Terrible first lesson with my pupils

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God, don't even say the word "teacher" at my presence

I'm a student of a foreign languages teacher training college and in this year we are having our teacher practices I teach English a class of 14 year olds now - I had only two lessons with them until now. Do you really want to know how the first one looked like?

The first thing that comes to my mind every time I'm thinking about this is Vonnegut's book's title:"Welcome to the Monkey House". I came into the classroom and trying not to pay attention to a terrible noise said my name... well, it was the only thing I was able to do because my pupils (hmm, it's a veritable irony that in Polish the word pupil if used when we are talking about a kid attending school means "teacher's pet", somebody who's very liked by him) despite my attempts to calm them down behaved like a group of mad buffalos rather than normal young people

Only imagine: I standing there, surrounded by the noisy brats one of whom proposed an intimate intercourse with him to me (with this small difference he didn't use such a subtle expression) His mates were throwing sponges and pieces of chalk at me at that time. I'm not joking. Few minutes later another bloke asked by me what his name was told me a vulgar name instead of the real one. There was also a dude who informed me they had an English teacher a year earlier who was so afraid of them that she decided to live in Canada for fear of them and that they'd do everything me to do the same

I won't even bring up an issue of several other unpleasant things that happened to me during that lesson. They shouted at me that they wanted to go out so I let them go 15 minutes earlier than they should and the very first thing I did then was to go to the secretariat to ask for the telephone number of their form-master. Unfortunately they didn't have it in that moment but I met there two teachers who were informed by me about my problem. Their eyes were getting wider more and more and they promised me to inform him about everything. I talked about this to each person met by me - to teachers, other students of my college and even today when I was waiting for my bus I started talking about this to a lady who was also waiting there with me.


Today we had a lesson again. The form-master decided to be in the classroom with me in that time and my first words were a small lesson of a law. My pupils were informed by me that their insults were against the law and if a thing like that would be repeated by them, I'd do something about this - their parents would have to pay damages and I guessed they wouldn't be very happy of it. Today there was also a meeting with parents and said boys's behaviour will be rewarded with the lowest grade possible at the end of the semester. Well, today my dear pupils behaved quite differently - they were ashamed, calm and full of contrition.

Btw, those kids's English is very poor. They have problems even with so simple things like the names of articles of clothing or animals

god bless you for being a teacher. i could never do it, did the kid simulate sex with his fingers by doing that in and out finger in the hole thing?

Gaining the respect of the students was very important.

I'm glad you had the right people to back you up on that.

Hopefully the kids will now know that you mean business and show you some respect.

I'll NEVER be a teacher, it's only a gloom duty for me.

The kid didn't do anything like that with his fingers; instead of it he used a vulgar word for sexual activity - I don't know how to translate it into English; it's expression whose English counterpart means something like: sexual activity of a girl with a lot of partners, being a licentious girl, something like that. I don't know what an English word for it is.

I'm going to be that class's best English teacher they ever had. They said their teachers of this subject were all trainees like me until now, young students who didn't take care whether they'd teach them something or not.

You definitely have the right attitude -- they are lucky to have you! I think you handled the situation in exactly the right way.

Your whole first day makes me think of Sidney Portier's first day in "To Sir With Love" !

Kris

They expressed regret for this incident and even though I told that the best apology for me would be a proper behaviour I think that an attempt of begging my pardon was a triumph of stupidity and impudence - it's just as if they were spitting at me and later asked whether I'd like to get a kleenex to wipe my face.

They are horrible at that age, try geting a job teaching younger ones.

We were choosing our classes several months ago and now there's no possibility to choose a class again. In fact it isn't even a job as it's normally understood - we are not given money for this; it's compulsory to teach for one year when there's your last year in a school of this type.

Wow. At least my students weren't nasty to me.

Makes me wonder about whether I'm thinking in my
right mind, with teaching.

Today I had the third lesson with said class. They were writing a short test checking their general knowledge - they really represent very low level of English; my first impression is right. They even didn't know how to construct simple sentences in English, even such like: "Her hair is golden" or "I'll be 35 on April".

But after this small scandal that broke out when their form master was told by me what had happened during our first lesson they started to show me respect The tone of their voices when they are telling "good afternoon" to me is full of respect

Remembering that a small spoon of honey can allure more flies than even a big barrel of vinegar I decided to try buying their favours. I decided to put a small "+" in my notebook next to the name of a person who would have done something to encourage them this way to participate in lessons. Today I put there four such signs - for people who were reading a short text about archeological dig - with a HORRIBLE accent, I must add

Sorry to say this,but being a teacher is a worst job for an Aspie.
Specially to teach NT teens.
NTs can smell our fear and social insecurity,and then hell begins.

To be teacher,or examiner one must be very socially adapted and secure.
And I highly doubt that any Aspie fits this description.


Nevertheless,I wish you good luck with your job.

Umm....there's a difference between rowdy buffalo-behaviour and that of normal young people?

Rowdy buffalo-behavior is actually 'normal' for normal young people.

I'm not afraid of them, they are only teenagers, nothing more. Girls are ok but boys (not all, fortunately, but many of them) are annoying. It's almost as if I came back to my elementary school God, I have had time enough to forget how banal, infantile and - let's not be afraid of this expression - stupid, people of this age can be.

I'm very glad it's not a normal job but only practice which is necessary to graduate from a teacher training college. I have a lesson every Thursday and Friday with one class.

Well, I must say that I guess, there's only one thing I avoided - having a litter bin put on my head. Several years ago there was such a case in one school in my country - an English teacher had it done by his pupils what was recorded by one of them. It echoed all over the Poland and became almost proverbial.

Today my dear pupils were writing a kind of test because I wanted to check their level of knowledge about numerals. And you know what? One boy, a veritable man of genius, surpassing Einstein and Dexter from Dexter's lab realized that there was a test when there was 10 minutes before the end of lesson