Quote: am subbing middle school (6-8) and talk about some disrespectful, rude kids...not all of them of course but enough to make it very difficult to teach.
yeah, being a sub for that age group must be really tough. Just something to bear in mind, though - I've been shocked at how intolerant and inflexible the middle school teachers were with my kids (and we have a GOOD school).
Honestly, reacting to them with rigidness and ill-humour just keeps the spiral going downward. The teachers they loved the most were the ones who were truly entertaining, made their objectives very clear, and had kindness behind their firmness. The ones they hated were the ones who were confusing, wrote assignments on the board at the end of class so they didn't have time to copy them, were arbitrary and negative, wouldn't admit a mistake if a child corrected them (talk about losing all credibility!), didn't allow wiggly boys to wiggle a little, criticized them in front of other students, etc.
Not saying YOU would do any of these things, just trying to point out the things that make middle school torturous for a lot of kids. (And mine are good kids, smart, one has mild ADD ).
Also - lots of teachers don't seem to realize - this generation does not really read cursive! I can't tell you the number of times my kids have said they didn't know what the comments the teacher wrote on their paper meant, because they couldn't read it! It might as well be Greek!
