I haven't posted much this week because 1) I've been tired and 2) my mind is elsewhere. Wednesday I had my first observation, which didn't leave me feeling very positive. Apparently, according to the hatch marks that my supervisor made ON the official evaluation form, I used nearly 50% more negative comments than positive reinforcement. My mentor teacher was appalled and totally disagreed with the evaluation, but I just felt bad that I came across so negatively. It's the kids that these so-called negative comments are directed towards. And just because someone criticized me and I didn't like how it felt, doesn't mean I shouldn't take some of that person's comments to heart. Anyway, I'm not a teacher yet, haven't really been trained how to teach in my schooling, and am therefore just learning.
However, one person's idea of negative is subjective. For instance, if I discovered that a student had been goofing off and not working along with us on his/her paper during the lesson and then brought that up to the student, that marked me as negative. I was told I needed to use a lot more non-verbal communication to get my message across. So instead I guess I'm supposed to walk over to the student and just point at his paper. And by the way, I'm supposed to utilize all these techniques I've never been taught while someone is staring at me and grading my every move. Yikes.
Other than that, it wasn't all bad. But I was told I needed to put on a "dog and pony" show anytime I am being observed. I purposely did not do that, because isn't that sort of fake? Oh well, I guess it's all about the show and not about the kids.
5 comments:
The sad thing is... I've seen several circumstances in schools where it's all about the teachers and not about the kids. I guess it starts in the training. I guess since you are going to be a teacher, I better start being more "positive" in my comments about them. I think I'll choose to use non-verbal comments to be postitive. Hope you can hear them over the phone.
Nice Blog, some interesting info and thoughts, a bit radical for me at times but thats ok.
Radical??...wtf?
I think it's one of those random spam comments that I could avoid if I put in that extra security? Or do I already have that in.
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