About The Book

Whether you’re a first year teacher looking for guidance, or a veteran teacher looking for ideas, this short book offers the most unorthodox advice you will ever come in contact with. You may think of it as an instrument to keep your sanity, a book on traditional classroom criticism, an educational read, or simply additional tools to critique, use, or pass over. Either way, you will surely find it entertaining, funny, and worth your time. All from the proudly self-proclaimed: “Worst teacher to ever enter a classroom”.

Friday, September 24, 2010

A Bit about Me Teaching

A Bit about Me Teaching
Two days before the start of the school year I received a phone call from the middle school principal asking if I was interested in teaching seventh graders. Not wanting to leave my current job, I agreed under the condition that I would work both jobs, 80 hours a week, as well as continue in graduate school. I was excited to work in the field of education, believing I would finally be working with the “educated”. Quickly I would discover that the classroom had more of a resemblance to cattle herding than actually educating, and as for the “educated”, they were few and far between.  As a first year teacher, I found you just survive and any bubbly personalities that walked through the door were quickly sapped by their self-defeated, halfwit coworkers. If you wanted to fit-in with the majority of the other teachers, you needed to find solace in pretending to smile, coupled with a devotion to poor-old-me complaining.  I was lucky I suppose; I was naturally born equipped with the arrogance of not giving a crap. I kept to myself mostly, or the handful of people I liked, and dedicated my time to making a connection with those I would be teaching. Not too many educators can stay employed as long as I could when they routinely picked fights with their bosses, publish articles bashing the system of education, routinely played tricks on their coworkers (like substituting decaffeinated coffee for their regular coffee just to watch everyone yawn all afternoon), played loud Rocky music before tests to get the students pumped, used every sick day allotted to them, and all around -- make a mockery of the system as much as possible. I survived for two years within this guise; teaching passionately and free from concern, pushing the limits of what was allowed within the classroom, and had remarkable success with both test scores and student interest. Teaching is ranked high among jobs of stress, but, of my two years teaching I can remember very few days I ever felt the stress of those around me. It was fun! Clearly, my lack of stress has more to do with my personality than the strategies I offer. In fact, many of the strategies may seem hypocritical to anyone who witnessed my classroom. I assure you they aren’t. Just as an awesome diet book can be written by a glutton, so too can a rouge teacher, who enjoys a loud classroom, offer you ways to keep yours silent. Thus, it is my hopes that through this multiple book series, I can offer you ways to lighten your stress load and have fun in the classroom.

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