JCC Has anyone been a Substitute Teacher before?

So, I'll be a Substitute Teacher from this Monday until I start my next full-time job in late November, so it will be a good month. But I'm a little nervous.

I was a Corps Member in City Year Rhode Island a couple years ago: acting like the teacher's assistant (5th grade), running small group interventions to tutor the ones who really needed the help in reading/math/leadership and encouraging high attendance, and helping run the afterschool program. Last year I was a Team Leader in NCCC, managing a diverse team of 18-24 year olds on different projects with nonprofits throughout the country (my team was mostly in California, Oregon, and Nevada). And one of those projects was helping supervise kids and run summer programming at a Boys & Girls Club (between Reno and Carson City, near Lake Tahoe). And I volunteered in India for 5 weeks last summer, between City Year and NCCC, helping out a small pre-school of about 6 kids in the mornings, and helping tutor older children and young teenagers from a poor neighborhood in the afternoons.

So I have some experience with teaching and working with kids, more on the younger side though. But being Team Leader and enforcing strict policies for college-age young adults for a year (living with people you're the boss of isn't easy, especially when your boss expects you to enforce policies 24/7, and you also have to share cooking/cleaning duties and bathrooms and living/sleeping space and the only vehicle with your team too!) probably helped more prepare somewhat for high school students.

I'm taking this job (which I thought I could have started in September, but the bureaucratic process is much longer than I thought it would be) until I start my next full-time job as a VISTA with a brand-new program that's partnering with my local school department, to give individualized attention to each 12th grader in my hometown to help them graduate and come up with a post-graduation plan (which could be college, or an apprenticeship, or full-time job, or paid internship, or AmeriCorps, or the military, or a technical school, etc). And I'll be like one of the program managers and designers. So I figured being a Substitute Teacher would help me understand the education system better while helping out my hometown (while building on what I've learned), and might help me decide if I want to do something like Teach For America. And it will help me pay the insurance bills until the next job starts (having Crohn's disease and being over 26 is expensive), and I'm sure I'm going to have to start paying more for my college debt soon too. (Which wasn't in education, it was a bachelor's in political science, and a master's degree in public administration).

So yeah, I have some experience, but I've never been the only adult and left completely in charge of a classroom for an entire day before. Does anyone have any advice on being a Substitute Teacher?

 

Don't worry. Relax. Everyone will assume you'll be crappy anyway.

 

I used to troll subs.

 

When I was a boy, we had a project to grow plants. They had an intentionally short life cycle to make the thing fit into a neat unit of the science curriculum, so they only blosssomed a few weeks before dying. I had missed several days some time back, and thus my plant had went un-watered period. That put it about a week or two behind everyone else's. As a result, then, our substitute teacher arrived on the day that everyone else's plant was dying and mine was in full blossom. I don't think I've ever enjoyed a 20 minute lecture on responsibility so much in my whole life. I was literally quaking with laughter as he berated everyone for just letting their plants die, and asking them if they had pets or were going to raise children in the same fashion.

Please try to do something like this for someone, if you can manage.

 

I don't think the American schools would have caned. It's why they're such an unruly lot - spare the rod, spoil the child. Well, what makes the British Empire great is discipline! And discipline comes from being given a good hard dicky back ride in Sir's study. Or a caning.

 

In my school there was a substitute teacher -who was chosen to sub quite often- that everyone loved and was never trolled, and she always showed the movie Matilda every time she subbed.

And this was when I was a senior in high school, not grade school. It might have helped that she was an adorable old lady.

So I guess my advice is be on old lady and show Matilda?



But for real, I think it depends on the age of the kids. If they are young, you'll probably be fine. If they are middle school or older, just don't let them get to you no matter what they might try.

 

i think the most important part of being a good substitute teacher is understanding your role. if you're a long-term it's a little different, but if you're just subbing for a couple days or whatever in different classes, you need to understand that the teacher probably doesn't want you teaching their students anything. your job is to follow the plans as best you can, keep the peace, and enforce rules. be firm but fair, and most importantly, be clear. but like, don't be a hardass. you're a sub, and the kids have no reason to respect you when they walk in that door. so don't expect them to, until you earn it.

work to earn their respect and get them to like you by being funny, firm, and clear. it's a pretty sweet gig. i did it all last year until i got a long-term job.

 

You should also try and be in the same realm as Prenn for beards, Ghost.

 

Lots of people have been substitute teachers before.

 

Don't give them the spiel that you gave us in your opening post. Half of them will fall asleep, and the other half will throw stuff at you.

 

Because this never gets old:

 

yeah don't be that guy.