Congrats Neal, good luck in your career change! Teaching can be amazing!

Neal, shame the hotel thing didn't work out. You've chosen an honourable and valuable profession and I reckon you'll make a fist of it once you get into the system. It sounds like you've managed to get onto a good program so if you approach it like everything else, you'll be a shoe in for a permanent spot in good time. All the best mate and don't let the little buggers get you down. Dealing with teenagers can really be a bear.

I have been teaching sporadically in the university and at the lawyer's school, so that is a very different kind of teaching that dealing with young guys. When you teach universitaries and specially post-universitaries, the key thing is to explain things well, specially the basic concepts they need to use in the future as base of their reasoning. However, in my opinion, when teaching young people the main difficulty is actually motivating them. Grown ups in post-university WANT to learn, they are there for a reason and expect that you explain things well; however youngsters many times do NOT want to learn, they are there because their parents sent them to school or because they do not want to work.

So my advice is that you read some books about psychology of teaching to young people. But choose wisely, there are too many "good will" psychologist writing nonesense around.

That original system, which I myself experimented, worked reasonably well and served to lead people into what was most appropiate to their abilities/motivation, but as you say it has been destroyed by good-will leftists who think that it was classist or leaded to frustrations. What a stupidity. Having in the same class intelligent and stupid childs with and without a support at home and huge differences in many areas is a sure way to disaster. But don't tell that a leftist, they want everybody to be able to have a universitary title -and if they lack the level, then let's move that level down. So everybody can be "equal".

For me that is nonesense, people need to get a fair opportunity that is not limited by their family money and teaching support to make the best out of it. But if they don't, then so be it and it's perfectly acceptabel that they work at something else instead of frustrating themselves and destroying the universitary education of the others who can/will.

Now try to explain that to a no-brainer leftist ... :doh:

:haha::salute: Welcome to the education system.:shifty: That aspect of teaching I don't miss at all.

Don't blame you for getting out of the hospitality trade Neal, I've noticed that the higher up the ladder you go in it the more...'rubbish' gets dropped on your head. That's why I'm staying near the ground, the frequency of the drops are higher but there's a protective layer of supervisors over my head to absorb a lot of it.

My family moved to Houston in 1959 when it was just all fields lol

I was just 16 in high school. Nine years in the US Navy right out of highschool still only 27 I came back to Houston working for Southwest Security as a trouble shooter in 1971-72 installing smoke detectors at Shell Oil on the channel, had the keys to every 7-11, stop and go and u totem in Houston.

Took a chance at being a salesman for Southwest Marine selling sailboats in Seabrook for 5 years and I am so glad I did ... reached out for my full potential and became top salesman.

Now I am just an old retired sailor on social security trying to write the next best submarine movie, "Last Patrol" ever written, again reaching out for the impossiable.

I say go where your heart leads you so when it's over you can say, "at least I tried my best"

Time is only an extension of his promise to come back for us all someday ... :yep:

Update 2013

I've had a couple people ask me about my teaching job, so I thought it would be worth an update. Over the summer I had probably 8 interviews. I didn't get any of the jobs. One was for a co-op teacher for students interning at a hotel. I would have been perfect for that, with my degree and background in hotels. I think I did well in that interview and I checked back for the verdict...once a week for 5 weeks, before finally being told the job had been filled by an internal candidate. I also interviewed for 8th grade English, middle school science and even a history position at the max security high school where they store the gangbangers before turning them loose on the world. Nada. :O:

The last interview I received was telling: the principal was a nice lady, about 35, and she asked good questions and was interesting to talk with. The other members of the team were also in the interview, ladies ranging from 22 to 29 yrs old (you can see where this is going). I was recommended by one of my co-student teachers who had scored a job there. She told them I was a really sensible man with broad experience, friendly, easy to work with (we had been in the training classes together and on some of the same teams). After the interview, I went to one of the pedagogy classes with the other student teachers, including the lady who endorsed me. She asked me about the interview, and I described it. There another student teacher at our table (not part of our normal group) exclaimed she was interviewing there too later (she was young, willowy thin). We wished her luck. So, the next day the principle called me to let me know I didn't get the job, and to thank me for interviewing. She even said I could use her as a reference on any future interviews. I asked her what qualifications I needed to shore up, and she revealed that she liked me for the job, but the other teachers wanted someone close to their own age, someone they felt would fit in with their group. Alas. I can understand a group of young ladies having reluctance to bring in an old cowboy to their team. But that wasn't getting me any closer to a teaching job.

So, I missed the initial new teacher day. Most of my classmates had jobs. Pretty disheartening, but that's life, there are no guarantees. Obviously these experienced principals felt I was lacking something, probably more teaching experience. So, I signed up to substitute teach. It was better than nothing, it would get me in the classroom, and possibly help me get some principal to love me and bring me in to fill a vacancy.

Coming up: Onkel Neal and the legions of hell.

Neal
Very sensible course of action. :yep: Experience is a top selling tool when interviewing.

Advice
 

[quote] Tak, I know you're a teacher, any advice? Any other teachers out there? [\quote]

I went into teaching computers and software for a software company and did well for 13 years before the hi-tech bubble burst. After they went under, and two years lookin, I started teaching programming at entry level at the community college.

I went from teaching adults who wanted to learn to kids who didn't. I got a lot of attitude and grief.

My advice, Neal, stay cool. Everyone can't do everything well, teachers or students. I learned as much teaching as my students did. I just didn't realize it until I retired.

Here's some real advice:
1> Don't jingle keys or coins in your pocket when talking.
2> Walk around as you teach, up front and among the students,making eye contact.
3> Talk to the kid in the back row.
4> Write BIG on the board, for the back row.
5> Admit it when you can't answer a question -- but get the answer back to them pronto. With reference/proof/example.
6> Anticipate what questions you are likely to have to face, ahead of time.


Good luck!:know:

As golfer Chi Chi Rodriguez told me years ago, "Everything works out for the best!" And you know what Neal? He was right. :yeah:

May God have mercy on your soul.:haha:
http://www.theblaze.com/wp-content/u...t2-620x413.jpg

For the most part, subbing isn't that bad. If you get called a lot, you can pick and chose which classes you take.:yeah: It also was a great learning experience.:doh: I'll have to give you a call to tell you the good stories.:D

It was the best of times. It was the worst of times.:03:

1000% Yes:up: Don't blow your top at them. If they (the kids) figure out they can push your buttons to get you to blow up.....

It's very entertaining....for them.

This is what both my sister and one of my high school classmates had to do to land a a full time position.One teaches in Louisiana the other in Florida.A few years before my mother retired from teaching she mentored a new teacher that was male and in his fifties so they do hire older people you just have to go to the right school.

Yes, age and maturity should go a long way I would have thought...it certainly helped me after I retired.

Neal, as a high school student, I can give you this advice:

Keep class interesting. Mix it up. Come up with new ideas. Consider suggestions from the students. Really get to know the students. Be a friend to them. If there's a kid who doesn't like you and he shows it, feel free to use humorous insults. The rest of the class will love it. Don't be afraid to throw some fun things in the mix every once in a while.

Also, try to get to know a bit about what the kids like.

My old history teacher was an awesome guy. I loved his class. He did stuff like this. He'd go out of his way to make sure we learned something in the chapter. I'm thinking of calling him to ask him if he'll come back since Ms. Communist resigned this week. :sunny:

Do you know what you will be teaching? :hmm2: