Friday, March 4, 2011

Good Days and Bad Days

In this post I'm not going to go into the fact that whether or not a good day is 'good' or 'bad' is all in your head, but it is, rather, I'm merely going to reminisce now on the fact that some days just go good, and some don't.

Today was one of the good days - at work. Group of grade 3's - a different group of grade 3's than my Tuesday group (the group from hell) - but about the same number of kids: 15-16. Same class, same lesson plan, but today went so much better.

I'm constantly trying to do it, but it's very hard to notice and track down all the tiny variables that contribute to a class, as a teacher, going great, or falling apart. I was more on-the-ball today, tried something new out (letting kids know what I needed to cover at the start of class on the screen - which I do all the time during the summer. Why didn't I think of this until now - duh!), and was more charismatic, which let me focus more on teaching than class management - which works all-around much better: kids who would be listing are, instead of being distracted by kids who aren't or getting bored by the fact that the instructor isn't teaching, instead trying to get the 3-6 kids who are being noisy or not listing to, well, listen and behave. It's a vicious cycle.

So today was a good day - I wait to see whether or not I can carry this momentum forward.

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