Twitter Backfires - One Week Later
Wednesday, May 7, 2008 by jethrojones
I have received a lot of great comments on this post, and I figured I should respond in the comments, but then the comment kept getting longer and longer, so I am just going to do a blog post.
I understand what most of you are saying. I think what I am still struggling with is that this class really has been my worst. When they are here, I have a sick feeling. This is my fault. I have been so fed up with their attitude, passive-aggressive behavior, backtalking, and all the other things they have been doing that I just don't know what else to do with them. It was not a motivational thing. I motivated my students with negativity a lot last year, but it is not effective, for me at least.
The real benefit to this all happening is that they have actually listened to what I have said since this incident. They are not just blowing me off. I think that we listen to each other more. This week we have been doing state testing, and I was not looking forward to dealing with them while those who finished early goofed off and weren't respectful of the other students. But they have been doing a really good job. I haven't had that sick feeling this week. I know that kids can and will be kids, and I am okay with that. It is the over-the-top aggression and disrespect that drives me nuts. I said it before, do I deserve respect from this class after calling those girls out? They certainly have not thought so.
Paul, great link! You are right on as usual. Both the students and myself had a blind spot. They were blind to how they were making me feel, and I was blind to how they felt about me. Now that something is out in the open, we can start to have a conversation about what is going on. Hopefully, it will lead to something productive. This class has been much better this week. I don't think that it is because they are trying to please me. In my opinion, they realized that I am telling other people about them, and they don't want to spoken ill of. (And that would be bad, talk about losing trust!) Either that, or they realized that I was serious, and they don't want to be "the worst" at anything. Or maybe, I just got it off my chest, so now I am not as annoyed. Who knows?
Have a Good Life.
I understand what most of you are saying. I think what I am still struggling with is that this class really has been my worst. When they are here, I have a sick feeling. This is my fault. I have been so fed up with their attitude, passive-aggressive behavior, backtalking, and all the other things they have been doing that I just don't know what else to do with them. It was not a motivational thing. I motivated my students with negativity a lot last year, but it is not effective, for me at least.
The real benefit to this all happening is that they have actually listened to what I have said since this incident. They are not just blowing me off. I think that we listen to each other more. This week we have been doing state testing, and I was not looking forward to dealing with them while those who finished early goofed off and weren't respectful of the other students. But they have been doing a really good job. I haven't had that sick feeling this week. I know that kids can and will be kids, and I am okay with that. It is the over-the-top aggression and disrespect that drives me nuts. I said it before, do I deserve respect from this class after calling those girls out? They certainly have not thought so.
Image Credit: Road to Well Being
Paul, great link! You are right on as usual. Both the students and myself had a blind spot. They were blind to how they were making me feel, and I was blind to how they felt about me. Now that something is out in the open, we can start to have a conversation about what is going on. Hopefully, it will lead to something productive. This class has been much better this week. I don't think that it is because they are trying to please me. In my opinion, they realized that I am telling other people about them, and they don't want to spoken ill of. (And that would be bad, talk about losing trust!) Either that, or they realized that I was serious, and they don't want to be "the worst" at anything. Or maybe, I just got it off my chest, so now I am not as annoyed. Who knows?
Have a Good Life.
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I have to pop in and tell you that I am trying to wrote a blog post about one of my lower classes. Your experience keeps popping into my mind and I have changed the wording 100 times and still considering not posting it because of what happened to you. Sometimes I hate blogging because I can't really write about any of my "negative" experiences involving anyone at school, or any of the "challenges" I have with students...it forces me into some kind of generic change the names, situations, and details to protect the innocent.
Paul, I have a lot of those blog posts saved as drafts. I use my blog for reflection, and it makes it hard when those things that I really need to reflect on are unpostable because of the feelings of others. It is frustrating, but probably good to censor yourself at times to, as you said, protect the innocent. Those blog posts about the negative things might be the best topics to actually blog about. I think that it would be good to save those posts for a few months, years, decades and then post them.
Maybe I will just start my posts with:
"I have a friend who is a teacher and he has this class that..."
Yeah, nobody will ever know if you are talking about yourself then. ;)