Struggle Bus

I'm still on the struggle bus. Working with the kids here is like an emotional roller coaster. Sometimes I'm holding back tears from frustration and other times I am laughing and amazed at their whit, curiosity, and abilities. I wish it could be the latter all the time.

Yesterday, I had Year 7 do exquisite corpses instead of the clay activity since they were out of control Friday. They were so excited by the exercise but they could hardly follow simple directions. So today, I decided to kind of withdraw from the power struggle. I projected instructions for the next steps for the clay project and was going to tell them that I no longer wanted to try and instruct over their talking and tell them to figure it out themselves since they obviously don't care to learn from me. I had them line up as usual, but instead of yelling at everyone to quiet down and get in line, I tried the passive technique teachers frequently use here of just waiting until they were ready. It took about 3 minutes, but soon the rest of the students picked up on my wait time and began instructing each other to get in line and self-regulating. I was impressed as I brought them into class. They then sat down quietly and looked at the projection. Since teachers don't project daily objectives here, I didn't do it either, but I think I'm going to start doing it again because it helped them see the goals for the day right at the start. As they continued to be quiet, I decided to go ahead and instruct them on the next steps. They then took off and zipped through the objective for the day. I made sure to use positive reinforcement, especially with my more challenging students. I held up one students' project as an example for the rest of the class which then encouraged the rest of them to bring their projects to me and have them checked. It started to get a little out of hand towards the end of class, but I was very pleased with them today. I just can't pin down what causes them to swing from hot to cold from day to day.

Monday I taught Year 9's Banksy lesson and that went very well. Banksy seems to captivate a lot of students. Maybe it is his rebel attitude and controversial artwork. But they were so engaged and had a great discussion.

Today, Year 8 made me have to hold back tears. I didn't want to teach the aboriginal lesson Tarryn had prepared because 1. It was her baby and she knew the lesson inside and out and 2. It is wasn't mine and I wasn't well informed or prepared. I told Tarryn she should really teach it, but she insisted that I needed the experience. So I taught it. And it kind of flopped. Tarryn kept interjecting to add more information, which is fine, it was like team teaching, but she really just should have taught it. Then one of our notorious troublemakers made a comment about my artwork as I was helping him generate ideas that made me have to fight back tears. I couldn't believe he would have the audacity to tell me that my artwork looked phallic (except in much more crude way) to my face.

Again. Just a roller coaster.

I have communicated with Leanne my frustrations and my need for extra support and modeling of classroom management for this particular group of students and she told me that I needed to lower my standards or else I was going to be perpetually disappointed. I can understand that in the sense that their achievements will look different from my students in Fishers. For example, a student sitting still through a whole lesson would be a big achievement here while it would be expected at Fishers. But on the other hand, I believe lowering your standards just perpetuates mediocrity. And that is what I believe is happening at this school. The teachers expect so little of their students that the students are okay with being substandard.

I really am trying to turn this into a learning experience, to bolster my classroom management skills, but I don't think I can change an entire school culture within the next 6 weeks nor is that my responsibility as a visitor in a foreign country.

Aside from my challenges at school, I have been enjoying every other aspect of my placement!

This morning I removed a three-toed skink from our living room. I thought it was a twig and when I went to pick it up it started writhing around like a worm. My first encounter with a household pest.

And I've reinstated my morning beach walks. I think it puts me in a better mood for the day and is a great way to start my mornings. Today was particularly misty and there were a ton of surfers. It was beautiful!