Top Ten Things Future Teachers Need to Know:
1. You will cry over you students. Not every day, or even very often, but it will happen. Sometimes it will be in your car in the long journey home because after a whole day of begging them to listen to you and staying up all night to work on lesson plans, they spend the day ignoring you. Sometimes it will be a quick tear after a student with a bad home life comes in with eyes full of tears because all they want to do is play music and they can not afford to get their instrument fixed. More often than not, they will be tears of laughter over a kid using profanity or saying something insane and you're relaying the story to your mother. But tears are a part of the territory.
2. Students want to learn, but they also want to play Flappy Bird. And you can't blame them, you also want to play Flappy Bird, but you (unlike them) recognize the importance of class time. And it is easy to say "We must be more interesting in Flappy Bird! We must engage the students!", but actually doing this require more effort than you think. Flappy Bird is pretty interesting.
3. It does not matter that you were in high school only 4 years ago, you sooooo do not understand how important prom is or how awful it was when another girl was jealous of your boyfriend and tries to fight you in the halls. You get a lot of eye rolls.
4. It completely matters that you were in high school only 4 years ago. What do you know? You can't possibly have learned that much in 4 years, and you look like maybe you could even still be in high school. So they do not need to listen to you, because it is basically like a peer teaching the class.
5. Elementary school was a strange time in our lives we do not seem to remember. Especially kindergarten. Do not over analyze kindergarten, for your brains will melt. In kindergarten, it does not matter that they beg to listen to Frozen and so you reward them with a song, they will cry. They will cry because their classmates are not listening to them sing, or that was not the song they wanted to hear, or it was the song they wanted to hear but they also want to hear all of the others, or you did not tell them they had the prettiest singing voice. They will cry more often than you anticipate, and often without warning. It's disarming to go from laughing together and having a great time singing music to sobbing uncontrollably for no known reason. Why, Kindergarteners? Why?
6. 3rd graders just want to be anywhere but in 3rd grade. And can you blame them? They are not cute like the kindergarteners, so no one fawns over them; they're not in 5th grade, so no one is giving them speeches on their bright future and unity. So what is the point? They're the red headed step-children of elementary grades, and they know it. You have to take extra time to make sure you do not leave them out.
7. Middle School: still not sure what is going on their. They may be the red-headed step children of the world. They are awkward and full of dramatic plot-lines. I just want to document one school day, translate it to Spanish, and create a best-selling novela. They just want to be loved, and they will wring it out of you like a sponge.
8. You have to know what to do if time runs short. And I do not mean have a back-up list that you can reach into like a memory piggy bank. I mean like your lessons should exceed the amount of time you have, especially if it is your first year teaching. Because there is nothing more terrifying than running short on your lesson in a kindergarten class, because THE SECOND you stop talking their minds are somewhere else. So you can not hesitate, you can not even say "Let's see here..." You have to just jump in to a new activity. I HAVE A THEORY THEY CAN SMELL FEAR.
9. Packing a lunch is a hassle. You never think about it the night before. You think about band and what you need to work on and conducting, and then you think of games and keeping kids interested. And by the time you think about lunch, you're laying in bed almost asleep. And then you tell yourself you will get up on time in the morning and you will have time to make a lunch. And then in the morning you keep hitting snooze and then your lunch is a box of crackers and a banana.
10. You will become a bag lady. You will begin with a medium size tote bag. What a glorious bag it is! It hold your laptop, your lesson plans, your papers, the worksheets for class. What joy! But then you begin to add things, scores, ukuleles, books. Suddenly you need another bag, and then another. You have a lunch bag, a bag for books, a bag or instruments and things, and the bags just keep on coming.
Ultimately, this crazy journey will be the best thing that ever happened to you, and you will have some great stories to share. Just remember that some days are bad, but the good days make them worth it. The smile a student gives you when you share a good day, or when they finally understand what you have been working on; the laughter of those crazy elementary schoolers; getting to be the person who introduces Aladdin to a new generation, these things keep you going. You just keep moving forward.
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