With less than five weeks to go before classes start, I finally decided that with all my preparations for classroom management and discipline, finishing up reading through textbooks, working out assignments, getting organized, and so forth, there was another thing I needed to do: ask questions.
One of the questions I addressed to my principal was my schedule. You might wonder why this question came up, especially when it doesn’t seem at all requisite for preparing. That’s true – I mostly just wanted to find out what I’m in for, and so I threw it in for good measure.
It could be worse, but it could be better.
Of course, part of the hard part in this arrangement is the fact that I’ll be teaching four courses at any given point in time. I can’t do anything about that, being the only full-time high school English teacher (I’m lucky enough not to be teaching freshmen, given the size and demographic of the school), and I knew what I was getting into from the first interview. That’s not really a problem for me.
There’s also some good news: My principal (and/or the guidance counselor) did me a favor and scheduled all of my sections consecutively, so that I teach both sections of sophomore English back to back, and similarly with my junior English. I don’t have to switch gears between different courses, and there won’t be any interruptions between the courses, either. I didn’t have this in my student teaching, which had AP English – English III – lunch – English III – Channel 1 – AP English. I think this arrangement will be nice for the quality of teaching I can give; I’ll be able to get into a groove and keep the momentum with the same material for two consecutive periods.
The bad news: My prep period is 2nd hour, and rather than a study hall where I can be productive, I have lunch duty immediately preceding my own lunch. Having prep during 2nd hour will likely mean that I’ll spend that hour doing grading or other non-instructional tasks since I will need to have senior English (1st hour) ready before school and won’t probably have enough time to get the other three courses ready before my prep is over and I start teaching my block of sophomore English. I sort of feel robbed – the teacher I’m replacing had a last hour prep! (That was a very nice benefit of my student teaching experience, especially since I had the last two periods free after having taught all morning.)
I had a feeling that I would get lunch duty, too; the teacher I’m replacing had lunch duty, and my cooperating teacher had suggested that I request a study hall after she and I looked at the previous teacher’s schedule on the staff webpage. I’ve decided not to rock the boat, though, and to just settle with it for now. Maybe there will be some way for me to get the study hall placement at some point, but I’ll make the most of what I have.
Now if I can only finish getting myself ready for it…
Docere Est Discere 
July 23, 2009 at 8:29 pm
Just wanted to let you know that I get a little giddy when I see an update in my RSS reader from your blog. I really appreciate what you write and that you take the time to comment on my blog when I (occasionally) write.
I’m planning on picking up my posting schedule if/when I get a job. Anyway, not sure what prompted me to reply to this post instead of any of your others. Just want you to know that I’m still here reading.
July 24, 2009 at 7:54 am
Thanks for the encouragement, Sam – I really do need it from time to time, especially as traffic seems (?) to have dropped off a little in the summer months.
I hope you do pick things back up; I enjoyed reading what you wrote, and I’ve got a site of my own that I’m hoping to use somewhat like what you did with your student teaching courses. (I’ll share it with you sometime since it looks like your website setup worked out pretty well.)
July 27, 2009 at 4:25 pm
If it makes you feel better, I actually think lunch duty will be easier than study hall. Lunch duty won’t be any fun, but if there are any problems with students you have other people on duty with you to help. But in study hall it is just you (maybe it’s different at your school) so you have to deal with any issues. I think study hall would be tough management-wise for a first-year teacher. I also think you wouldn’t really get much of your own stuff accomplished on study hall because you have to be constantly monitoring the students.
As for your preps, too bad. First or last prep are the best! I highly recommend you get everything ready the day before ‘so you’re not stressing about needing to finish something on your prep for that day’s classes.
Just smile and don’t complain to your administrator! It sounds like at your school you have to pay your dues before you get better duties and preps.
July 27, 2009 at 4:39 pm
I admit that I haven’t really heard any first-year teachers’ accounts of study hall management, so I can’t say whether or not it would be easier, but the possibility of getting work done is there. With lunch duty, there’s no way I can get anything done, which is probably why my co-op thought I should ask for it. It’s really not that big a deal to me at this stage, though.
To the rest, I’m in complete agreement, and I definitely plan on making sure everything is ready before I get to school each morning. That’s why I said that my prep will probably be used for non-instructional tasks, things like grading where there’s no strict deadline (and of course large projects that do have a deadline wouldn’t fall into this category).