April 1, 2025 • 18 mins
Finding the sweet spot between following a regular teacher's lesson plans and bringing your authentic self to the classroom—that's the balance every substitute teacher must strike. Drawing from seven years of substitute teaching experience across elementary, middle, and high school classrooms, I explore when to stick to the script and when to trust your teaching instincts.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Greg Collins.
Substitute Teacher's Lounge.
It is April Fool's Day, 2025,april 1st Today.
Why don't we talk about?
You know, I feel like I'vegotten pretty smart as a
substitute teacher.
I've been doing it.
This is my seventh year now.
Maybe there might be times whenI look at what the teacher has
(00:25):
told me to do, or listen to whatshe has told me to do, and say
you know, I think I know better.
I don't think I want to do itthat way.
I'm going to do it the way Iwant to do it.
I don't know.
Am I just saying all this insarcasm, or are there times when
(00:47):
you shouldn't listen to theregular teacher?
Substitute Teacher's Loud.
All right, all right.
I am in the midst of a week ofsubstitute teaching.
That's probably the mostunusual blend I've ever had as
(01:11):
far as beginning to end.
We're getting.
This is our last week ofsubstitute teaching before our
spring break in this area, andit just so happens this week I
do two elementary school days, Ido a middle school day, then I
do two high school days.
Now that's stretching it rightthere, and you know it is hard
(01:33):
to adjust.
So help me get through all thisand I guess I'll be a stronger
person because of it.
I want to mention last week thehugs episode was a popular one,
but the one I want to, the thingI want to mention about it is
the elementary school kids thatI've had since I recorded that
(01:55):
episode just for giggles.
I told them they know I have apodcast and I said one of my
recent episodes was aboutwhether or not teachers should
hug students and it's funny,their perspective.
All of them I'll say all ofthem immediately said yes, they
should be able to hug thestudents, and I'm thinking, man,
(02:16):
how things change as you getolder.
I'm going to talk about thingsthat have happened to me.
This is actually over the lastseveral months, triggered by
something that happened recently, and then I'm actually going to
start by telling you a storythat, ironically, was recently
posted on our SubstituteTeachers Lounge Facebook group,
(02:39):
and I'll paraphrase a bit.
Not that I want to mess up thisposter story, but I wanted to
say it in such a way that Idon't plagiarize and maybe it
will encourage you to go aheadand look.
If you go there right now, it'sprobably the third or fourth
most recent story, because it'sgetting some decent replies and
(03:00):
I was curious, even if it wasposted, what the main reply
would be.
But here's what one of theteachers said.
He basically said that he hadbeen a teacher a long time
before he started substituteteaching and, with his
experience, decided to kind ofgo off track from what the
substitute teacher had left himto do.
I think it was something to theeffect of that the teacher had
(03:26):
left to have a or meet theirgrandchild and they were taking
a day off to do that.
So even though that teacherleft him a writing assignment to
have the kids do, he went offscript and had them write a
script paper about the teacher'sgrandchild and in effect he
(03:52):
thought it would be a nice touchif they all wrote a paper about
how great it is to havegrandkids and have a new member
of the family.
So he went off of.
Now that might've meant thatthis was a writing assignment
that the teacher thought wasimportant for the class and
instead he did whatever hewanted to do.
(04:15):
So let's start by offering thequestion would you ever do that?
I'm not sure I would do that.
The general consensus I'mgetting from the Facebook group
page is that they were proud ofhim for doing that, and I
normally don't go too much offwhat the teacher says, unless
(04:37):
there is a situation where I metthe teacher.
In fact I did this yesterday.
I'm actually subbing at thesame elementary school two days
in a row, but for differentteachers, and I dropped by the
second teacher's room on thefirst day to see what she had
going on and she basically toldme the general idea.
But she said if you want to,it's an art class.
(05:00):
But she said if you want to gooff track a little bit, just go
ahead and try some things as youwould want to.
That's a little bit differentthan doing things on your own.
But let me tell you what hastriggered this recently.
It's more a verbal request andthen we'll talk about things
that we should stick to.
(05:23):
When a teacher leaves us notesthings, we can kind of step
outside of the notes a littlebit.
Now we never want to have theattitude I'm going to go in,
size these kids up and dowhatever I want to.
Well, I don't think that's verysmart.
There are a significant numberof teachers that do in fact
(05:44):
leave busy work that maybe hasbeen sitting in a folder for
months until they take a day off.
I know for sure it was aboutfour years ago, when I was
long-term subbing, that the headof the department told me.
