Relief Teaching in Primary School

I finally taught relief teaching in primary school today!

Today was totally embarrassing. I face the class from 2-3pm and after a brief reprieve (recess), I had the same class again from 3.25-5.30pm. This was how my timetable looked like:

2-2.30 - Pri 3X English Language
2.30-3 - Pri 3X English Language
3-3.25 - RECESS
3.25-3.30 - Pri 3X Maths
3.30-3.55 - Pri 3X Maths
3.44-4.25 - Pri 3X Maths
4.25-4.55 - Pri 3X Maths
4.55-5.25 - Pri 3X Science
5.25-5.55 - Pri 3X Science

Gosh. 1+2.5 hours of the same class. RIP.

The kids were quite alright, to be frank. However I guess I didn't mentally prepare myself for the role at hand like what I'd do in the past where I'll muster some classroom activities that I can fall back on and even plan a contingent lesson plan of games. However while I reached the school at 1pm, I suddenly realised MOE has no idea that I've recently graduated and should be moved to a higher pay bracket. At this point the staff in the general office told me it was my responsibility and I should've updated it on the MOE web site. My response, rather, was 'so what do I click - Application or Renew?'. Neither am I a new applicant nor is my relief teaching licence ending soon. Thankfully the school's very near my house, so I went home, grabbed the MOE number and called up MOE customer service, who instructed me to email them about it. Duh, you should put this vital information somewhere on the web site! Or else the school can easily do for us since they can verify the degree immediately! There hasn't been a reply up till now from them, and it doesn't feel comfortable that I haven't signed my appointment letter when I left which states the usual (lower) pay bracket that I am entitled to.

Ok, so that's administrative. After that I waltz to the office and the teacher I was to relieve popped by to collect his stuff, said "I have nothing to be done today. They are alright if you keep them busy." and sprinted off. Keep them busy? By chance I saw a stack of activity worksheets meant for relief teachers (a godsend) and grabbed a few before heading off.

The kids were at the hall, so I went there in time to see a teacher teach them how to sing "Wish Upon a Falling Star". I admire his bravery to sing out loud in front of all the students, to be frank. After the students were dismissed, I finally found the class, and caused my first taboo when I didn't know the order by which the students should leave the hall and ended up cutting the queue. The other teachers there were definitely not amused.

What did I do the first hour? I thought I'll snuck some planning while asking the kids to go on silent reading. It quite work, silent reading, though it wasn't exactly silent all the time and some kids ended up drawing or even worse, folding foolscape paper into vehicle-like contraptions modelled after the Japanese anime "crush gear" and attempt to make a din by ramming them against each others' vehicles. I tried to engage the class by saying that they have to narrate a story about what they have read or conjure one up from their drawings and such if they did other stuff. It didn't really work though, 'cos the kids were either too soft, or the other kids were too unbothered to pay attention and made much noise, making the sharing session an impossibility.

It was a relief when the bell for recess rang.

I became desperate, with 25 minutes left to conjure up magical activites that can calm a huge bunch of 9-year olds. An exercise in futility it was in the end. I trudged to class with my invisible arms in the air. It was supposed to be Math, but as they have just started the new semester and didn't bring their old books, I couldn't do much in the way of quizzes without evoking lots of disgrunted shrieks that will send the teachers in the next class running over. I did a quiz in the end, and coming up names for the groups was already a torture. We first played word creation where they pitted against one another forming words from a large word. I went easy on them, giving them words with tons of vowels like 'aeroplane' and 'beautiful'. It was not bad, though a team lost horribly 'cos they weren't the least interested in the game but were more keen on either collecting beads that were dropped on the floor or their ramming their makeshift crush gears. However the noise continues unabated. Thank goodness no teacher came over to threaten for silence, or I will be totally embarrassed.

After that I tried to teach them some English by reading a text from the reader. It was quite difficult in the end too, as once again not everyone was keen in doing it and it ended in despair, with me trying to strain my voice to keep everyone (or whoever that was with me) to read the text. I tried going through some difficult vocabulary words too, though I think nobody bothered except the monitor and his group.

Wow his group is amazing. Not only were they enthusiastic during the games, the monitor also came up to me with suggestions on how to control the class! The remark I remembered most vividly was that I was too lenient with them... sigh. Is being stern while wearing a perpetual frown the only way to go? The kids were also awful, spilling their water in the middle of the classroom and causing a mini-crisis where I didn't know what to do. Where can I find the cleaning lady or a mop to do it? Should I do it in the first place? The first time it happened I didn't bother about it, though the impending thought of 'danger! slippery for kids!' came to my mind all the time. The second time round, some kids volunteered to run to the toilet to get some toilet paper to soak up the water. I had to give them permission and I must admit they did a good job. Then they pestered to take out their radio to practice singing two Chinese pop songs for a singing competition in August. Gosh! It was a wrestle between me and them as they sought to turn it up loud and me keeping it down for fear of interrupting other neighbouring classes. It was hopeless in the end, as the kids screamed louder than the radio. Finally to my relief the bell came and the Chinese teacher appeared outside the classroom. Freedom!

While exiting the classroom, I muttered an apology to the Chinese teacher for the noise, though he replied with a "It's like that, they're naughty", allowing me to heave a sigh of relief. Oh well!

So I left the school, came home to take a breather, and went down to Holland V to meet the USP Orientation pple. So glad to have seen especially MC and GR. Hisashiburi! :)

Makeshift "Crush Gear" - actually I forgot about this other contraption they have which suspiciously resembles Beyblade, a spinning top toy made popular by the anime. Do you remember those small, rectangular erasers with the flags of countries printed on them? The kids stick a staple through the middle and viola! A top! The rule is the same as 'Crush Gear' too, to push your opponent's spinning eraser off the tabletop.