I am started to wonder how I will get through this semester.I don't mean to be melodramatic, but I thought that once I figured out what was going on, everything would be okay - still stressful, but in a normal sort of way. Instead, every day I feel more overwhelmed, and every meeting we have that is supposed to clear things up makes me feel more confused, because everyone talks as if we should already know all of this and they're just giving us a reminder. I can't keep up on my reading, and soon the projects will start pouring in; I have a lesson plan on grammar due on Tuesday and a huge reading strategies project due next Friday on a book I've barely had time to crack open, let alone finish and begin to create teaching methods. I swear they move up the date that the student teaching application is due every day (now it's supposed to be in on Monday so that we can get all of our requests for placements, and I haven't even found it yet). I come out of my teaching classes clenching everything - stomach, jaw, fists - and listening to my iPod in an effort to prevent myself from hyperventilating.
I hate feeling guilty after a good talk with my roommates because I should have been reading, and I always fall asleep doing my reading anyway, because I can't ever seem to get enough sleep. (Yes, I realize this is largely my fault, but I can't help it. Mostly.) A lot of my roommates have all kinds of crazy things going on in their lives, and I feel like I can only give them a tiny part of the attention they deserve, because part of my brain is always trying desperately to find a plan that will enable me to accomplish everything in time without some kind of spontaneous combustion during midterms.
It would also help if I didn't feel like half of what I have to read is utter crap. This comes directly from one of my books: "Educators must help parents understand prenatal brain development. these future children are also future students."
Wait. Are you telling me that I need to track down the parents of children who haven't been born yet so that I can tell them how to nourish their unborn child's brain so he or she will be a good student 16 years down the road? Why am I wasting my very limited, very stress-filled time reading this, not to mention the drivel about seating charts and aquariums? Leave me some time for the things that will actually help me and stop drowning me in things that will probably be easier to learn in practice or from real teachers anyway!
This is that time of year when I wonder if I picked the wrong major, because I don't want to do this!
In happy news though, I like my job as a very part time nanny (even though I had to change a diaper of the greenest poop I've ever seen yesterday) and my Hitchcock and Poe class is every bit as amazing as I thought it would be, even though I never have time to get through all of the reading assignments.
I'm going to go and eat breakfast and then write a five paragraph essay about whether or not we should teach the five paragraph essay. Figure that one out.
See you in April.
2 comments:
I stumbled upon this blog via blogger and since I had just read this post I thought I would share it with you. It's a little encouragement (kind of) for (not) becoming a teacher. Oh, my mother would be proud.
But seriously, I hope things calm down a bit for you; good luck with everything!
I hear you! I know we talked a little bit about this last night (at least about how tired I am) but I just wanted to let you know that I think many of us are in the same boat.
I'm kinda worried, because this wasn't even supposed to be a difficult semester for me. I even dropped a class. Now, I'm at the U until 9 or 10 in the evening, four nights a week. That kind of schedule eats at you, even if your earliest class is at 9:40 in the morning.
In any case, I don't mean to ramble, but hopefully we can hang in there together. If your sanity is ever in need of a reality check, you know my number. I'll be glad to give you a pinch...
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