She said why don't you takethese sheets, put them in a
folder somewhere and one day,when you have to be absent, just
(06:04):
let the substitute teacher knowthat they can do those sheets?
Well, that's busy work, that'sjust work for the kids to have
something to do.
Most of the time, though,teachers leave you assignments
that they don't want you to getbehind on.
You know, not too long ago,I've told you that I was subbing
(06:26):
four days for a class rightafter they had had five days off
for snow, and so I knew thatmost likely the teacher didn't
want me to just teach anything.
They in fact had a plan for me,because otherwise they would be
(06:46):
nine days behind and it wouldreally take some catching up to
do Plus in elementary school.
For the most part, all thedifferent classes I think that
was a third grade class they'reall doing something similar, so
you got to stay up with theother classes.
The other day I did a half-daysubstitute teaching job, and I
(07:07):
like those on occasion.
Especially, I like third grade.
I think that's my favoriteelementary school grade right
now.
I was in.
I actually signed up for afirst grade, even though I
co-taught with that teacher sometoday, and first graders are
okay, they're just seven.
(07:28):
You know, anytime you get 37year olds in the in the same
room.
Well, you got to expect alittle out of controlness.
You know my computer doesn'twork, it's clocking, I can't get
in.
Can you tell me what you saidagain, teacher?
I want to build things withthese blocks instead of do doing
(07:49):
what you told me to do withthem.
You know, you just gotseven-year-old kids in there and
, believe me, I am one of thosethat I don't try to get them
quiet, overly quiet in thehallway because they're seven
years old.
Man, they're kids.
This isn't the military.
Now I want to tell you this Ihave noticed differences between
(08:14):
elementary school versus middleslash high school in that
they're so young that you haveto be a little bit stricter.
You have to get them into themode where they pay attention to
you and for the most part theydo.
You have to Not discipline,that's too strong a word, but
(08:37):
you have to be strong.
I notice teachers in elementaryschool.
They're really sharp andfocused on what they tell those
kids and if you don't fall inline like you're supposed to,
well, then maybe you lose yourrecess or you get a demerit or
whatever they're calling itthese days.
Or I know I go to one schoolwhere they do something good.
(09:02):
They call it a punch and theyalmost respond better to that
than a negative reinforcement.
You know, I'm kind of apositive reinforcement guy.
You do this, you get a JollyRancher, rather than if you
don't do this, you're going tolose out on that.
(09:22):
You're not going to be able togo to that assembly where you
get to watch a ball game at oneo'clock this afternoon.
So that's kind of my thing.
So the other day I got into thishalf day and it was almost a
little not creepy is the wrongword, that's too strange but a
little took me back a little bit.
(09:43):
It's almost like the teacherknew of my reputation, which I
thought was good.
But she said some things to meas we were leaving and she was
very sharp with her kids.
They weren't doing that much.
They were lined up to go tolunch or recess.
I can't remember what it was.
When I first got there it wasrecess.
(10:04):
I do remember that now and Isaid well, I'll go out with them
.
And she.
She immediately said listen.
And she started talking tothose kids and said if we have
the same situation we did a fewweeks ago, where the substitute
teacher left me three pagesabout how bad you kids were, you
(10:25):
better not treat thatsubstitute teacher this way.
And then she went on to saysome things to me about how you
can't be.
She didn't say the wordfriendly, but this is the
impression I had.
Didn't say the word friendly,but this is the impression I had
.
You can't be friendly withthese kids because they won't
get their work done or somethingto the effect of we go by our
(10:46):
last names here.
We want them to stay focused.
Now I think I've told you this.
I let the middle schoolers, andespecially the high schoolers,
call me by my first name.
That came really from thevolleyball court, because
players got to know me involleyball and would call me Mr
Greg, so I let them call me Gregin the classroom.
(11:07):
I don't really let the studentsin an elementary school do that
.
I don't even tell them my firstname, because I do think that's
a little bit too loose to haveelementary schoolers call me by
my first name, but I thought itwas so unusual that she in
effect was giving me a couple of.
She said it in a friendly way,but she was giving me a couple
(11:30):
warnings Be serious, so thatthey get their work done and
don't let them call you by yourfirst name so we can be
respectful.
So you know me well enough fromthis podcast.
That almost made me feel likeshoot, I'm going to tell these
guys my first name.
Just go opposite of what thisteacher said, because it kind of
took me back a little bit.
(11:50):
It was almost as if you notonly have to carry out my
lessons plans, you have to do itwith this personality type.
