Thursday, December 01, 2005

Not Again!

Well this never seems to end.
My class was observed today too! For 20 minutes the principal sat in my class during writing. She came over to me, asked if she could see me during recess, and then thankfully, she left my classroom.
I came to her recess time, and she went on to criticize my writing lesson. I was doing personal narratives, and she got angry about it. She asked how I was teaching if she hadn't given me writing lessons.
I told her that she had never given me the lessons, but she had told met to teach, so I went online and did my own research. I got a lot of nice material, and the class was really enjoying. She got angry and said that her research was much more thorough, and she didn't really like that I was teaching with material she hadn't made up herself.
I hate this! I'm trying to be a good teacher, and all she does is criticize.
We went through the materials I had and then she said,"This is why I don't like when you do your own research. You're teaching memoirs, not personal narratives!"
I told her that memoirs and personal narratives were similar, and that I had done my research, and explained the difference to the class. She refused to listen to me, and she insisted that I tell the class that we were going to do memoirs instead.
I told her that I wasn't going to do anything of the sort. Besides that it was degrading for me to go into the class after two days and tell them to scratch their projects because we were going to do something different, I worked hard, and I didn't' feel that she was right.
She saw that I wasn't going to give in, and she just told me to make sure that this writing should not take more than 2 weeks, and then they would do memoirs.
I told her ok, but I already planned for this writing to take a month, the way she had outlined it to me on curriculum day.
I'll play it by ear.
Before I left, I asked her why she was going around checking all the girl's loosleafs.
The principal looked at me and very simply said, "Oh, that's just my way of checking up on what you've accomplished."
I was disgusted and I asked her why she couldn't just ask me. I mean, she was already collecting my planbook every week.
She just smiled and said, "Well, it's just part of my jobs."
She asked me if I would mind if she went into my class for 5 minutes to talk to them about an important topic, and being the good one, I told her it was ok.
Guess what? 5 minutes turned into an hour and fifteen minutes, and I walked into the class with 15 minutes left to the school day.
I was about to leave the building at the end of the day, when there was an all call asking me to come to the office. Frustrated, I went back upstairs, and met with the principal who proceeded tell me how disappointed she was with me that I had never called B.E.D.'s mother when she didn't come to P.T.A.
I really got angry then, and I gave it to her. I asked her why the mother didn't call me when she had a problem. The nerve of the principal to side with whomever opened their mouth to her. I told her I'd call the mother anyway, but I was upset at her for being so one-sided.
I got a little more upset when I realized that none of the teachers had called this mother, but the principal only called me up to tell me how disappointed she was in me. I guess she just likes to make me feel like garbage.
I assume the other teachers aren't jewels she feels she has to polish.
I came home so annoyed and discouraged, I was close to tears.
Even my husband sat down to seriously talk to me about school. I don't know if I can continue doing everything I do without pay, without appreciation, and without trust.

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