My Teaching Experience from Student to Professional with Lesson Plans

So I had two interviews with a school, and I thought they went pretty well. They did, but I wish I had better rehearsed some of my core philosophies and what I might respond to potential questions.

I had to call and ask if they had made a decision (hadn’t heard back in over 3 weeks) and it turns out they said they mailed a letter and I maybe did not receive it. I think it has to do with my address needing a postal box and maybe they didn’t include it. Word to the wise= specify contact information clearly!

Even though the interviews did go well (2nd interview shows that they did like me), I think in the end the fact that I’m a newbie was the breaker. No way to know for sure, but I think that is probably what it was.

I’m still optimistic, and will keep expressing interests and trying to get more interviews. I might check schools in a few other states I’m interested in too. It’s not too late in the game, and I can just take what I’ve learned so far to improve my personal pitch.

I somewhat agreed to do summer school, thinking it was more of a tutoring than teaching thing. I think the school was almost desperate because I told them I didn’t know much Italian at all. I ended up teaching Spanish and Italian.

Not easy. It was obvious once it started that none of the teachers there wanted to do it because it was a somewhat unpleasant task. There are multiple subjects in a classroom at one time, and the kids don’t want to be there. And in my case, there was very little guidance about what to teach. I felt bad making the kids do 2 hours of reading and writing, so I ended up doing a lot more planning and work than I had anticipated.

It was paid, but not much. And it felt like much less when I realized how much work I had to do outside of it. However, fellow aspiring teachers, if you are interested in helping with summer school, ask first about how it is structured.

I heard of another school where they hand the teachers packets and where they have specific tests to help the teachers in planning what to cover in such a short time.

Once I decided to look at it as kind of a paid internship (it wouldn’t hurt the resume either!), I got through it. I tried to make it easier on myself, and it was only two weeks (some SS’s are 4 or 5 weeks).

The grades I gave seemed somewhat inflated, but it was very challenging for me to come up with materials and tests, especially considering that the school didn’t even have extra blank workbooks for me (only ateacher’s edition that I had to white out!).

C’est la vie!

It was a good experience overall, I guess, but I would probably never do it again. Tutoring would be a lot more lucrative and flexible. But I am glad I suffered through it right along with the kids.