"you're not a real teacher until you've cried anyway"
when i first arrived at the school i used to see this innocent looking blonde boy standing outside in the corridor. i couldn't believe he had been sent out of so many classes as he was always polite and looked sheepish when people walked past.
anyway, i ended up teaching this boy in my year 7 class and he was very quiet and always got on with his work. then one day as i was walking past his desk, i noticed that the task he was so engrossed in had less to do with learning spellings and more to do with drawing cartoons. so:
me: X, put that away and get on with your work.
X: leave me alone, everyone is always picking on me, i hate you. your work is boring anyway, i'm going to tell my dad over you.
i kept him behind at break, and he decided to mumble on (mostly about setting his dad on me for some obscure reason)so that his 15 minute detention soon turned into a 45 minute detention. he finally mananged to remain quite for 2 minutes, and then i had to let him go to get to my next class.
i walked into the class (year 9) and burst into tears. the classroom teacher quickly escorted me in to the staffroom, amid cries of "we didn't do anything to her" from the year 9s, where i wailed lke a baby for about half an hour. that's when my mentor told me "you're not a real teacher until you've cried anyway", which made me feel heaps better. i really do think having a good mentor can make or break your pgce year. anyway, she also told me that X can be very aggressive when it comes to his cartoons (it's what he wants to do when he grows up) and also, as i've learnt since, boys have to put up a macho image in front of their friends when they are being told off in public.
i don't know why X got to me so much, i think i just needed to cry to get it out of my system. i haven't let a student get to me that much since (well at least i haven't cried since!)
i think you just have to remember that in the classroom, it is not a "real" situation and the students rarely hate you, just what you represent. plus, most (but not all) of the time students only misbehave when they're bored or the work is too difficult for them. that's why supply teachers have such a rough time, the students feel that the member of staff doesn't care about them and won't be with them long term so don't bother making the effort.
one good thing to come out of it was that the year 9s were really nice to me for the rest of my placement:)
so, when was the last time you cried...
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12 comments:
Aww blessy
gime his adres!
I think crying is good for ppl, i get emotional wen im online n il like cry if thers no flapjack at colg, or lunch time is more than 15 mins away.
I think people that react like X are probly insecure, were his cartoons crappy?
It sounds like you were in a cry-ey mood already cos I'm sure you must have put up with worse from secondary school kids! If not then at least the stress of your pgce year must have made you pop your gasket several times! Oh I just remembered... studying is a doddle for you! Cow...
It dawned on me that it's been ages since you cried. Alhamdulillah. SubhanAllah... Aside from all the crap that's happened in my life the last two years or so, I get bad PMS and feel like crying about that time - as well as the rest. Hey you should do a post on PMS. Maybe I should get my own blog... Hmm.
I love your random quotes.
I removed my comment dunno how or why but i shall retype.
Mishy: oh quiten down!
Hema: I shall blog about the last time I cried as in serious tears not the everyday laughter tears. Mishy cries when its too windy she pretends its because she has senitive eyes but really she just gets scared.
One time it was really windy and rainy and she got so scared she sang singing in the rain in the middle of a road to comfort herself!
mishy- i removed your comment because you used my real name, not because i didn't like it. sorry, but i like to use this blog to rant about my students sometimes- don't want them to come accross it by accident! haven't quite(!) figured out how to edit yet, so you're going to have to type it again. i'll make it up to you by doing a 24 post soon:)
saabirah- thank you, i'll update my random quotes every day especially for you then:) as for the crappy things that have happened to you, well you know you'll always be one of the most important people in my life, so you're always in my duas, even if you do call me a cow:)
i was in a crying mood already, i know he didn't say anything really bad. and yes, i have had to put up with much worse since then, that incident was near the start of my teaching career:0
i cry all the time. actually, i'm crying as i write this. its just so sad. sob sob. i dont know what life is like as a non-crying person. but its just water. salty water
Well hemma lemma ding dong I am outraged. I shall sit and fume in this computer cluster. And come onnn update with the Jack already. I'm calling it Jack now because he has so little screentime I need to call it Jack so I know what I'm supposed to be watching a programme about. Jack Jack Jack. This post is about Jack.
Re: tears - taste the happy Michael! Taste it! Kinda tastes like sad...(you wont't get that unless you watch Arrested Development. No? OK I'll just sit here and chuckle to myself like I always do, tee hee. I'm in a strange mood.)
nasolacrimal fluid actually....
just now i cryied, seeing that you admitted in public that you are a spice freak... know that im into take that, and perhaps some would feel that i am just as interrupted, but i mean SPICE GIRLS... come on yas.... :o)
the last time i cried.... (other than just now) last friday at work, someone came out with a stupid remark that just hit me somehow, and due to some hormonal disturbans (as most of you women should be able to recognise) i started crying...
i guess sometimes its just hearing something at the "perfect-wrong" time that can make the difference.
kys kys samia
samia- aww you really do have a hard time at work sometimes don't you? hope you get that new job you want. what did that woman say to you? give me here address, i'll sort her out. i'll attack her with my spice dolls or something. ok i'm kidding i didn't really have the dolls, although i do have a box somewhere still with all my spice stuff in it. i liked baby spice the best, and used to wear my hair in bunches for a while. actually i still do sometimes.. i'm going to end up with no friends in a minute aren't i?
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