become better at my job

just would like to become faster and effeciant. I just don’t want to be fired for being slow. I hate being slow…

that you’re prepared in advance and doing your best really increases job satisfaction. At least, it does if you like your job to start with!

I’ve been getting to work early (less morning rush), got everything prepared in advance, except for my one troublesome class _{but since everything else is under control that’s not such a big deal…}

I have good ideas for lesson plans through the end of the month too. Yay me!

One of the things I noticed a few months ago is that even though my students are usually generally well-behaved, I experienced certain days (sometimes two-day periods) at school where most of my classes were troublesome – whether it was through absolute non-participation, or through temper-tantrum-type stuff.

I’m an assistant teacher for 3 grades, and it wasn’t specific to one grade (well, younger ones were worse). One day, I had made a special effort to do a fun activity, very easy, because I had done more difficult grammar stuff the previous class. But no one would participate. I totally didn’t expect that from them.

It was frustrating, but later I realized that they had a test period coming up imminently. Instead of doing something fun “wasting time”, they were all worried about the test – they would have preferred doing difficult grammar exercises!

After they get their tests back I saw some temper tantrums from students who got poor results, so I realized that’s the best time to do something really easy /low stress, just to encourage participation and inclusion. Plus the sense they’re “wasting time” is like a reward for their hard work before!

It totally made sense once I remembered how students’ logic works – having been one myself ;-)

Before Christmas break, I was putting a lot of effort into my lesson plans and prep. It was wearing me out.

Now, I’m trying to work smarter, rather than harder. I’ve done quite a lot of activities with the kids, and I want to reflect back on which were most successful. That way I can use similar frameworks to develop new activities. I’d like to spend less time giving instructions, so they’ll have more time to use English.

My main criteria for a successful activity are 1) fun, so that they actually participate, and 2) useful (not too easy, not too hard).

The dilemma is in keeping the clueless kids interested (easy & fun), while not “Kindergartening” the advanced kids.

Well, not sure how to do this. I mean, I have some ideas of the things I’d like to improve on, but if at all possible, I don’t want to become a pain in the butt for others.

The overall problem is, I don’t speak the background language much at all (I’m an English teacher), so if I offer to help out more, or ask my coworkers for extra work, I’m afraid it will be more of a hindrance than a help!

But if I spend my free time at work studying Japanese, then it’s OBVIOUS that I’m not working. And also if people have questions about English or want to chat, when they see me studying, it makes me seem ‘inaccessible’.

Anyway, in the next few months before I leave, I won’t manage to learn Japanese to a conversational level… so I feel like my hands are tied.

Or maybe I’m just a slacker.