To me that's crossing the linea little bit.
I told them after she leftagain.
I joked, as I've told youbefore.
I said now I'm the meanestsubstitute teacher you've ever
met and they could tell from mypersonality that I wasn't.
(12:13):
And we did tell some friendlystories.
I made sure they got their workdone.
So I did it my way.
I got the teacher's work doneand, in my opinion, as long as I
(12:33):
do what's on that teacher'slesson plan, I can carry it out
in the method and thepersonality that I want to and
I'm not going to change fromthat and the personality that I
want to and I'm not going tochange from that.
And a teacher shouldn't expecta substitute teacher to do it
with a specific attitude, aspecific personality that's
taken away from who they are.
So that really caught me bysurprise and we had a good
afternoon that day.
(12:54):
It just so happened that I didcatch them when they actually
did a lot that afternoon.
Sometimes you never know withthird grade and younger, if you
do a half day, you might havethe half of the day when they're
really not doing that much.
They might have one hour classand the rest is involved with
maybe a recess and lunch andtheir activities such as gym or
(13:15):
music or whatever library therest of the day.
But in this case we did quite abit that day.
And finally I was so curiousaround 2.30, I asked them.
I said listen, guys, did asubstitute teacher really write
three pages about you guys?
And they started nodding theirhead yes, and I said I can't
(13:39):
imagine, as well as you'vebehaved for me today, that you
guys ever got in that muchtrouble.
And they told me some of thethings that they did, like you
know, standing on chairs, beingtoo loud, all that kind of thing
and they had been so wellbehaved.
And I'll just say this for whatit's worth in my opinion, the
(14:01):
better you treat those kids, theless mean you treat those kids,
the better they're going tobehave for you.
If I'm mean to them, they'regoing to be mean to me.
That's the way I go about itand I'm not going to change just
because some teacher wanted meto do it with a specific
personality style.
It's up to you what you want todo.
(14:23):
One last little incident thatI'll mention.
That happened.
It's actually funny because ithappened after I decided to
record this episode and then Isaid well, this is a perfect
example.
I was supposed to be asubstitute teacher for a
librarian.
The librarian in me hadactually gotten reasonably close
in that she contacts me aheadof time when she's going to be
(14:46):
gone because she knows I knowher system.
She knows I know how to use thelibrary gun.
She knows how to check in booksand check out books and put
books back on shelves in theirproper places.
So she specifically asked forme.
So when I got in there, I'donly been there like 15 minutes
maybe, at about 745.
And the principal comes in,who's a really good dude, I
(15:09):
consider him a friend and hesaid well, mr Collins and I knew
I was going to ask because theythey were really shorthanded on
substitutes and he said wouldyou rather be seventh grade math
or band today?
And I said, well, of the twoI'd pick seventh grade math.
I said, but I should tell youthat the librarian chose me
(15:32):
specifically and wanted me to behere and he said yeah, I know,
he said, but she doesn't haveany students, so they actually
closed the library.
I went to math class andprobably the students that
needed the most help in mathwere all in the first period.
So there was a helper in thefirst period and it was one of
(15:54):
those helpers that liked to yellalmost to the point of yelling
at the kids to sit up straight,and I don't really like working
with those kind of co-teachers.
I'll tell you this I rememberback when I was subbing in the
sixth, seventh grade for thekids that are now seniors and
they had a co-teacher that wentaround their classes and since I
(16:18):
subbed with them so long, theywould have me come in and eat
lunch with them and thisco-teacher never ate lunch with
them and they would be veryhonest to me about.
They didn't even like it whenshe was in here because she had
such a negative attitude andwould often take over the class
and take it in a direction theteacher didn't want to go and
they didn't appreciate it.
Well, that's kind of how it feltwith this teacher that was
(16:41):
co-teacher, that was in my room.
She made so many suggestionsand I finally just told her you
know, I said no, I'm pretty goodat math too, so I'll handle it.
She's.
She would tell me several timesyou could do it this way, and I
said no, I've got some ideasand I did not let her take over
the class.
Now she was very friendly andallowed me to do my thing too.
So there are times when you'llrun into teachers, co-teachers,
(17:03):
whatever that want you to do ita certain, do a certain thing
and there's a difference betweendoing a certain thing and doing
it a certain way.
And once you gain the respectof those teachers, they're going
to give you some leeway.
They're going to allow you todo some things on your own.
I don't think I would everchange a teacher's lesson plan,
(17:27):
especially the first time I hadmet her, but I would stick with
my guns as far as this is mypersonality, I'm going to teach
it that way.
