I'm currently in one of my "once in a blue moon" lesson planning kicks. I suppose I'm rested and have been away from children enough over my winter holiday. This may have caused a rush of teaching motivation. I'm not too sure. As much as I hate to say this now, it is good to get back to work after some time away. For me, it's nice to fall back into a routine and feel a sense of accomplishment...even if that sense is: I got out of bed today, walked into my classroom, and tried to teach, but the kids were more interested in making paper airplanes, throwing bits of eraser into each other's hair, or popping each other's zits.
Damn these kids need to get out more.
Why am I on a lesson planning kick, then? Well, I believe it's a last ditch effort to make my days teaching go a sliver better than usual. Teaching takes up a decent four to five hours a day and I'd like that time to be survivable. I am of the mindset that if I spend a meticulous three or four hours planning a day's lessons, then there's no way that it can't work. Even in my third year of "teaching," I should know that this profession just doesn't work that way. Well, I'm at the stage where I'm too desperate not to try. Organization helps, but who has time for that when you're planning meticuously for hours?
So, moving onto the big question...
I went to university to be a teacher. There are moments when I still like it. A good class and a good lesson can go a long way in the book of "feeling good about yourself." But a steady stream of bad can pull you down faster than an unforgiving riptide. I think often of friends at home or of those who have steady jobs in America. Experience, money, and comfort will increase with every year. In Hungary, my experience will increase but I won't stay here long enough for that to matter. In Hungary, I make forint, not USD. This currency is useless outside of this country. I don't know if I want to teach anymore. I don't know if I want to go back to America yet. What....then....does that leave for me to do????
Teaching, teaching, teaching...
...is so very tiring...thankless...frustrating...
Yet even so, I've been able to grasp the greatness of my experience here. Taking both the good and the bad. It is a once and a lifetime chance. And all the steady jobs and comfortable lives that seem to be on the other side of the fence never once tempted me to go back to America. Even leaving behind a steady USD salary in America, I always said to myself that I'd rather save my sanity than money.
Today, I took a personality quiz with my students in class to find out if we were optimists, pessimists, or realists. Surprisingly, I turned out to be a pessimist. The above paragraph seems pretty optimistic to me...but then again who's gonna believe an ESL workbook personality quiz?
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This (second) year I've been better about lesson planning, but I think it's actually because I'm a worse teacher. This year I'm more indifferent, but I can use good lesson plans as an excuse. For example, if my lesson is awful and the students are bad, who can blame them? But if I put effort into planning a good lesson, and they're still misbehaving and stupid, then obviously the fault must be theirs and not mine. That's my defense, I guess.
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