Wednesday, April 13, 2011

A 6th Grade English/Language Arts Teacher

Today I walked into an assignment that should have been hell.  The school I worked in today just got back from spring break on Monday.  The teacher I covered for has been gone all week, and they've had a different sub every day.  It isn't common knowledge, but there comes a point, after enough different subs in a row, that the students turn feral.  Any conditioning or routines put into place degrade very quickly; often within two or three days.  Before the students arrived, in fact, I had other staff warning me that I was in for a rough time.
Actually, when I first got to the room there was a teacher in there getting some stuff around.  The first words out of her mouth were, "Oh, good.  You're tall.  Do you have a loud voice?"
I think part of what saved my day was that there were high school students giving anti-drug presentations during every class period.  Any time remaining I only had to facilitate silent reading.
The day actually ended up being pretty easy.  Even ended up getting compliments from both staff and.....students.

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