One day off

Week 3
The lower grades which I taught in the previous week were swapped out this week for a grade 11 class. I began teaching them the kidney this week. There are 2 classes which could not be more different from each other. The one class is a very small class with only about 17 learners and the other class is a full house of about 30. I began my lessons with them with a short video which worked very well, the learners paid attention and made an effort to ask questions after the video. I then moved forward with an informal class test on the information in the video and I am pleased to say that both classes did quite well in this small test, save for the one or two students who did not listen at all. This was a successful first lesson with both classes with minimal talking in the background and wonderful interaction. Unfortunately the lessons which followed (lessons without videos) were a bit more disruptive, with learners starting separate conversations and discussions during my explanations. I was forced to go against my nice nature and hand out writing out of the current work that we were doing as a punishment for their constant talking. While I am not a very short tempered individual I did feel quite offended at this occurrence. After some time to myself however I was able to recoup and remind myself that everything the learners do is not a personal attack on me as a teacher but rather simply a child doing what children do, i.e. push boundaries. I will be sure to be more firm with the classes from the moment they walk in so as to establish a good routine for the learners. My only drawback is that the mentor teacher I am shadowing allows for more discipline issues to occur than I am comfortable with during my teaching. This means that it will be more difficult for me to break the habits of the learners in the classes while still not being that dominating teacher who shouts every 10 seconds.
Teaching aside, I was asked to babysit a class of grade nine learners this week just for one period. They were an EMS class and I had no notes of any sort to keep them busy with so I requested that they write me a half page paragraph on what they would say a “good Teacher” is. From reading these notes I am quite surprised at the maturity of the learners who understand that there needs to be a fair amount of discipline in a classroom as well as structure. Many of the learners wrote that they would like a teacher who does not simply read out of the text book to them, or a teacher who is firm with them but nice at the same time. This was a wonderful learning experience for me as it reaffirms my thoughts on what children crave and that is structure. Children need a structure in place for them to grow within, a structure that is not too rigid but at the same time has clear boundaries. Even if these boundaries are only in place for them to test.
Sports practice this week were good, despite the holiday midweek removing one of the sports days, watching the learners play sport is interesting, identifying the learners who enjoy the sport and take it seriously and then the learners who are simply there because a sport is compulsory. There are a great many learners who take pride in their sport and play it to the best of their ability while at the same time there are some who are simply gifted with a talent but choose to show off rather than hone their skills.
Despite my lessons with the grade 11s not going as great as I had anticipated I am very interested to see how the grade 10s respond to me in the next week as I have had a number of the learners ask on a regular basis when it is that I would be teaching them.
At the end of the day this is a learning experience and the more of the bad behaviour and ill-discipline I experience, the more equipped I will be to handle it once I become a teacher. I will admit that on the odd occasion I do wish I had more time to sleep in but at this point in time even without being paid for what i am doing in the class I can say that I really do enjoy passing on knowledge to the learners i have had the privilege of interacting with.