LAUGH
They say that teachers make as many micro-decisions per day as surgeons. Maybe that’s why the characters on Grey’s Anatomy sound so much like teachers.
1. When a new student has been added to your roster, but the front office never told you.
It’s Monday morning, you have all your printouts for the entire week ready to do and just enough desks and books for all of your students. Then a brand new face shows up out of the blue and throws your entire week into utter chaos.
2. When you spell something wrong on the board, and they all notice.
There’s a reason not all of us teach Language Arts. Sure some of us may love Science, but that doesn’t mean we won’t occasionally misspell a word like lightning. (Lightening? Lighning? Lighting?) It’s good to use those little moments to teach students that it’s OK to make mistakes. And also that they wouldn’t like it if we started laughing at them every time they misspelled a word.
3. A teacher’s constant state of exhaustion.
Whether it’s physical, mental, or emotional, exhaustion is a daily occurrence in the life of every teacher. It could be the thousands of micro-decisions you have to make every day. It could be the soul-draining experience of teaching a lesson that no one understands. It could be the never-ending stream of reminders, functions, assemblies, meetings and interruptions that can derail your day at a moment’s notice. Or maybe it’s all of those rolled into one.
4. When the class clown shouts something wildly inappropriate, but completely hysterical
No matter how grown-up you get, there are some childish things that will always be funny. Fart noises, dirty jokes, and Uranus are just some of the things that could make you giggle or guffaw at any time. And you never know when your class clown is going to unleash another joke bomb on the entire class.
5. When you realize a fellow teacher is just as crazy as you are.
We are an odd bunch. We come from all walks of life and have a wide variety of interests and personalities. That’s why finding a teaching buddy is paramount to surviving a school year.
6. When you teach students that it’s OK to have a bad day
It always amazes students when they learn that teachers have bad days. It double amazes them when we tell them that it’s OK for them to have bad days too.
7. When you’re 4 hours deep into yet another professional development training.
Don’t get me wrong it’s always good to learn new strategies, but does there have to be that many of them? It seems like every year some “expert” writes a book about how we should re-think our entire approach to education. Next thing you know you’re breaking out into teams to discuss 87 new ways to teach long division.
8. When the principal asks why you’re not doing more group projects.
We would love to incorporate cross-curricular, differentiated, multi-lingual, team-building projects into our lesson plans. We would also like a raise and more copy paper. Sometimes you have to settle.
9. When students ask a question that you just answered
You tell students all week long that there will be a quiz on Friday. You spend an hour reviewing for the quiz on Thursday. You have them write it in their daily planners. Then Friday arrives, you start to hand out the quiz and the first words you hear are “We have a quiz today? Why didn’t you tell us?”
10. When a student gives you yet another excuse for why their work isn’t done.
If these students spent as much time on their work as they did crafting their excuses, they’d all be passing with flying colors. It could be the “I didn’t have time last night”, the “I didn’t know you wanted us to turn it in” or the old classic “My (fill in pet here) ate it”. Either way, as my high school band director was fond of saying: Excuses are interesting but unimportant.
