Observing a Substitute Teacher

I walked into class today to find that the teacher was gone and there was a substitute. This gave me the chance to observe the classroom when the teacher was missing. It takes a special kind of person to be a substitute teacher, because it is a really tough job. The students thought that since their teacher was gone, they had the opportunity to misbehave during class. The students began class like they did each day, taking their daily map quiz. Then they went on to read about South America in their atlases. Early on, I realized that this was more of a lecture style class, in which the students read the text and the teacher talked more about what they had read. The students were having a hard time paying attention throughout the lecture. They were used to being vocal in class through discussions, which created problem early during the class time. The substitute was having a difficult time disciplining some of the students, which is understandable. This isn’t the students’ teacher, so they feel as though it doesn’t matter how they act. This causes me to wonder: How do you discipline as a substitute teacher? Or as a teacher? How do you manage the classroom without having to stop your lesson to ask a student to behave? This lack of respect escalated to the point in which as student told the teacher that he was singling him out for bad behavior because he was black. This was clearly not the case, as the teacher had disciplined other students that weren’t black. What bothered me most was that many of the students found this comment to be funny- especially the student who made it and his other African American peers. I’m not sure if that is because these students were a little more comfortable with the topic of racism, but it still bothered me because I don’t think that racism is a humorous topic. This situation in class also causes me to ask: Do kids today think that racism is funny? With comedians like Chris Rock (although I’m not sure seventh graders should be old enough to listen to or watch his comedy) racism is funny rather than depressing. After this incident, the students watched a video on South America. While I used to look forward to watching videos in class, these students seemed uninterested and didn’t pay attention. I could see many of them writing notes and even getting up and walking around the classroom. Although today’s class was a little less exciting for the students, the activities they did were classic plans that are left for substitutes. In my experiences with having substitutes, many times we did the same. It may not be as interesting, but it is a plan in which the students still learn that day.