My mind changed pretty quickly when we got to the first round of demos. My peers were actually as good if not better than me in most cases at planning lessons and coming up with ideas and then executing those plans. I wasn't the best writer, not even close, and I wasn't the only person capable of connecting to teenagers. I was comfortably middle of the pack, and intensely uncomfortable with that. I wanted to stand out and impress everyone. This was my area to shine. And yet, I was barely even glimmering. I got discouraged. I let things drop. I started pushing my work back, and waiting until the last minute to get anything done, and as we watched successful demo after demo my motivation dropped and my anxiety ratcheted up. I was intensely proud of my peers, don't get me wrong, but I couldn't shake the sense that I was failing in comparison. The end times were upon me and I was not at all prepared. It seems silly and dramatic to think that this is why I was so nervous leading up to the demo. But I became convinced that failure was inevitable.
When I got my topic one of the strategies in Noden's chapter was to have students solve a murder. To illustrate how this is supposed to work, Noden wrote a murder mystery. Except it wasn't actually a story, it was just a listing of clues. The students were supposed to arrange the clues into a paragraph. It seemed simple enough. I thought I could make it more exciting and actually write my own murder mystery to have the students read aloud in class. I'd be teaching from a whole text, not just discombobulated sentences then. It seemed smart and creative and fun. All things I want to be as a teacher. For some reason not a single part of me thought that might be too much work. Which, as someone who spends a lot of time pushing off schoolwork until the last possible second, really should have been my first concern.
I lack foresight. I get caught up in minor details and then lose sight of the big picture, or I forget that the big picture needs actual details to support it. I spent, all told, about ten hours of time just writing/editing/beating my head against a wall on this lesson, and who knows how many more hours just worrying about all the different things that could go wrong. One of the things that especially stressed me out was that I couldn't figure out how to transition from reading the fake article to talking about paragraph structure. I got so fixated on the transition. on finding the right words that would magically take the classroom from A to B, that I forgot to plan anything to be at B. B just was. I ignored this, finished my lesson plan, and called it a day. I had the big idea done, my fake magazine article created and I figured the rest would fill itself in. A fit of inspiration would take me and I would give the best lecture about paragraph structure that anyone had ever seen this side of the PASSHE system. Fate and bravado would protect me and carry me through.
Fate and bravado did not protect me, Fate and bravado suck. Instead I tripped up exactly where I knew I would. That wriggly transition threw me off. I modeled the paragraph, sure, but not in the way I wanted to. I started my paragraph with an "I believe" statement, unintentionally reinforcing the idea that thesis statements should begin like that. Not my kind of thesis. But I panicked, and I had to follow through. I had wanted to actually show students the sequence from Noden's book, with the proper terminology and everything, but I somehow completely forgot about all of that. I didn't actually instruct anything. I just led a weird, rambling sort of discussion about 'controlling ideas' and support sentences. I had meant to call on students who don't normally participate, but instead I kept looking to Spencer to save me from myself. It was bad. I had way more time than I though I would, and nothing left to fill it with. The assignment sheet was meant to be their homework, but because I had so much time left I just made it a part of class. and even then we still had extra time left over. I honestly expected reading the fake article to take longer.
Time management is not a skill I've ever been good with. I'm going to have to change that.
It wasn't all awful, and the idea is still really cool and creative. I did alright, and I really liked how I started class, I just know it could have been so much better. I think ultimately that's what bothers me the most. I really disappointed myself with this demo.
