Sick Day

Sometimes, it's really hard to live with the fact that I am, in fact, a bad teacher. I am unorganized. My classroom management alternates between fair and poor. My explanations can be incomprehensible and my lessons are often disasters. Now, I myself do not like failing, or being bad at anything, but I can take it. I never was very good at chess (or mountain biking, swimming, anything musical or artistic) or a whole host of other things that I usually decided were not important. But teaching is important. It's important to all my students and to the parents who entrusted these students to me. If I can't teach them what they need to know, they won't graduate. Everyone says the first year is the hardest, everyone says I'll get better, but I need to be a good teacher right now for these kids, and I'm not. I don't know that I could work any harder at it. As it is, I usually spend my entire day working, from when I get out of bed until when I get back in bed again. I stop to eat, and drive places (usually to office depot or wal-mart for something for school) but teaching is consuming me. I wouldn't mind so much, if only all that work paid off, if only somehow by working 12 or 14 hour days I would become a better teacher, but that's not happening right now, and I'm having trouble forgiving myself for not being better at this. For not being more organized. For not even knowing how to do this job better. For all my kids who will be retesting next fall.