I recently taught a class for the first time :)
I was filling in for the actual teacher, and the class was part of a homeschooling co-op where different moms gather and teach classes on different things. This class was on the water cycle, and I was tasked with teaching the children about precipitation.
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I had agreed to this deal in a very casual, last-minute kinda way. My mom (the teacher) had been looking for someone to take her place because my little brother's cast was coming off and she had to take him to the doctor. At some point, she had the bright idea to ask me, and I was like "yeah sure man no big deal, I can handle children, I'm the oldest child of like 25 kids, it's no big deal."
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And she was like, "Okay, if I can't find another replacement inshallah you're going to teach the class."
So I promptly went to bed and didn't think about it until Monday, when my mother shook me awake and announced, "It's time for class!".
Needless to say, I had
a) not prepared any lessons
b) not read the lessons that my mother had prepared
c) no idea what I'd be teaching
I sort of stumbled around collecting the supplies my mother was handing me; a binder with the lesson (JUST TEACH THEM PRECIPITATION), some dry erase markers, and all the supplies for the activity.
Furthermore, although I would be following my mom to the school, I would have to drive back ALL BY MYSELF, which was frightening because it was only the second time I'd done something like that, and the first time I was doing it with a license. (Dear Officers That May Be Reading This, the first time was because my parents had locked themselves out of the car while they were at a Little Caesars, and I was the only one who could go bail them out, and I can't reasonably be blamed for that).
My mom dropped me off, showed me to the classroom, and told me to chill out. I guess in retrospect I may have looked something like this:
I spent the entire 15 minutes rearranging the desks and re-drawing the little 'water cycle diagram' I'd scrawled on the board. (I also took some photos, because I wanted to text them to my cousin and prove that I had done something productive on break besides sleeping, cleaning, and sort-of learning how to code).
The classroom itself wasn't very big, and I knew I was only going to be teaching four students (minus my brother) but that didn't stop me from stressing out, and then my first student arrived.
He was so adorable, with a little backpack and his mom in tow. She dropped him off, and he fiddled with a toy car for a while til' the second student came. This kid was also cute (spoiler alert: THEY WERE ALL CUTE) but instead of a backpack, he had a huge deck of football cards.
I chatted with them for a while about sports until the last two students arrived with his mom, who waved cheerfully at me, and then forcefully locked the door. I can't say I wasn't terrified, because now I was alone with four little children, waiting for me to inject their minds with knowledge.
I think that's when they decided that
a) I was weak
b) I didn't know anything, and
c) they had all the power.
"We learned about the water cycle!" one kid shouted, complete with dramatic eye-rolling, before he turned away from the board and started a conversation about which sport was the raddest.
I was totally not prepared for this, so I just joined in their conversation, desperate to win back their attention by any means possible.
"Okay, so you guys want to be sportsmen?" I squeaked. "That's so cool, uh, what do you want to be when you grow up?"
"A football player."
"A soccer player."
"My mom teaches the other class, and she did science things with us last time."
"A racecar driver."
I jumped on that third response and blurted, "Well, we're GOING to be doing science stuff today, TOO, so let's go through the water cycle reeeeeally quickly, okay?"
It took about three seconds to get through the previous lessons (evaporation, condensation) and then two seconds to explain precipitation. Then I whipped out my supplies for the Big Experiment.
It was set up like this: I filled a clear cup halfway with water (to represent the atmosphere), and halfway with shaving cream (to be the clouds in the sky). Then I took a dropper full of blue dye and squirted it through the 'cloud'.
The dye would seep through and drizzle down through the water, simulating rain.
The kids thought it was immeasurably rad, and for a while I was excited because I'd recaptured their attention. However, there was a problem: I hadn't brought enough water to fill all their cups all the way.
"I'm coming back," I told them as I stepped out of the door. "Don't lock me out, okay?"
"Okay!"
Now, my mother had already warned me that these children had a tendency to run, so I basically sprinted to the bathroom, filled the bottle, and hightailed it back - but nobody had left.
They were biding their time.
I handed them each a plastic clear cup and told them to hold onto it, but when I started filling up the cups, it turned out that I still didn't have enough water. This time, when I burst out of the room at top speed, two of the boys followed me.
The other kids cheered as I chased the escapees around. One of them bolted out to the room where the mothers were, and I decided not to follow him because the other runner was doing circles in the hall. When I came back, the first boy had returned, and one of the students who had been sitting down was halfway out of his seat, ready to repeat the act.
It took about 5 minutes to sit them all down, and when that was done, I had to deal with the shaving cream.
Everyone wanted to stick their fingers in it, and because I wasn't sure how long I had to keep them in class, I let them drag it out and play with the white fluff. They spent hours shaping it like "real clouds".
Then it turned out that there was only one dropper in the supply case, so they couldn't all do their experiments at the same time, which meant I had to let the waiting children continue to mess with the shaving cream. Needless to say, the cleanup afterwards was a huge ordeal, and I got sprayed in the face with blue fluff about three times.
However, everybody seemed to grasp the idea of precipitation really well (that's what I was there for, anyway). They were really excited about their 'rain in a cup' - so excited that they wanted to take their cups home, but I had to say no.That didn't stop one child from attempting to sneak out of the room with it after class, though. He would have gotten away with it, too, if it weren't for his sneaky giggling and constant looking back.
Unfortunately, the cloud experiment was the coolest thing I had in my repertoire, besides some homework I cheerfully passed out and they all reluctantly stowed away. When the clock hit 12:30, they began to crowd the door.
"Wait, class isn't over!" I cried, blocking the exit. Then, less certainly, I asked, "when does this class end?"
I had completely forgotten to ask my mom. There was no signal, so I couldn't call her, and if I opened the door to ask one of the other teachers, there would be no stopping the flood of children.
"We need to go RIGHT NOW," one of the kids urged "RIGHT NOW!" And when all the other children began clamoring and agreeing, I decided to trust them. So I stepped aside and let them pour out of the classroom.
It turned out later that I had released them thirty minutes early; but in my defense, it's very hard to hold a group of children for class on a single topic, the entirety of which has already been exhausted.
I'm glad that the experience wasn't too stressful, and although it wasn't enough to make me wanna become a teacher, I still enjoyed it.
Unfortunately, my own classes start next week :( no more sleeping in for me!
