Teaching diary 

There are some notes to my teaching praxis:

• When I started to teach the most difficult cognition was that I am not able to learn everyone everything. I came to the class full of ideals and when pupils failed, I blamed myself and I was very hard on myself then. It took me some time to struggle with it and find the balance. I believe that a good and honest teacher can influence a lot but definitely not everything. I also believe that every teacher has to go through this stage and no one can fully prepare you on it. I talked to my colleagues and they confirmed it to me. It is necessary to do self-reflection, but you cannot influence everything that is the fact I had to accept.
• Teaching is very much about paper work. As a form teacher I spent many hours filling in some sheets that did not have anything in common with a lesson itself. Sometimes I felt more like a secretary than a teacher.
• Pupils are not a problem, parents are. I was able to come to an agreement with almost every pupil. However, some parents come to school to argue or to tell you how you should do your work etc. I do not think I am very good at talks with parents. I have never had a bigger argument with a parent and I have been always able to find a compromise, but I think that I make too many concessions now and then.
• Every class is different and even every day is different. I plan lessons ahead and sometimes I do not stick to it when the situation requires it. For that it is good to have some back up plan. I have a notebook where I collect various activities for pupils. I take the notebook to the class and use it for example when I see that pupils are too tired or bored. However, it happens that the lesson totally goes wrong, and I cannot do much with that. I do not feel well after the lesson and I think about the lesson a lot even later at home. It brings me to the next point. I am not capable of letting work at work. I realize that it is not very healthy, but I has not found the way how to change it yet. My brother once said that it is a natural thing for women, men can simply turn it off and stop thinking about anything concerning their job. If it is true, I would rather be a man…
• One finding at the end. The university did not prepare me for the reality much. There are subjects like practical English or didactics which were/are really beneficial, but the rest of the compulsory subjects were not very useful for the praxis especially for teaching at elementary schools. I do not judge anybody’s work, it is my point of view and I know how hard is to make any changes in education even the smallest. However, the question is if it is possible to prepare for teaching reality.