People always say that student teaching is THE most stressful 16 weeks of your life. It’s not that I didn’t believe their warnings; I just didn’t want to believe their warnings.
I knew my schedule would change significantly, but prior to this semester I told myself it wouldn’t affect my social life. Yes, I would still go to Shorty’s on Tuesdays for bingo and karaoke and yes, I would still be able to get late night Sheetz. Wrong. Dear God, was I so wrong.
Student teaching is literally a job (without pay). I wake up at 5:30am Monday through Friday. I commute thirty minutes to get to my placement and then stand all day teaching in front of a total of 100 creatures (students) with raging hormones over the course of six and a half hours. I am constantly lesson planning, creating warm-ups and other curriculum materials, and grading. Every day at a certain point I am sprinting to the copy room to make sure I find an open copy machine and slave over it as I make 110 copies of every worksheet I need to give them.
Oh, and lesson planning sucks by the way. It’s extremely tedious because not only do you need to map out a lesson or activity, but also you need to map out what you are going to do every second of every day. I need to know literally what I’m going to say for 45 minutes per class every single day. And if you do not know what you’re doing, your students will know – do not let this happen; it’s embarrassing.
If that isn’t hard enough, my workload seeps into after school hours too. You thought once I left the middle school I was done? Yeah, I wish. If I’m lucky I’m out the door by 3:00pm, but only to rush home and continue to do more work. There are times I’m stuck at the school until 5:00pm and the only noises you hear in the building are the garbage can wheels as they squeak passed my room from the janitor pushing it.
There is NEVER a moment where I’m not thinking about my students. They are my top priority. While it may look like I’m just casually laying on my bed scrolling through my Twitter feed, I am thinking in the back of my mind what I will do as warm-up tomorrow, or how I can simplify the project’s directions so my one student who struggles can understand it, or how I can incorporate all of their interests into the next lesson. All 100 of my students are on my mind 24/7 because not only is it my job right now, but because I also love and care for them (typical teacher quote, I know).
Oh, and did I mention I have practicum too? Yeah, not only do I have to teach for five days a week, but also on Tuesdays I have to attend a class. A two-hour class after teaching, more like yelling, at 100 seventh graders. In this class I am expected to complete daily journals, weekly schedules, two PDE 430 forms explaining EVERY SINGLE THING I have used/taught/incorporated into the classroom, one giant teacher work sample project, attend two to three ESL night classes for two and a half hours and write a four-page paper on it, create a portfolio, update my resume and my philosophy of education paper. Oh, and let’s not forget – I needed to buy two textbooks, read chapters weekly and complete a presentation on an assigned chapter. All of these assignments have deadlines throughout the entire semester, so while I am drowning in work for student teaching I also have these bullsh*t assignments to complete as well.
So, to those who think I have free time – think again. I barely have time to breathe.
To all of my friends, I apologize. I’m sorry that I’m constantly swamped with work. I’m sorry I can no longer attend late night half apps, midnight Sheetz and Wawa runs, and sit in the library for seven hours straight laughing and completing our assignments. It’s not that I do not like you. It’s not that I do not want to hang out with you. It’s not that at all. Trust me. It’s just I never have free time anymore. And the moment I am finally free, I just want to sleep or relax in bed – or let’s be honest I need to head over to Shorty’s to relieve stress. I am no longer a degenerate college student. In fact, I’m not a college student at all anymore. I’m full on adulting, so please do not be offended when I say I cannot wait to graduate.