Into the Lion's Den We Go!

Yesterday finally arrived! I didn't know then that yesterday was what I had been waiting for, but I knew once it got there! At round about 9:00 AM Monday morning, I received a call - hooray! from Mckenzie Elementary School's beloved secretary Ms. Derrinda. She asked me to come sub for a 2nd grade classroom for a half day! What an absolutely perfect way to experience being in a classroom for the first time - half a day on a Monday afternoon. I cleaned myself up, put on a pretty 2nd grade appropriate dress (which, let's be honest, is my whole wardrobe because I am a 2nd grader at heart. 2nd grade was the best year in elementary school for me. Thank youuuu Mrs. McClung!), and headed out the door to the big bad Mckenzie Elementary School! I got lost, and I'm not ashamed to tell you that. I had directions and everything, but I still had to go into the Middle School to ask how to get to the Elementary School. Don't wanna talk about it.

Anyway, it was absolute trial by fire! I learned an incredible amount from being in a classroom for a few hours. Like, for example, don't trust the teacher to have spare pencils that work -_- We lost a good 25 minutes of class time because nobody could sharpen their pencils. Curse you RoseArt! Why are you still in business! Your products are rubbish! Seriously though, who has ever gone cheap and bought RoseArt over Crayola and been really impressed? That's right, nobody. Because they are rubbish. Lesson 1 from the 2nd graders: Bring pencils, and a sharpener in case the one in the classroom also leaves a bit to be desired.

Really I would like to blame the whole day's crazed atmosphere on the pencils. Because really, how much of a student's attention can you expect to hold if they have nothing to do their work with? Aside from that, there weren't a lot of serious problems. The computer logged me out of the kids' online math textbook, so we had to do the Math Lesson the old-fashioned way...still on a computer though. It just didn't have an animated cartoon to go with it. What a shame that we didn't get to reaffirm the students' ADD in school that day! I can see myself already turning into one of those technophobes that thinks all the computer animated nonsense will be the death of us. ^_^

Due to the lack of order over pencils and math, we moved at a very slow pace. I'm ready for next time though! If today wasn't a Hang Out with the Jace Man day, I would be all over town applying to sub for other districts as well. The pay is doo doo, but the experience is completely integral! Especially for someone like me, who needs to experience all different grade levels so I can choose a concentration in college.

If any Tennesseans read this blog and know of a school district that has friendly students and needs subs, let me know! I'm too enthusiastic about it to just stay in one group of schools! Hahah.

See Y'all ;)
TFMM