**Apologies for typos/stream of consciousness-sounding entries. As I get busier, I have less time to write completely thought-out, edited posts!**
I can't tell you how special each and every one of the SB students is. They're all so unique and they all have such passion for so many things. I had a particularly rewarding moment, however, when I was chatting with Shrimathi, a now 12th grader who I tutored nearly every night in essay writing and grammar last year. I was supervising her evening prep period last night and in the moments before the rest of the class came in, she pulled me aside to say this: "Austin! I've been waiting to tell you this for so long. All of my teachers told me I have improved so much in English. I get the highest marks on my English tests now. When they told me this, I was so happy I said, 'I have to tell Austin! She'll be so proud of me!" Shrimathi then proceeded to run to me and hug me saying, "Oh thank you so much, Miss." It sounds like something out of a movie as I type it all out, but I swear to you this is exactly how it happened. Shrimathi has dyslexia, though she doesn't know it, and because I struggled with dyslexia my whole life, I decided to take her on as a private tutoring student last year. She hadn't gotten any help for her learning challenges in all her years in school and all of her tiny mistakes had added up to some tough-to-crack habits. I sat with her each night, making her write and re-write her essays, hoping to have some impact on her writing skills and more importantly, on her ability to make a clear argument so that she could stand up for herself. I left SB feeling unsure. I hoped my words would come back to her during a big exam or essay and would give her the push she needed to do her best work. So you can only imagine my thrill when she told me how well she's now doing. For a student who was in danger of having to repeat 11th grade, this success fills me with unmeasurable pride and excitement.
But on to today...
This morning I woke up at 6:00 AM for morning prep (study hall) with the 9th and 10th graders. It was oddly chilly, so I brought along the one sweater I have with me (you don't generally pack sweaters when heading into a tropical, semi-arid climate zone but it's been unusually mild and even cold at times). I got there a few minutes early to check some messages before the school day began and then walked up to the second floor where the upper grade classrooms are.
After prep, I went to breakfast, which was a scary-looking yellowish squishy rice situation. Surprisingly, it wasn't bad at all, especially when adding a cut up hard boiled egg to the mixture, one of the better parts of breakfast at SB. I shadowed the teacher I'll be taking over for during the first three periods, but after tea time and assembly, I went off to teach my 8th grade civics class.
Because I don't have a ton of lesson planning to do this week, during my free periods, I've been working on all of the lessons, review games, and monthly tests to be administered next week. I'm sure my schedule will change when all of the volunteers leave this weekend, so I'm trying to get ahead, knowing I'll have to spend much of my weekend lesson planning for additional classes.
I taught Drama 5 - a time for the kids to get out of the classroom and run around in the afternoon - which I was particularly excited about. They're a tough class to handle (I had them for dance and social studies when they were 4th graders), often disobedient and rowdy, but they mean well... most of the time. :) We started with "Do You Know Your Neighbor?" so I could remind myself of all of their names, then played "Indian Chief", and finished with a rousing game of "Zip, Zap, Zop! - Speed Edition", a game I usually use to emphasize the importance of enunciation and eye contact. I'm thinking of having them do skits next week! They need to work on their speaking skills.
I plan to spend most of my afternoon preparing choreography for the upcoming week's dance classes. I have 2 options: a jazz/hip hop combination (which I'm 99% sure they'll choose) and a musical theatre combination (which I have in case they're feeling like trying something new). I'm also contemplating having a contemporary combination because I hear they've been interested in that recently.
I also thought I'd share an observation with you all. In teaching grades 5 and 7-10, it's been especially interesting to me to observe and sort out the developmental similarities and differences between the grades. Something as simple as asking them to erase the notes from the last class on the chalk board while I get out my notes for my own class is a completely exciting privilege to the 5th, 7th, and 8th grade students. But if I were to ask my 9th and 10th graders to do the same task, they wouldn't be excited about it in the slightest. In fact, they would put on a mask of apathy in order to show their classmates how much they didn't care and even, how much they resented me for making them stand up from their comfortable, back-of-the-room hiding spot. It's like some kind of internal switch flips when they move on to the upper grades that tells them it's no longer cool to be excited about doing the teacher a favor. But now that I think about it, the impetus for the flipping of that switch is almost assuredly external. So maybe it's not really developmental but rather social - a change in dynamics caused by exposure to constructs that tell them that apathy is the more acceptable route to choose. As obvious as this now seems to me thinking back on so many of my experiences as both a teacher and as a student, it's so different to observe it in this kind of environment. A place where respect, appreciation, and enthusiasm for learning are of utmost importance. And I'm by no means saying that my students work against these virtues once that inevitable "switch flip" occurs. But it's just interesting to me that even at Shanti Bhavan, students fall victim to the apparently global epidemic of false apathy. I'm usually able to crack it, though, especially when we're in dance or PT. I know that's not who these kids really are!
