Prep Hour

After lunch, Schultz and I went back to the classroom where she had me look through the textbook to recommend a poem or two from the Harlem Renaissance.

That was kind of tricky. It was hard for me to recommend things because I didn't feel like I was any kind of authority on the the subject, but I guess that when you come right down to it, I am. I am a reader and an English major and that sets me apart from most people. I guess that I've become sort of insulated in my little world of English majors and books and forgotten that I have the skills to pay the bills (sort of).

Schultz and I also talked a lot about school & education politics and stuff like that. I guess as a 'masculine' (her word, not mine) male interested in teaching, I would be given very high priority when applying.

I'm still not clear if Schultz thinks that this is a good thing or not. She said that the more 'femmy' male teachers have trouble connecting with students, especially the guys. However, Schultz also talked about back in the days when she worked for Donny back at JFK. She seemed to resent him for telling her to hire dudes no matter what. I guess you just need to be the right qualified dude. She told me an anecdote about some guy she interviewed at Kennedy who brought a guitar to the interview and said, "I don't really go for traditional/formal interviews, so I'm just going to sing you a song." Seriously.

Schultz also told me about her move from Kennedy to Jefferson. in 2001 or 2002 Steve Hill, then the assistant principal at Kennedy became head principal at Jefferson. Two or Three years later, he asked Schultz to fill an opening at Jefferson. She said that after she got the job she had to distance herself from Hill because some other teachers might think that she was 'brought over' from Kennedy by Hill and they wanted to escape that stigma.

Towards the end of this prep hour, after I told Schultz about my suggestions for the Harlem Renaissance, she told me about the frustrations and that come from teaching English lit for a person who loves books and reading. She told me that it can be extremely frustrating for a person to teach a book that they love, say To Kill a Mockingbird, and have a third of the class hate it because they refuse to give it a chance because they are crappy students that don't give a crap about their educations. She also said that getting any member of the 1/3 that doesn't give a shit to give a shit about anything can be extremely rewarding.

Lunch time

Third Hour is prep, which really means lunch. Lunch was pretty fun, the group of teachers span a pretty large span of 'experience,' from Jamie, who is only two or three years out of Gustavus to Art who has been at Jefferson for over 40 years. Definitely more fun that sitting by yourself in a big empty classroom. All of the stories about lying to the children, and tips on how to handle them, and general banter around the table reminded me of... any group of people, really. One of the other teachers even said that she forgot that school started up again until 7pm the night before.

Day One, Hour Two

Hour Two is Honors English 9, which seems to be very similar to the class that Schultz taught me back in the day. I'm still sitting among the natives, S had these kids do the same reading assignment over break. The 9th graders are pretty funny, so far I've seen two of them wearing new Christmas clothes that still have their tags attached.

I was given a special assignment for this block: to read two short stories by Langston Hughes and Nella Larsen. I was told to help her determine teach them as part of a Harlem Renaissance section, rather than Death of a Salesman. It's weird that a high school teacher can much such a huge change in the schedule with only 11 days left in the semester. I thought that this would be the kind of thing that they would have had figured out for a while. I would flip if one of my professors decided to make a change like that. I guess college students tend to care more because we have to buy our books. I do advocate reading Langston & Larsen by the way.

Passing Time

During the passing time before second hour, Schultz and I went into the large group office that is shared by many Jefferson teachers, where we met a 10th grade English teacher. I think Schultz had to pick something up from her desk too, I'm not sure. Anyways, this 10th grade teacher said that Jefferson has a much healthier work environment than many other schools, including Kennedy. Schultz and this other teacher, whose name I think is Suzy agreed that this is because of the sense of community created by the large office room. It's like living in a suite with a bunch of friends compared to to working at a school like Kennedy, where the classroom setup makes life lonely and boring for teachers, like living in a single room. At Jefferson, all ten or so of the English Teaches eat lunch together, whereas Schultz told me that back in the Kennedy days, she would either eat alone or with one other teacher only.

It's interesting to learn this sort of social/political-type stuff, especially when I find that my beloved Kennedy High School was an unhealthy work environment because the friendships that I saw between my teachers is one of the things that first attracted me to teaching.

Day One, Hour One

So, I was literally with Schultz for about 10 minutes before the school day started. Her first class of the day is English 11. When I had imagined shadowing, I thought that I would get to sit at a desk and feel big and important. Instead, Schultz introduced me briefly, put a teacher's copy of the textbook into my hands and told me to go sit down in one of the desks in the back of the classroom.

She needed the desk room because she was interviewing her students about novels they were supposed to have read over Christmas break. When Schultz called a student up to her desk, she opened it up to the back fourth or so, and read a sentence. The students were then supposed to explain the context of the sentence. Meanwhile the class takes notes from 11 pages (note that they have 80 minutes to do this) and I skim the 9th grade text on Romeo & Juliet.

Lots of the students don't have their books, and even though I would probably be one of them, I am surprised by the cavalier attitude that so many throw around as they tell Schultz that they didn't read their books at all. I would have been mortified. Well, a bit embarrassed at least.

From looking through the teacher's textbook, I can see how a person could manage to slide around and be a crappy teacher by just doing everything that the editors put in the margins. I'm pretty sure that one or two of my teachers back at JFK did that, and it will be interesting to see how Schultz compares to this hypothetical crappy teacher.

Day One

The first teacher I am shadowing is Mrs. Schultz. Schultz taught me in ninth and eleventh grade back at Kennedy High School and was pretty awesome. Since then she's moved to Jefferson, the other school in town and still seems to be pretty awesome. She has a unique talent for relating to students that I have always admired. She somehow manages to make friends with all of her children while constantly barraging them with mild insults. It's a style that is right up my alley.