I had a mini breakdown today.
I’m not writing this for sympathy or to rage against what made me lose it a bit this morning. I’m doing this more in the hope that putting fingers to the keyboard (or in this case, to iPhone screen) will help get this out of my system and into a bit of a better place mentally. Catharsis is good and all that.
What caused this moment wasn’t actually anything that big – to do with exam entries and students’ differing expectations about what they are or should be allowed to do in terms of exams. The problem kind of stems from a handful of students being allowed, at the beginning of the year, to move up to a higher level class when really they shouldn’t have. They had just one out of three exams to do, so they were allowed to move up. Cue lots of moments throughout this year so far of ‘Well, I’ve only got one/two exams to do now, can I move up too, Mike?’ and do you know what, they are not ready!
So I just couldn’t take it for about 20 minutes out of my morning class today. I walked out of the room. That’s not happened to me before. They also said that my classes had been too easy and a bit boring for them (though they said ‘I am boring in this lesson’).
So what to take from this? More structured lessons, more focus on writing and accuracy, less unpluggedness. Maybe less fun?
Thank heavens the Entry 1s were lovely this afternoon 
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Did you have lots of weird and wonderful combinations of exams to choose from at the start of the year? Learners being told one thing before the summer break, then told another thing when they got back, a couple of sympathy “oh go on then” moments, what appears to be (to the students) slightly differing approaches to assessments by other teachers at the same level?
I feel your pain. I’ve been avoiding the question, hoping I can dodge through to the end of the year on mostly L1 S&L quals, and a few Functional Skills. I think I’m about to run out of excuses, so will be biting the exam bullet soon. Good luck!
More weird and wonderful students (!) than exam choices to be honest. That and students hanging over from last year with one or two modes to do, the more able thinking they should have been put in for all the exams in December, the exceptional (as in special case, rather than a brilliant) student coming up in a bunch from E3, the perennial absentees I somehow have to get through all Level 1 with 46% attendance.
In some ways this year has been utter crap so far!
Still, onward and upward!
Sorry that it got that bad Mike. I know exactly where you’re coming from, despite the different context. We don’t have exams to put our students up, so sometimes it’s just a case of a student asking to go up so many times that they wear the teacher down, and get put up just to make them go away. And then there’s the classic “But teacher, I already in this level for 3 weeks and I need ILETS 6 (sic)”. Don’t you just wish there could be an undisputable universal level test sometimes?
Here’s to the year getting better and the students and other teachers realising that going up a level does not automatically mean you learn more!
Sandy
Thank you for the solidarity, Sandy!
Not much to add but definitely agree that students should realise that going up to the next level isn’t necessarily going to benefit them.
Mike =)
Lots of us experience this every so often, especially in private sectors here in Canada. It’s more about customer pleasing than about what’s best for the student or the class, but that’s another post.
Hope you get a handle on how to deal so everyone’s sanity remains intact. Perhaps challenging at a level far higher than they are capable might prove the point.
Good luck!