Rant continued....

OK, so I thought of a few more things as I had time to think and plan my lessons and all that (BTW, I realized that the whole mock Constitutional Convention isn't going to work out but I've got some ideas down, including a group project that I have to write up while watching Aidan Quinn on SVU). Anyway...

first of all, I should probably preface that I don't dislike my BTSA lady (despite the fact that has a slightly silly name)... she's very nice and I think she genuinely wants to help out. But, that doesn't dispute the fact that I got absolutely no encouragement from her today.

And I figured out some of the things that pissed me off about what she said. One thing that she mentioned was that because I have a lot of ELL learners, I need to try and show pictures. OK, fine, I understand that but I have NO resources to use pictures. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE using pictures- I used pictures up the wazoo last year- I had power points and slides and more pictures that I could count. And I would love to use pictures this year but I have absolutely NO resources. I have ONE white board to use for both periods, I have a piece of crap overhead that the kids and I both hate, I have no LCD projector and my TV is so small that the people sitting in the back can't really see it (plus, I have no cord to connect my computer to the TV). So there's really no way for me to show pictures unless I pass them around the class.

Another thing that my mom mentioned that is helpful is realizing that I should probably teach to the observer on the days that I'm being watched instead of teaching just to the kids. Sometimes when someone is only in the classroom one day/one period a week or every two weeks, they only get a tiny little glimpse of what is going on. If I'm having an off day or the kids are having an off day, that's all they see and that's all they're going to write about. So that's something that I need to work on for the next time.

That doesn't make me any less pissed off though....