A Primary Experiment

I was sitting on the train on my way home from work on Tuesday when I got a call about work for the next day. It appears that ITN has put me at the top of their call list. As happy as I am about that, I was a bit shocked when I was asked if I would go work at a primary school. I was assured that it was a lovely school, the lessons would be all planned. I asked what age of kids - 8 years old. When I still couldn't give an answer, I was told to think about it and call back. So I did. I thought - how bad could it be? It's only 1 day. It might even be fun. So I phoned back and said yes.

When I got to the school, the teacher was there. She went over the lesson plans for the day. Then she told me that the class had 24 boys and 5 girls. She said the boys could be a bit of a handful. The morning went fine. I had them in the computer room doing some kind of art in MS Paint. Then in Math I had to teach them division. Clever bunch of kids - most of them got it right away. I even got hugged several times by a really cute black kid. I was thinking that the day was going quite well. Then lunch happened. I'm not sure if they had too much sugar during their lunch break or what, but the rest of the day was completely different. It started when I went to collect the kids from the playground at the end of lunch. They could not stand still and quiet in a line. That was when I had to deal with my first set of tears. One boy started crying because another boy had called him names. So I am dealing with that while trying to get the rest of the class settled. The rest of the afternoon carried on in much the same way. It was problem after problem. So and so called me this. So and so took my eraser. So and so took my chair. Then there was the overly helpful ones. I'll write the name of the bad kids on the board. No thanks, can you just sit down and read like you are supposed to! I'll help you with the blocks (during the science experiment on friction). No, actually, when you help, you are in the way and the other kids can't see! But they don't see reason at that age. There was a couple more crying episodes (boys again) that I had to deal with. Finally 3:15 arrived.

I don't know how primary teachers do it! The kids are so hyper. And so needy. It was exhausting! As cute as they are at 8 years old, 29 of them is too many for me! I tried it out for a day as an experiment, and my conclusion is: Never again!