Thursday, December 22, 2011

Gotcha Day


Since tomorrow is the last day before vacation and the kids might be slightly wacko and unwilling to work, make sure you work them anyway, or give a test.  There is bound to be an administrator lurking around with a computer, just itching to do an observation.  The day before a holiday is their favorite time.  And, the later in the day your class meets, the better your chances are of getting this unexpected visit.

Admins don't think there is any problem with doing this.  One said he liked to observe this time to see what stuff teachers are really made of.  I said, if he doesn't know he is not much of an administrator.

Have a great vacation and good luck tomorrow.  I know from experience it will be rough.

6 comments:

Profesora de español said...

I had one of those visits this week. Seriously, who makes an impromptu classroom visit/observation the week of winter vacation?

Ms. Tsouris said...

Funny thing about this post...I was talking to another retired friend today who said something along the lines of "Just think! Admin will be roaming the halls tomorrow observing as many older teachers as they can!" You apparently are not the only veteran educator to think of the possible negatives dumped on NYC teachers their last working day of the year. It's the ony-too-well-known "Gotcha" school of administration.

Schoolgal said...

Some teachers got observed the last week of school before summer vaca at my former school.

Idiots!!!

Pissedoffteacher said...

They do the same in my school. I bet someone is being observed now, as I type.

Cara Boutkids said...

Do superintendents observe principals at these times, as well?

& do school board members observe the superintendent?

Beverly said...

I had a walk-through in my last block. We were watching the cartoon version of "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" (I teach high school English). I had essential questions on the board for the three holiday cartoons that my classes chose for that day. The EQ for Grinch: "How would the story be different if it were told from Max's point of view?" We discussed this as I changed from one cartoon to another. We also compared "The Little Drummer Boy" to "The Gift of the Magi" (the movies were our reward for finishing the story on time). Finally, we watched "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" and looked for symbolism in the colors used for Sombertown. Let's see... I made use of technology, I gave students a choice of what they wanted to watch, I had essential questions and class discussions relating both to prior knowledge and directly to skills in our Standard Course of Study, and my students were engaged in the lesson.