I don't want to compromise it,and I think those kids will have
a good day and follow thelesson plan all the better.
Greg Collins.
Substitute Teacher's Lounge.
It is April Fool's Day, 2025,april 1st Today.
Why don't we talk about?
You know, I feel like I'vegotten pretty smart as a
substitute teacher.
I've been doing it.
This is my seventh year now.
Maybe there might be times whenI look at what the teacher has
(00:25):
told me to do, or listen to whatshe has told me to do, and say
you know, I think I know better.
I don't think I want to do itthat way.
I'm going to do it the way Iwant to do it.
I don't know.
Am I just saying all this insarcasm, or are there times when
(00:47):
you shouldn't listen to theregular teacher?
Substitute Teacher's Loud.
All right, all right.
I am in the midst of a week ofsubstitute teaching.
That's probably the mostunusual blend I've ever had as
(01:11):
far as beginning to end.
We're getting.
This is our last week ofsubstitute teaching before our
spring break in this area, andit just so happens this week I
do two elementary school days, Ido a middle school day, then I
do two high school days.
Now that's stretching it rightthere, and you know it is hard
(01:33):
to adjust.
So help me get through all thisand I guess I'll be a stronger
person because of it.
I want to mention last week thehugs episode was a popular one,
but the one I want to, the thingI want to mention about it is
the elementary school kids thatI've had since I recorded that
(01:55):
episode just for giggles.
I told them they know I have apodcast and I said one of my
recent episodes was aboutwhether or not teachers should
hug students and it's funny,their perspective.
All of them I'll say all ofthem immediately said yes, they
should be able to hug thestudents, and I'm thinking, man,
(02:16):
how things change as you getolder.
I'm going to talk about thingsthat have happened to me.
This is actually over the lastseveral months, triggered by
something that happened recently, and then I'm actually going to
start by telling you a storythat, ironically, was recently
posted on our SubstituteTeachers Lounge Facebook group,
(02:39):
and I'll paraphrase a bit.
Not that I want to mess up thisposter story, but I wanted to
say it in such a way that Idon't plagiarize and maybe it
will encourage you to go aheadand look.
If you go there right now, it'sprobably the third or fourth
most recent story, because it'sgetting some decent replies and
(03:00):
I was curious, even if it wasposted, what the main reply
would be.
But here's what one of theteachers said.
He basically said that he hadbeen a teacher a long time
before he started substituteteaching and, with his
experience, decided to kind ofgo off track from what the
substitute teacher had left himto do.
I think it was something to theeffect of that the teacher had
(03:26):
left to have a or meet theirgrandchild and they were taking
a day off to do that.
So even though that teacherleft him a writing assignment to
have the kids do, he went offscript and had them write a
script paper about the teacher'sgrandchild and in effect he
(03:52):
thought it would be a nice touchif they all wrote a paper about
how great it is to havegrandkids and have a new member
of the family.
So he went off of.
Now that might've meant thatthis was a writing assignment
that the teacher thought wasimportant for the class and
instead he did whatever hewanted to do.
(04:15):
So let's start by offering thequestion would you ever do that?
I'm not sure I would do that.
The general consensus I'mgetting from the Facebook group
page is that they were proud ofhim for doing that, and I
normally don't go too much offwhat the teacher says, unless
(04:37):
there is a situation where I metthe teacher.
In fact I did this yesterday.
I'm actually subbing at thesame elementary school two days
in a row, but for differentteachers, and I dropped by the
second teacher's room on thefirst day to see what she had
going on and she basically toldme the general idea.
But she said if you want to,it's an art class.
(05:00):
But she said if you want to gooff track a little bit, just go
ahead and try some things as youwould want to.
That's a little bit differentthan doing things on your own.
But let me tell you what hastriggered this recently.
It's more a verbal request andthen we'll talk about things
that we should stick to.
(05:23):
When a teacher leaves us notesthings, we can kind of step
outside of the notes a littlebit.
Now we never want to have theattitude I'm going to go in,
size these kids up and dowhatever I want to.
Well, I don't think that's verysmart.
There are a significant numberof teachers that do in fact
(05:44):
leave busy work that maybe hasbeen sitting in a folder for
months until they take a day off.
I know for sure it was aboutfour years ago, when I was
long-term subbing, that the headof the department told me.
She said why don't you takethese sheets, put them in a
folder somewhere and one day,when you have to be absent, just
(06:04):
let the substitute teacher knowthat they can do those sheets?
