justplainbil

Just Plain Bill

A Great Ride

I’ve now come to the end of my first tour as a substitute teacher for the Santa Fe Public Schools. Over the past eight school weeks, I spent 34 days in a variety of classrooms, serving one or more days in all grades from pre-K through high school, in 10 different schools. I’m still fortunate to also be working as an adjunct faculty member, teaching online business courses at a California community college, providing the opportunity to compare the writing challenges of my public school students with those of my college students. Added together, this has been one of the most rewarding years of my career. It’s been a remarkable year of balance and contrast.

Overall, I’ve found the students to be energetic (yes, some a little too much so), interested, and fun. They provided me with a wide variety of learning and behavioral challenges to add to my experiences during a long career as a learning and development professional. I’ve been fortunate to work with learners at all levels, in a great variety of settings.

My major takeaways include the following:

·     I had to work with less-than adequate lesson plans, which required a large amount of spontaneous, creative learning activities.

·     In general, I found the discipline level to be a little lower since my last public school teaching experience over 30 years ago. Some might say this is to be expected, as the level of permissiveness over that period has “deteriorated”, and our public schools would naturally be a general reflection of today’s societal norms.

Of course, the values and tolerance would have morphed into what we would call a more “permissive” society, quite different than what I experienced when I was last in a public school classroom over 25 years ago. More liberal dress, language, and culture… surviving the Vietnam War, the fall of President Nixon through Watergate, the scandals experienced by the organized church, the rise and fall of a great number of familial institutions giving rise to Generation X - latch-key children, etc., which most likely make up the generation in which the parents of my students grew up. No wonder…

The remuneration for my substituting was equal to one nice dinner for my wife and me for each day I worked, but well beyond any financial reward was my recommitment to, and increased belief in the goodness of all children. I reconfirmed that all children respond well to being listened to, validated, and respected. It was also reassuring to discover that I had not lost my “touch” as an educator for this emerging generation, insuring that learning was taking place regardless of the students or setting.

As a sub, I have both the benefit and the liability of only being with the students for a few days at the most. This can be a benefit, as I am a contrast to their regular teacher who is responsible for their long-term progress. This can be a liability, in that the students don’t get to really “know” me, and I don’t have the privilege of building anything but a short-term relationship. A long-term relationship is something upon which I firmly believe all meaningful learning is based.  In my 10 years of classroom teaching starting in the late 60s, I made home calls to all my students before school started. That provided an invaluable foundation upon which the trusting, long-term relationship I refer to is built. I literally had no discipline problems in any one of my classes.

Finally, it was humbling and gratifying to receive a number of appreciative comments from many students in classes where I substituted. Several notes, pictures, and one origami flower from a high school student now adorn my refrigerator.