Twas the night before classes
and all through my brain
I couldn’t stop thinking
tomorrow will be a pain
It comes from my knowing
that its been so long
Thought I was ready for classes
But it turns out I’m wrong
I don’t even have what to do
this first day
I don’t know what to write
Don’t know what to say
I’ll ask them some questions
and make it seem fun
But inside my heart
I just want to run
I used to be good at
this teaching game
But that was two years ago
I bet now I’m lame
The world has moved on to
a place I’ve not found
Students got smarter
I got fat and round
Yet I’ll still hit the classroom
and hope for the best
That should get me started
I’ll bullshit the rest.
In all seriousness, I’m a mess. I don’t have the first bit of a plan of what to do when I see these kids face to face and I have to do it for 4 straight classes. I’m nervous and unprepared and today was highly reflective of that. I didn’t get any writing done and I basically sat around and stared at the screen secretly hoping it would tell me what to do. It didn’t. The face to face stuff is terrifying all of a sudden and it used to represent the backbone of what I did as an instructor. Now I have to go back and relearn how to be a teacher and do it wearing a mask in a room full of masked faces that hide emotion and don’t betray understanding.
It is going to be a long day.