Tough Decisions

I personally think teaching is nothing but a series of tough decisions, some carrying more weight than others. I constantly ask myself: Should I escalate the consequence or give another verbal cue? It is better to ignore or acknowledge this student’s comment? Does this student’s behavior today warrant a phone call home? Do I have enough materials for this lesson? Am I challenging my students enough? Am I challenging them too much? Am I actually doing everything I can to reach my students? (Ha, no to that.) I don’t know if it’s just a quirk of being a teacher, but I spend a decent amount of time second-guessing what I am doing.

            I am only about seven weeks into the school year at this point (when I was writing this blog) and at this point, I haven’t made any tough decision that stands out in my mind. The school year is still too new. And I think I have repressed many of the truly trying days from last year.

Overall though, one of my hardest decisions as an educator had more to do with me than my students. I have already touched on this briefly in a previous blog post (Something Old, Something New), so I am not going to get super in-depth. Last year, I was struggling with the workload, the stress, and classroom management. I was unhappy with my job and I knew I needed to do something different. I wanted to try teaching chemistry, or at the very least have less preps. That is when I started thinking about moving to a new school district.

If I left, I could potentially teach what I wanted. Or I could move to a larger school with more teachers and less preps per a teacher as a result. But this also meant I would be just another teacher leaving H.W. Byers. The English III and IV teacher before only lasted a year. Same with the one before that. So I started asking for advice and input from others. I talked to my mother, my friends from MTC, and I even sent an email to Sarah Jacobs.

Sarah happened to be very adamant on staying at the same school for the two years of MTC and based on her advice, I started to see if any other teaching positions were available within my school that were better suited to my preferences. H.W. Byers High School already had a veteran Chemistry teacher – who briefly toyed with the idea of retiring and ultimately decided to stay on another year – so that turned out not to be an option. Eventually, I learned of an opening in the middle school. I would still be teaching English, but I would be working with younger kids and I would have one less prep. Anything sounded better than what I was doing at the time, so I said yes and accepted the new position.

The most immediate consequence was that I wouldn’t be staying in the high school and staying with my students. But I only moved to the middle school, right across the parking lot. I could have moved a lot farther away. Instead, I still see my old students from time to time. And they actually seem happy to see me. On the other hand, though, they also jokingly ask, “Did we run you off, Ms. Lindsay?” And when they do, I feel like maybe I should have stuck it out in the high school for another year. I mean, it couldn’t have been any worse than the year before.

In the end, I think I made the right decision, though. I only have to plan for two classes this year. I am more firm with the eighth graders (although they are their own brand of crazy). I am a week ahead in lesson plans. I have some reusable material from last year and Liz Towle shared her materials with me as well. I have had less difficulty getting in touch with parents (because most are still involved at this point). I am already reading an extended text with my children. I have better procedures in place. I have a principle who is present and authoritative. Classroom management is a bit of a struggle, but this is only my second year of teaching. I have a lot of growing to do still. I don’t regret my decision to move down a few grades. If you’re miserable or unhappy, can you really expect to do your job well/to the best of your ability? Sometimes, you have to make personal decisions – do what’s best for yourself – in order to be the best teacher (or other choice of profession) you can be.