca.  I just got here about an hour ago.  I'm basically back to where I was almost 3 months ago now.  I don't exactly know what I'll be teaching.  I don't know when I'll start teaching.  I don't know the school.  I don't know anybody here.  I was dropped off at the house of a woman that I can rent a room from, but I'm not sure if I'll be staying here or not.  It's also taken me less than an hour to realize how good it was to have Jen around for company (and to help with Spanish).

My panic aside, I'm fairly optimistic about this change.  While I'm still teaching outside of early childhood, it will be good to have students a few years younger than the teenagers I'd been working with.  It will also be good to have a normal, full class instead of just one or two kids.  Plus, this city (at least what I've seen of it) reminds me of a suburb that I would find back home.  It's not huge and not small.  There are a few fast food places.  It seems sort of quiet and a little more pleasant than Catacamas.  The only drawback is that it's really hot.  Like, uncomfortable with this laptop on me right now kind of hot.  Looking forward to only having cold water in the shower kind of hot.  Sitting in your underpants in front of the fan and still hot.  I'm thinking, though, that I'll just get used to it after a couple of weeks or so... sort of like the rooster outside my window in Catacamas.  This is doable.

As I expected, I'm not keeping up very will with this blog.  It's been almost a month, so I apologize if you've been waiting.  I have been busy... my class started last week Monday!  Well, half of the students came Monday and the other half came on Wednesday.  Half, of course, being one.  Things different from what I'd expected.  I have one 13 year old girl who went to a bilingual school for a year and already understands quite a bit of English and one 14 year old boy who came in knowing (sort of) the alphabet, the months, and numbers 1-19.  I was horrified when I learned the ages of my class (considering that, after student teaching in 2nd grade, I'd decided I did not want to teach above Kindergarten), but I've actually enjoyed it a lot.  I don't know if I would do very well with a whole classroom of teenagers, but working with the two is nice.  The start has been a bit rocky because I've had to teach it a bit like a double grade classroom and plan the day so that one student is always working independently while I work with the other one.  I've never done that before, so my timing hasn't been quite right all of the time.  I also need to try to find more ways to have my students work together in a way that is helpful to both of them.  I'm still figuring out how to do that when they're at such different levels.  I'm creating most of the curriculum on my own because the materials that were provided (first grade workbooks) aren't really appropriate for my students.  The content is way too basic for the girl, and the activies are too juvenile for the boy.  He hasn't quite reached the age where it's fun to do little kid-ish games again.  I don't really know what I'm doing.  They seem to be learning, though, and have told me that they enjoy class.

Outside of school, not a ton of new stuff has happened.  Things are good and I am enjoying myself.  Last weekend, Jen and I made some of the best cookies I've ever tasted.  She has also stopped translating for me as much and instead repeats or rephrases things that I didn't understand.  It's kind of nice because now my host family realizes that I can understand quite a bit if they just slow down or word something another way.  Also, I'm fairly certain I'm staying for another year.  I'm not positive yet if I'll be at the same school or a different one, but I'm pretty sure I'll be in Honduras.  I talked to the guy who hired me, and he said that there should definitely be a place for me at one of the schools.  Thus far, this news has gone over rather poorly with my family.  I'm hoping it will get better after a few weeks, though.  Keeping my fingers crossed :/.