Substuite teachers/supply teachers - what'd you think?

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Are those teachers who aren't your regulars annoying?
No 12%  12%  [ 4 ]
No 12%  12%  [ 4 ]
Yes 29%  29%  [ 10 ]
Yes 29%  29%  [ 10 ]
Not sure 9%  9%  [ 3 ]
Not sure 9%  9%  [ 3 ]
Total votes : 34

deep-techno
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04 Jul 2006, 12:23 pm

People think that just because the power of our normal teacher to keep the class quiet is not there, the class decide to be very noisy, and whimsically disruptive, while others will have a laugh instead of doing the work and completely defy the seating plan. That is just very illogical and stupid.

At the end of the lesson I will have been the only person to have sat in the correct place! Phut! Some people... :x


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earthmonkey
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08 Jul 2006, 7:07 pm

I accidentally put 'No' when I meant to put 'Yes.'

Substitute teachers have been horrible for me. In elementary school, he/she wouldn't know the routine and the way the teacher did things, and wasn't willing to try to adapt to the way our class ran. I remember one particularly distressing day, I raised my hand and said, "I know that you're new and so it's perfectly understandable that you don't know how the class does things, but we don't mind informing you of the routine so long as you are willing to listen and adapt to it." The kids in my class actually AGREED with me (for once), but the teacher didn't seem too pleased for some reason. Fortunately, I wasn't the only one who had trouble with this; apparently at the kindergarten/first grade age, most kids were nearly as resistant to change as I was!

Recently, during my sophomore year of high school, I had been absent for a lot of time (a couple of weeks) and the day I came back was the day of the chemistry chapter test, which a substitute teacher was to administer. He explained to the class that for those who were absent, they should just attempt the test and write a note to the teacher saying when they were absent (some of the kids wanted to not take the test because they were absent the previous class, which was just a review day). I tried to explain to him that I had missed the whole chapter and so could not even attempt the problems, as I'd never been exposed to the material (actually, it turned out that all the material the chemistry class covered was stuff I'd taught myself independently three years previously, but I didn't know that at the time; I didn't even know which chapter I'd missed).

The teacher kept repeating the same thing over and over, and I tried to reason with him, but he was one of those terribly unreasonable people who don't listen to logic. So I went back to my seat and started typing a note on my Alphasmart so that when I got home I could send it to my regular teacher via e-mail. Then a second later the teacher is behind me, tapping my shoulder, and I sort of freak out, not having known he was there (I just gasped and flung my arms a bit, I didn't scream or hit anyone). This apparently annoyed him even more, since apparently he'd been trying to get my attention, but couldn't say my name because he didn't know it. Unfortunately, I had been so absorbed in phrasing my note correctly that I had not noticed anything. He told me to stop typing so I wouldn't distract others who were taking the test, but unlike most other keyboards I've used, this made hardly a sound and certainly wasn't any louder than the pencils of students who were taking the test. I told him, "But I'm writing a note to the teacher like you told me to. Which instruction should I follow??" He just walked away, telling me to come to the front.

I went up to the front, where the sub asked me my name as he was writing something down in red pen on the sheet from which he had read directions for what to do with the class earlier. Now, I've been involved in a LOT of misunderstandings with school officials, so I knew this meant something not good. He asked routinely my name, and I told him, then I asked, "Why have you requested this information from me?" And he said he was writing that I had been oh what were his words??? I think it was "resistant to following directions" or something of that sort. Which is absolutely absurd to anyone who knows me; unless an authority figure's instructions are illogical, violate my rights, or are otherwise harmful/stupid, I follow them.

Needless to say, I spent the next hour and a half (our classes are 1 1/2 hours long) confused and trying to figure out a way to resolve this, as being written up by a guest teacher is grounds for detention, which I wouldn't actually mind, except that it was totally groundless, as I had only been trying to work out a logical solution to the problem and had done so with utmost manners (I hadn't had a bad attitude, not in my voice and not with my words). Normally, I am allowed to leave class without taking a pass to just destress in the hallway for 15 minutes, but I knew that this teacher probably didn't know that, and it'd just get me in more trouble, and I just kept wiggling my legs more, started to rock, and I kept trying to think a way out of this. The stress just kept building.

Then lunch came, then the last class that day: AP European History. Luckily for me, we had a unit test in that class that day! And guess how especially lucky I was that day? The teacher who had substituted AP European History the last week had to leave early, and the substitute from chemistry was going to administer THIS test, too! :evil:

Now, during lunch I found out from a friend that there was a test coming up, and so I prepared an entire speech in my school planner explaining my situation as clearly and logically and concisely as possible. So prior to the final bell ringing, I approached the substitute teacher, and began reading my explanation, and he stopped me mid-sentence to say, "So you're not taking this test, either?" in a very nasty way. IMO, teachers (including substitutes!) should be held accountable for how they behave towards students, especially when it's obviously a well-meaning student who fumbles with communication (I stuttered a lot, and had trouble speaking whole sentences prior to my written, planned speech).

So yeah. I have negative vibes with a lot of subs (but not all).


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Captain_Brown
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11 Jul 2006, 4:27 pm

No, they don't annoy me.



mattw
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12 Sep 2006, 5:24 pm

when i was last at school before i started homeschooling supply teachers caused a lot of bother to me. When the proper teacher isnt there the class is all wild and doesnt follow the normal routine. This once caused a big problem in RE when the teacher didn't realise i had autism. This led to me been excluded due to a fault of the schools. All of my exclusions from school have been caused by school its self by not providing a Leanring Support Assistant at times, teachers not been aware of autism, teachers not trained to deal with Autistic children



hyperbolic
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12 Sep 2006, 6:23 pm

I hate the idea of having a substitute teacher.