Well, that's busy work, that'sjust work for the kids to have
something to do.
Most of the time, though,teachers leave you assignments
that they don't want you to getbehind on.
You know, not too long ago,I've told you that I was subbing
(06:26):
four days for a class rightafter they had had five days off
for snow, and so I knew thatmost likely the teacher didn't
want me to just teach anything.
They in fact had a plan for me,because otherwise they would be
(06:46):
nine days behind and it wouldreally take some catching up to
do Plus in elementary school.
For the most part, all thedifferent classes I think that
was a third grade class they'reall doing something similar, so
you got to stay up with theother classes.
The other day I did a half-daysubstitute teaching job, and I
(07:07):
like those on occasion.
Especially, I like third grade.
I think that's my favoriteelementary school grade right
now.
I was in.
I actually signed up for afirst grade, even though I
co-taught with that teacher sometoday, and first graders are
okay, they're just seven.
(07:28):
You know, anytime you get 37year olds in the in the same
room.
Well, you got to expect alittle out of controlness.
You know my computer doesn'twork, it's clocking, I can't get
in.
Can you tell me what you saidagain, teacher?
I want to build things withthese blocks instead of do doing
(07:49):
what you told me to do withthem.
You know, you just gotseven-year-old kids in there and
, believe me, I am one of thosethat I don't try to get them
quiet, overly quiet in thehallway because they're seven
years old.
Man, they're kids.
This isn't the military.
Now I want to tell you this Ihave noticed differences between
(08:14):
elementary school versus middleslash high school in that
they're so young that you haveto be a little bit stricter.
You have to get them into themode where they pay attention to
you and for the most part theydo.
You have to Not discipline,that's too strong a word, but
(08:37):
you have to be strong.
I notice teachers in elementaryschool.
They're really sharp andfocused on what they tell those
kids and if you don't fall inline like you're supposed to,
well, then maybe you lose yourrecess or you get a demerit or
whatever they're calling itthese days.
Or I know I go to one schoolwhere they do something good.
(09:02):
They call it a punch and theyalmost respond better to that
than a negative reinforcement.
You know, I'm kind of apositive reinforcement guy.
You do this, you get a JollyRancher, rather than if you
don't do this, you're going tolose out on that.
(09:22):
You're not going to be able togo to that assembly where you
get to watch a ball game at oneo'clock this afternoon.
So that's kind of my thing.
So the other day I got into thishalf day and it was almost a
little not creepy is the wrongword, that's too strange but a
little took me back a little bit.
(09:43):
It's almost like the teacherknew of my reputation, which I
thought was good.
But she said some things to meas we were leaving and she was
very sharp with her kids.
They weren't doing that much.
They were lined up to go tolunch or recess.
I can't remember what it was.
When I first got there it wasrecess.
(10:04):
I do remember that now and Isaid well, I'll go out with them
.
And she.
She immediately said listen.
And she started talking tothose kids and said if we have
the same situation we did a fewweeks ago, where the substitute
teacher left me three pagesabout how bad you kids were, you
(10:25):
better not treat thatsubstitute teacher this way.
And then she went on to saysome things to me about how you
can't be.
She didn't say the wordfriendly, but this is the
impression I had.
Didn't say the word friendly,but this is the impression I had
.
You can't be friendly withthese kids because they won't
get their work done or somethingto the effect of we go by our
(10:46):
last names here.
We want them to stay focused.
Now I think I've told you this.
I let the middle schoolers, andespecially the high schoolers,
call me by my first name.
That came really from thevolleyball court, because
players got to know me involleyball and would call me Mr
Greg, so I let them call me Gregin the classroom.
(11:07):
I don't really let the studentsin an elementary school do that
.
I don't even tell them my firstname, because I do think that's
a little bit too loose to haveelementary schoolers call me by
my first name, but I thought itwas so unusual that she in
effect was giving me a couple of.
She said it in a friendly way,but she was giving me a couple
(11:30):
warnings Be serious, so thatthey get their work done and
don't let them call you by yourfirst name so we can be
respectful.
So you know me well enough fromthis podcast.
That almost made me feel likeshoot, I'm going to tell these
guys my first name.
Just go opposite of what thisteacher said, because it kind of
took me back a little bit.
(11:50):
It was almost as if you notonly have to carry out my
lessons plans, you have to do itwith this personality type.
To me that's crossing the linea little bit.
I told them after she leftagain.
I joked, as I've told youbefore.
