Sunday, April 3, 2011

long term substitute

For the past two weeks I have had the pleasure (if that is the right word) of teaching freshman English....Romeo and Juliet to be exact. When I sub for a class more than one day I give my "treat me the way you want me to treat you" speech and it usually goes over quite well. Unfortunately for a couple students they learned that the hard way. In the second class of my first day I kicked four students out because they were being disrespectful to their classmates and just plain annoying. Word got out and the rest of my classes were pretty mellow. We had discussions on what we were learning and the kids were responding or asking questions if they didn't get it and not "I don't get it" questions, specific questions that were proof they were listening - which is HUGE when it comes to Shakespeare.

By the end of my two weeks (sexing up Romeo and Juliet so they actually understand the story....it is about forbidden love after all) the kids were actually sad to see me go. They offered to poison their teacher (just like in Act III where Juliet's mother tells her she will find someone in Mantua to poison Romeo)...I mean, come on! the kids were paying attention and that is kind of exciting...but for the wrong reasons - we do not need to poison anyone.