Red Bull

Tonight is a Red Bull night. Lesson Planning and Hopkins presentations.

Hopkins

This experience would be so much better if I didn't have Hopkins work. Lets see....a 3 page paper over differentiation, action research final paper, poster presentation on wed, lab safety lesson plan, another paper for on research. This is all due in the next 3 days. Lets not forget to grade papers, lesson plan for this week. 1st year teaching = horrible.

Racial border line?

So, just to show you how some kids can be ignorant (as many kids can be in general)....today was the first day I that the whole, "Ching, chang, chong..." thing really bothered me. Yah know, how kids try to say some dumb shit when they want to act Chinese. I had to write the kid(s) a referral. It set the whole mood of the class off. Kids didn't learn. I was pissed off when I was teaching. Of course the kids don't think anything of it because they're, well, kids. How do you teach cultural diversity to urban kids? I had to say in class, "Sorry for the interruption for some ignorance in the class" in a very mocking tone.

Baltimore kids...you would think after 15 years of TFA teachers, the kids would get better. Apparently not.

And it's only Tuesday....someone please console me.

Almost done

Listen, so it's not like I don't believe in what I'm doing, because I do. It's the frustration that comes with it. It's the severe doubt from your students. It's the constant lack of total respect from your students that gets to teachers in Baltimore. I'm not only speaking for myself. Look, when you get so many "Fuck you!" only because a student can't sit in his seat or stop talking after applying some kind of threat...that's when this gets tiring. And when the student's lack accountability because they're, of course, NEVER at fault for anything that's when you begin to think, "seriously, who do these kids think they are?" And often times, especially since it's nearing the end of the year and they always ask me for a pencil, that's when I think, "Has anything gotten through to them? They need to be responsible for their own things!?" It seems as though I need to be teaching social skills more so than Chemistry or Environmental Science.

I guess teaching really is a thankless job. These kids have no idea what we do to plan these lessons for them, even though some of them may be boring for them. If only I could fast forward their lives to show them what an education can do for them, maybe things would turn around.

Teaching is great, I don't mind it at all. In fact, this challenge of teaching in an urban area, especially in Baltimore has really thickened my backbone. But sometimes, I wonder...how much of an impact am I really making?

So tired.

Oh man. The kids hate me. Apparently I'm always the topic of conversation among the kids. It's getting malicious. It's the 9th grade girls who just can't act normal anyways. Not like this is an excuse or anything but they're the lowest tracked kids.

Do I suck?

Am I a bad teacher? I dunno, I think I am...so...whatever. My kids hate me.

Teaching is a losing battle

Teaching is a losing battle. At this point in my 6 month teaching career, I've come to realize that you can almost never win whenever it comes to teaching. Your students will perceive as hateful (which may be true at this point), your students will not listen (which is also true at this point), and sometimes parents and administration appear to question your management and teaching abilities.

At this point, teaching has been the most miserable experience of my life. No longer do I believe in this education gap, but also, no longer do I believe in what I'm doing to save it. Why have I become so cynical and negative towards the education system? Well, for one, the education system isn't totally at fault here. We all say that the kids here are disenfranchised and they don't have opportunities outside of their surroundings. Okay, true, I understand that. And to a SMALL degree, that's true. But what many people fail to realize is, the system is only that small part as to why young black kids do not receive the proper educaction. I dare to say, the kids are at fault...the kids disenfranchise themselves. I do everything within my power to give the kid kids what they need. What good have I done here? Most of the kids don't fucking care at all.

Whatever...I have to fucking plan for yet another lesson where kids will destroy.

Friday

One of my students is having a hard time. I think the student had family issues. But what's really mind-blowing is near the end of the day, the student was arrested. I have no idea what the situation was, but it was really sad to see and HEAR. All I heard was in a screaming and crying voice, "Get off of me! Get the hell away from me! [crying] No..stop, I can't breathe!" The student was not a delinquent of any kind. Having some difficult times for sure. In my chemistry class, rarely, because the student has a baby. I dunno, Baltimore is a really difficult city to teach in.