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Ichabod!

17 August 2004 20:48

i feel pretty crappy, so ill keep it short.

yesterday wasnt so hot. the kids were really testing their limits and jerking me around. today, i cracked down on that behavior, and there was a huge difference.

but now theres a new problem.

now im having trouble deciding if theyre pretending not to know anything, or if they really dont know anything.

they cant follow the instructions in their religion book. i refuse to repea instructions more than twice if ive already written them on the board. they dont know multiplication tables. previous teachers have allowed them to use multiplication table cheat sheets when completing math worksheets. not in my class they dont. these students WILL KNOW their multiplication tables. silly me for thinking seventh graders would know this already.

and silly me for thinking they knew the difference between nouns and verbs. im not even going to get into that one.

how can i teach new material if we have to go on reviewing reading, writing, and arithmetic? how can i expect them to learn science if they cant read their text book, write a summary, or divide quantities?

im so frustrated. so i did the worst possible thing, i came home and laid down. bad bad idea, because i ended up sleeping way later than i meant to, and it wasnt at all restful because i was plagued by bad school related dreams. i wanted to be in bed by ten, and if im going to do that, then i only have an hour to plan for tomorrow before bedtime.

yeah right, like thats actually going to happen. i just keep telling myself that it will get better after the first week, once i get into a lesson planning pattern. but right now im just so frustrated.