I said now I'm the meanestsubstitute teacher you've ever
met and they could tell from mypersonality that I wasn't.
(12:13):
And we did tell some friendlystories.
I made sure they got their workdone.
So I did it my way.
I got the teacher's work doneand, in my opinion, as long as I
(12:33):
do what's on that teacher'slesson plan, I can carry it out
in the method and thepersonality that I want to and
I'm not going to change fromthat and the personality that I
want to and I'm not going tochange from that.
And a teacher shouldn't expecta substitute teacher to do it
with a specific attitude, aspecific personality that's
taken away from who they are.
So that really caught me bysurprise and we had a good
afternoon that day.
(12:54):
It just so happened that I didcatch them when they actually
did a lot that afternoon.
Sometimes you never know withthird grade and younger, if you
do a half day, you might havethe half of the day when they're
really not doing that much.
They might have one hour classand the rest is involved with
maybe a recess and lunch andtheir activities such as gym or
(13:15):
music or whatever library therest of the day.
But in this case we did quite abit that day.
And finally I was so curiousaround 2.30, I asked them.
I said listen, guys, did asubstitute teacher really write
three pages about you guys?
And they started nodding theirhead yes, and I said I can't
(13:39):
imagine, as well as you'vebehaved for me today, that you
guys ever got in that muchtrouble.
And they told me some of thethings that they did, like you
know, standing on chairs, beingtoo loud, all that kind of thing
and they had been so wellbehaved.
And I'll just say this for whatit's worth in my opinion, the
(14:01):
better you treat those kids, theless mean you treat those kids,
the better they're going tobehave for you.
If I'm mean to them, they'regoing to be mean to me.
That's the way I go about itand I'm not going to change just
because some teacher wanted meto do it with a specific
personality style.
It's up to you what you want todo.
(14:23):
One last little incident thatI'll mention.
That happened.
It's actually funny because ithappened after I decided to
record this episode and then Isaid well, this is a perfect
example.
I was supposed to be asubstitute teacher for a
librarian.
The librarian in me hadactually gotten reasonably close
in that she contacts me aheadof time when she's going to be
(14:46):
gone because she knows I knowher system.
She knows I know how to use thelibrary gun.
She knows how to check in booksand check out books and put
books back on shelves in theirproper places.
So she specifically asked forme.
So when I got in there, I'donly been there like 15 minutes
maybe, at about 745.
And the principal comes in,who's a really good dude, I
(15:09):
consider him a friend and hesaid well, mr Collins and I knew
I was going to ask because theythey were really shorthanded on
substitutes and he said wouldyou rather be seventh grade math
or band today?
And I said, well, of the twoI'd pick seventh grade math.
I said, but I should tell youthat the librarian chose me
(15:32):
specifically and wanted me to behere and he said yeah, I know,
he said, but she doesn't haveany students, so they actually
closed the library.
I went to math class andprobably the students that
needed the most help in mathwere all in the first period.
So there was a helper in thefirst period and it was one of
(15:54):
those helpers that liked to yellalmost to the point of yelling
at the kids to sit up straight,and I don't really like working
with those kind of co-teachers.
I'll tell you this I rememberback when I was subbing in the
sixth, seventh grade for thekids that are now seniors and
they had a co-teacher that wentaround their classes and since I
(16:18):
subbed with them so long, theywould have me come in and eat
lunch with them and thisco-teacher never ate lunch with
them and they would be veryhonest to me about.
They didn't even like it whenshe was in here because she had
such a negative attitude andwould often take over the class
and take it in a direction theteacher didn't want to go and
they didn't appreciate it.
Well, that's kind of how it feltwith this teacher that was
(16:41):
co-teacher, that was in my room.
She made so many suggestionsand I finally just told her you
know, I said no, I'm pretty goodat math too, so I'll handle it.
She's.
She would tell me several timesyou could do it this way, and I
said no, I've got some ideasand I did not let her take over
the class.
Now she was very friendly andallowed me to do my thing too.
So there are times when you'llrun into teachers, co-teachers,
(17:03):
whatever that want you to do ita certain, do a certain thing
and there's a difference betweendoing a certain thing and doing
it a certain way.
And once you gain the respectof those teachers, they're going
to give you some leeway.
They're going to allow you todo some things on your own.
I don't think I would everchange a teacher's lesson plan,
(17:27):
especially the first time I hadmet her, but I would stick with
my guns as far as this is mypersonality, I'm going to teach
it that way.
I don't want to compromise it,and I think those kids will have
a good day and follow thelesson plan all the better.
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