This, my third year of teaching, is by far the most trying. I find difficulties in planning, in preparing, in follow-up, and in finding ways to make these students connect to what we read and how we learn to write.
This is a difficult thing to describe, and I know that I am not the only one on my team or at grade-level to feel this way, as it’s a constant reminder at meetings and lunch and before school and after: the kids do not care. They’ve tuned out, and it happened long ago. I think it happened sometime just before they threw batteries and bottles at a guest speaker.
Maybe it happened when the student-of-the-week stole hundreds of dollars worth of belongings from another student. And maybe it happened today when a student walked into my class several minutes late (his last class was 15 feet from my room), gave everyone a high five, and then moved the furniture around to fit his needs before settling down.
Who knows when it happened, but it happened. It’s happening, and it happens every day. Kids are answering their cell phones in class (even after we’ve taken it fifteen times); they’re getting up and leaving class to get a drink, or to go see the weather; they’re plugging their iPods into their heads as they walk in, and they’re using class time to settle fistfights and breakup drama. And even the good kids, the ones in honors classes, when talked to about their behavior laugh in my face and walk away in the middle of a discussion.
They are flippant.
They do not care.
- Talk with them as a class about flippancy, and they cheer it. (And I understand this. I was 13 once.)
- Talk with them as a class about goals, and they boo it. (And I almost understand this.)
- Talk with them as a class about bettering oneself, and they shrug. (And I almost understand this.)
- Talk with them individually, and they blame it on others. (I definitely understand this.)
- Ask for help and they’re gone. (Understood.)
- Ask them to better themselves, and they tune out. (Wait.)
- Ask them to push a little further, and they leave. (Hold on!)
- Ask them to try something from a different angle, and (Wait, where are you going?)
- Ask them to read this for more infor… (Hey, seriously, where are you going?)
- Don’t you want to learn more? (No.)
- Don’t you want to find out the rest of the story? (No.)
- Whatever happened to Paul Harvey? (Who?)
- Can you help me? (No.)
- Can I help you? (No.)
Granted, this is not the model for every student. It is a model for the majority, and I don’t know how to break it.
Every day feels like a failure and I’m nearly at the end of my rope in teaching.
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It hurts, doesn’t it? When I’m in a down phase, I just keep hoping that a new perspective (and I feel like every two weeks I’m learning a new perspective, but this is my first year) will change that feeling. Good luck.
Ooof.
I think that one of the saving graces of my miserable first year is that I know it can’t ever get worse than that.
I’ve given a lot of ground I didn’t want to give this year, but (a) there are still a couple of kids I’m getting through to, and (b) most of the other kids aren’t interfering in that process.
Good luck…
Oh, please don’t say that…my journey is only just beginning. I don’t want to feel that way until I’m close to retirement. Though, the sad thing is, everything you’ve said is completely true.
When faced with this attitude from students, I tend to look to the parents. I feel like parents have given up on parenting and discipline. We can only do so much in our classrooms if this negative behavior is condoned in the home. 99% of the time, I called it right when I made a connection between the behavior of a student and the quality of parenting the student received.
I tend to look at the parents, too, and with the same same results as Nancy. Kinda makes me wish the parents had to go back to school once in a while.
I’m slowly making gains, but this year has definitely been a struggle.
You’d be surprised by how much they do listen and they do care. They just act that way sometimes because they’re 13. Although some of the things you described would not fly in my room. They’ve tried it but to no avail.
And these things don’t fly in my room either. In all of the above cases I’ve contacted parents, talked with students, assigned detention, assigned saturday school, etc. The gamut.
Even the star students are doing this stuff, and no matter what we say or do, and no matter how many times we contact parents, the behavior continues.
I felt this way this week, then I noticed a sheet on my board regarding students after spring break and then I backed off the work load in class but called most of my students in for lunch and after school interventions to get caught up.
Although I work at a high school, it is an alternative school and my students are similar emotionally.
In a way I’m lucky because accountability is huge in our school and we have the ability to send students back to their “home” school if they get multiple offenses, whereas in the regular schools and middle schools, there is no where to send them. The downside is that we must monitor them like K-3 students and our school is often the parents’ only attempt to fix a problem that has been misaddressed for 9 years.
The students, themselves, say that they need limits and they don’t respect their parents when they constantly fold on discipline. So even if they complain about your attempts, the truth is they appreciate the consistency.
Thanks for showing me the grass isn’t always greener.
Cathy