i have a question...

Wednesday, July 29, 2009

Summer Job, vol. XXIV, the Disgruntled edition

I don't know how much of this is fatigue and how much of it is downright discouragement. Sometimes this feels like a crappy job. We have staff meetings every week, where, lately, we've just been scolded at how poorly we're doing, how we're not engaging with the kids, how our energy and focus are low, how we're not ending up where we're supposed to be.

It's frustrating since I'm the kind of worker that, when told something like this once, figures out a way to change what I'm doing and consciously tries to do better. Hearing that we're still, "as a group," not doing what our boss wants us to do doesn't help anyone's morale or motivation. At this point, I think the general consensus is if we had gotten a real break to recharge, mourn, regroup, we'd all be doing far better this session. We are not robots. We cannot connect significantly to anyone or anything 24/7. And, at an organization in which he wants us all to concentrate on connecting with the individual, it's a bit discouraging to be lumped into a group of 120 staff members, as if we're all doing something wrong.

In other frustrating news, my improv class is still a bit hopeless. I keep plugging away at my lesson plan, strategizing literally every day to try to stay ahead of the kids. Yesterday, they just weren't listening or paying attention so I sat silently for the last 1/2 hour of class, and they began to play Freeze, which is a game with no point and no lesson, aside from quick thinking. They played it for nearly 35 minutes and got nowhere and exhausted the game. I've stopped caring a little bit because there are too many kids in that class that admittedly and pointedly (like, they have actually put it into words for me) do. not. want. to. learn. anything.

What does a teacher do with a group like that? In a class that could very easily just be called "Drama Games"?