Issue with Immediacy
This past presentation helped me realize my tendency towards perceiving all teaching matters as urgent, and immediately tending to them. As a newer teacher, I feel that this has stemmed from insecurity. Additionally, I have several tasks to complete each day between teaching, grading, going to school myself, and personal matters. This presentation has also helped me realize my growth towards not handling matters as immediate as I used to. I feel that I am growing more towards handling more urgent matters initially (e.g. rescheduling a test), then moving towards the less urgent matters (e.g. grading a paper).
This is an issue with me too. Sometimes, if I take a day off, I feel overwhelmed when I check back into class and see that a lot has gone on in class "without me". I feel the need to drop everything right then and there and chime in, post, reply to every email, etc.
Maritza, I understand where you are coming from. Things change so quickly in the school environment. Missing a day, or even a class, can make a dramatic difference on how on-top-of-things we feel.
Dr. Melissa Read
I felt the same thing when I first started at this school because there was so much to do and in my opinion structure wasn't there in the beginning and having to deal my schooling and the students that just didn't care I felt overwhelmed at times
Hi Ms. Cruea,
I can definitely relate to perceiving all teaching matters as urgent. Often times, I ask my current students and grads to set appointments with me so that assisting them does not interfere with my classes or with other students. However, many students do not respect my time (probably because I do not enforce my own policy of setting and keeping an appointment), and they usually end up showing up in my office or in the classroom when I am teaching, wanting me to stop what I am doing to assist them. I think that this behavior on my behalf has developed out of insecurity also. I believe it is due to trying to please everyone else (administrators, students, etc) at the detriment to myself. This module has made me see that I can and should set priorities for myself better than what I have been doing. I need to also realize that answering all emails the day they are sent is not necessary. I often get frustrated because I spend my day assisting everyone around me with their issues and/or their tasks, and at the end of the day, I end up staying at work late (usually much later than I should be leaving) to try to accomplish my own tasks and then go home and still have to lesson plan for the following day. Ironically, the other individuals that are asking for something from me are usually asking for something that they need to complete their own task, and therefore, they usually come at me with a sense of urgency that makes me feel obligated to respond immediately. I do believe that a lot of this can be solved by allowing program directors (I am a program director and full time instructor) to teach less classes so that they have time to effectively do their administrative responsibilities, and still serve the students (both current and grads) properly. I am very glad that the organization is finally looking at making changes in this area. I think it will be to the benefit of all in the end.
