thoughts- just thoughts

It's 11:30pm right now on a Monday night. It was a rainy post-baptism Sunday and I scurried home after a quick lunch with close friends to figure out my lesson plans for the upcoming week. My SAP plans were already prepared so I was just adding my finishing touches to my grade 10 Family Studies lessons. As I try my best to plan an array of activities, I am confident about these plans but it feels very different from last year. Unfortunately, I am coming out of a week where I am teaching very interesting topics with celebrity references, relevant materials, interesting videos...but have been met with students who disrespect me, stay on their phones the entire lesson and challenge my instructions. Day after day, I try to draw from my well of love, care and perseverance...but I seem to be running really, really dry. My lessons feel no different from fully coloured print advertisements that just gets soaked in the rain and eventually ends up by the sewer waiting to escorted away by another gust of wind. Feelings of anticipation have been replaced with heavy weights on my shoulders. They talk over my instructions, they refuse to open their laptops, they would not get up to participate in a gallery walk. I understand that my course will not change the trajectory of their high school career but I wish they just gave my activities and lessons a try because it might just give them a better understanding of the world around them. I wish they would just watch the 4 minute video so they can engage in a critical discussion about topics that affect them. I wish they could enjoy what my course has to offer. Yes, my course is not as captivating as your tiktok reels, as interactive as a mobile game and as important as your math homework...but there is value to some of these topics. I also wish they remember that I am an ordinary human being. I am not an emotionless robot who delivers marks and judges your food. I am trying to do my job and I wish you could also do yours as well.