Should I stay or should I go?

Now that I am almost through the third term I find myself wondering what I am going to do next year. I am going to stay in MTC. I am 95% sure of that. I am an acceptable to good teacher and I am getting better at it as I learn new things. I like the environment, the children, and the ability to connect with people that I otherwise would have never encountered. Yet I find myself weighed down with a lot concern about my next course of action.

The question I constantly ask myself is whether I am going to stay at my school or take a stab getting a teaching position elsewhere. I am getting tired of not being treated like a professional by my administration. I am tired of being criticized in front of other teachers for doing things I was told to do. I am tired of having my planning periods taken away by dumb meetings and professional development that now takes even some of my Saturdays away from me. I am tired of being talked to like I am a child. I am tired of being told that I am a bad classroom manager for sending loud and disruptive children out of my room so that I can teach the others. I am tired of being suffocated in bureaucracy and witnessing the massive misallocation of resources that happens in my district.

Most importantly I am tired of being treated like I am not important. I get the impression that I am replaceable and perhaps will be replaced. That feeling sucks.

The only thing that keeps me where I am are the children. I love them to death, even the ones that play with my last nerve. At least they have an excuse for being messed up. I know that my students need me more than those kids in the suburbs. They have never met a teacher like me and I don't think some of them ever will.

I don't want them to think I walked away from them because the going got hard. That is not the lesson I want to teach them.

The point is that I am seriously thinking about going to a place where even one of those aforementioned factors are improved. I just want to be respected.

I can't decide what to do.

January

I decided to turn this monthly post into sort of a status update on my teaching career (for those who are following).

I think I am starting to enjoy teaching. Last semester, I worked really, really hard and didn't get much out of it. For the bulk of the time I was always behind on grading, I rarely made parental calls, I didn't sleep well at night because I was either working or thinking about the next thing that had to be done.

The biggest change is that I've chilled out a lot. I've accepted that some things will never happen. For example, I will never make some people in my building happy. I'm OK with that. I realized that I was not responsible for making my kids be responsible--for brining their books, homework, and supplies to class. I could only offer rewards and consequences. Carrying the whole world on my back is not my responsibility.

The big leap for me was finally controlling things I could control. For example, I try to plan lessons out two weeks in advance (one prep is already planned until Spring Break) and I grade papers as soon as I get them. It is so easy to get behind and I am working hard not to fall into trap. In my classroom, I make an effort to make every second of time count--building on my efficiency from last semester.

My class management is not the best but it is getting better. I have more rewards (tickets are the greatest things ever) and I am making a conscious effort to be more consistent.

The glaring weak spot seems to be my personal life (or lack thereof). At some point I will make my life be about something more than teaching and talking to my friends (almost all of whom are teachers) about teaching. I'm kind of hoping that this situation resolves itself.

Here's hoping that I can build on January's progress in February.