Our school ends Memorial Day weekend, and aside from having a high school graduate!, it’s a calmer time. Tests are done and preps can wait.
But there’s an apt analogy for what it’s like teaching high school and it’s AI.
Teaching high school is like working with a different AI model each day. It might be a good one and it might by gobbledygook. This also depends on the person.
I stand at the front of the room, next to their desk, and online via Google Classroom and I make a request: Please read this article (sometimes it’s only blog posts from here) and write three sentences about what you learned.
Three sentences! Well, the AI never complains about that.
Often the work is okay to great – just like AI. Sometimes it’s nonsensical. Just like AI.
Early on, teaching felt overwhelming because I tried to do too much. It’s like parenting in that sense, only you have 120 kids. Jim Gaffigan has a good joke about this: what’s it like having a fourth kid? Imagine you’re treading water and someone hands you a baby. Students aren’t your kids, but they’re also not not your kids. I’ve hugged crying kids, fed hungry kids, listened, counseled, and encouraged. Kids are messy too.
Teaching got easier when I simplified my goals: pass the state exam, build relationships, be safe. If I’m working towards two or three of those things at any given time then we are making progress.
Teaching is a good situation to see the adage that people overestimate what they can get done in a day and underestimate what they can get done in a year. The kids change so much. It may not always be in the way I hoped – but it’s often in the way they need.
Have a great summer.
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