Spring Semester is Over!

I can't believe that I made it! I survived my first stint as a teacher. As I look back over the past four months I realize that I have really grown as a teacher and a person.

To begin, before deciding to teach high school, I taught for a few years at the college level. Not that teaching is lucrative, but working as an adjunct is especially brutal on the bank account. So, I went back to school to get a teaching credential because, while an MA is sufficient to teach at a university, an MA is not enough to teach K-12.

After taking a year’s worth of classes, a terror was instilled in me by my classmates and professors. I had never been afraid to teach, I always loved teaching, but after all of the horror stories from the classroom I must admit I was afraid that I was not cut out to be a teacher. It didn’t help that whenever I told someone that I wanted to be a teacher they told me that I was either brave or crazy. Well, I never really thought of myself as particularly brave….maybe crazy then? Who knows? I thought I would try it and if I couldn’t cut it then I would go back to college teaching or complete my PhD or something.

Well, after four months, many sleepless nights, 20 observations, and a few lunch detentions (I gave them, I didn’t receive them), I feel much better as much of my initial terror of the unknown has subsided and I was hired back for the 2006-2007 school year. That must say that I did something right, right? In the upcoming installments I plan on discussing everything from my first day to bathroom passes and myspace. Please let me know your thoughts and ideas.