I can't tell you how special each and every one of the SB students is. They're all so unique and they all have such passion for so many things. I had a particularly rewarding moment, however, when I was chatting with Shrimathi, a now 12th grader who I tutored nearly every night in essay writing and grammar last year. I was supervising her evening prep period last night and in the moments before the rest of the class came in, she pulled me aside to say this: "Austin! I've been waiting to tell you this for so long. All of my teachers told me I have improved so much in English. I get the highest marks on my English tests now. When they told me this, I was so happy I said, 'I have to tell Austin! She'll be so proud of me!" Shrimathi then proceeded to run to me and hug me saying, "Oh thank you so much, Miss." It sounds like something out of a movie as I type it all out, but I swear to you this is exactly how it happened. Shrimathi has dyslexia, though she doesn't know it, and because I struggled with dyslexia my whole life, I decided to take her on as a private tutoring student last year. She hadn't gotten any help for her learning challenges in all her years in school and all of her tiny mistakes had added up to some tough-to-crack habits. I sat with her each night, making her write and re-write her essays, hoping to have some impact on her writing skills and more importantly, on her ability to make a clear argument so that she could stand up for herself. I left SB feeling unsure. I hoped my words would come back to her during a big exam or essay and would give her the push she needed to do her best work. So you can only imagine my thrill when she told me how well she's now doing. For a student who was in danger of having to repeat 11th grade, this success fills me with unmeasurable pride and excitement.
But on to today...
This morning I woke up at 6:00 AM for morning prep (study hall) with the 9th and 10th graders. It was oddly chilly, so I brought along the one sweater I have with me (you don't generally pack sweaters when heading into a tropical, semi-arid climate zone but it's been unusually mild and even cold at times). I got there a few minutes early to check some messages before the school day began and then walked up to the second floor where the upper grade classrooms are.
After prep, I went to breakfast, which was a scary-looking yellowish squishy rice situation. Surprisingly, it wasn't bad at all, especially when adding a cut up hard boiled egg to the mixture, one of the better parts of breakfast at SB. I shadowed the teacher I'll be taking over for during the first three periods, but after tea time and assembly, I went off to teach my 8th grade civics class.
Because I don't have a ton of lesson planning to do this week, during my free periods, I've been working on all of the lessons, review games, and monthly tests to be administered next week. I'm sure my schedule will change when all of the volunteers leave this weekend, so I'm trying to get ahead, knowing I'll have to spend much of my weekend lesson planning for additional classes.
I taught Drama 5 - a time for the kids to get out of the classroom and run around in the afternoon - which I was particularly excited about. They're a tough class to handle (I had them for dance and social studies when they were 4th graders), often disobedient and rowdy, but they mean well... most of the time. :) We started with "Do You Know Your Neighbor?" so I could remind myself of all of their names, then played "Indian Chief", and finished with a rousing game of "Zip, Zap, Zop! - Speed Edition", a game I usually use to emphasize the importance of enunciation and eye contact. I'm thinking of having them do skits next week! They need to work on their speaking skills.
I plan to spend most of my afternoon preparing choreography for the upcoming week's dance classes. I have 2 options: a jazz/hip hop combination (which I'm 99% sure they'll choose) and a musical theatre combination (which I have in case they're feeling like trying something new). I'm also contemplating having a contemporary combination because I hear they've been interested in that recently.
I also thought I'd share an observation with you all. In teaching grades 5 and 7-10, it's been especially interesting to me to observe and sort out the developmental similarities and differences between the grades. Something as simple as asking them to erase the notes from the last class on the chalk board while I get out my notes for my own class is a completely exciting privilege to the 5th, 7th, and 8th grade students. But if I were to ask my 9th and 10th graders to do the same task, they wouldn't be excited about it in the slightest. In fact, they would put on a mask of apathy in order to show their classmates how much they didn't care and even, how much they resented me for making them stand up from their comfortable, back-of-the-room hiding spot. It's like some kind of internal switch flips when they move on to the upper grades that tells them it's no longer cool to be excited about doing the teacher a favor. But now that I think about it, the impetus for the flipping of that switch is almost assuredly external. So maybe it's not really developmental but rather social - a change in dynamics caused by exposure to constructs that tell them that apathy is the more acceptable route to choose. As obvious as this now seems to me thinking back on so many of my experiences as both a teacher and as a student, it's so different to observe it in this kind of environment. A place where respect, appreciation, and enthusiasm for learning are of utmost importance. And I'm by no means saying that my students work against these virtues once that inevitable "switch flip" occurs. But it's just interesting to me that even at Shanti Bhavan, students fall victim to the apparently global epidemic of false apathy. I'm usually able to crack it, though, especially when we're in dance or PT. I know that's not who these kids really are!
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