Teacher Talk - Intro/Unpacking a Rough Day

I have had this blog for a few years now and haven't really utilized it at all. There have been a few posts here and there, and none at all last year. Then Wayward Newlyweds became a crazy idea, and I found something to blog about, which was really a lot of fun! Now, I am sitting at my desk at home, alone, listening to the sound of rain and traffic outside. I was not expecting to be here posting on The Pagan English Teacher today but here I am.

The reason I am here is that I had a bit of a rough teaching day today, and needed a place to...not really vent, but unpack my feelings.

I won't go into a lot of detail, but basically a student that I feel I am starting to make a connection with had a panic attack in class, and I feel like I did not handle the situation well. At first I thought they might have been reacting to something in the book they were reading, as they are an avid reader, and I know sometimes I react quiet intensively to things I read. I couldn't quite tell if they were laughing or crying. Once I figured out they were not ok, I felt like my brain stopped. I stayed fairly calm on the outside, but inside I was searching for the right course of action. I tried calling their counselor first...no answer. Luckily the room I am working out of right now has an adjoining room that is part of the same program, with another teacher there. I went there and asked for the other teacher to stay with my student while I went down to counseling to see if their counselor could be made available. By the time I made it back, the other teacher and EA had made the call to move my other students into the adjoining room so the student could have a quiet space to come down. Myself and the other teacher sat with them and tried to coach them breathing and reassure them that they was safe, and we eventually managed to get them to a place where they could walk down to counseling with my colleague. When they left I felt completely useless and stupid that I hadn't been able to recognize what was happening faster. This student had told me that they have a hard time in loud areas and unfortunately the make up of that particular block includes a group of rather energetic loud speaking boys. I am by no means blaming them for what happened, but in hindsight I wish I had asked them to lower their voices a bit or suggest that the student hangout in the other room for a few minutes.

I think I'm really just afraid that the connection I had been making with this student might be broken because I didn't recognize what was happening and try and make them feel safe sooner. This was only the first block and it coloured my whole day. Then, just to add on top of that we had a staff meeting that I forgot about and was half way to Abbotsford before I was reminded  by my phone and had to turn around.

When I got home it was about 5:45pm and I would usually start dinner around that time, but I would also usually have given myself about an hour and a half decompress time between getting home and starting dinner. Today, my usual decompress window had been eaten up sitting in traffic, and I was hungry. But I was also feeling really down. I had kind of a rough day, I had no one I was coming home to, and I wanted my time to do nothing before having to do chores. I sat on my but for about 10 minutes trying to decide what to do. I don't know what made me think of it. but I decided to sit down at the computer and blog about the day. Then I thought, 'why not make it a new series type thing, like wayward newlyweds but for teaching stuff.' 

So that is where I'm at. Welcome to the new Pagan English Teacher series 'Teacher Talk'

Once again I make no promises for regular posts but I am going to try and use this series as an outlet, and possibly reflection tool for my teaching for a while. We will see how it goes. I know it's a bit weird to start off something new like this with a bit of a downer story, but this was the event that lead to the idea so there you go. Thinking back on it now, I think there may have been a few different steps I could have taken, and will hopefully be able to remember and implement if and or when this happens again, but right now I still just feel like I let this student down, and I really hope that I have not damaged our connection. I will try and remain optimistic!

For now,

Cheers

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