I'm a Decision Maker!

I remember early on last Fall quarter someone making the comment that when your students are staring at you and the room is quiet, they are waiting for you to say something. I believe it was referred to as "the deer in head lights." And you hope to god that you (as teacher) are not staring back. It's amazing how much work goes into teaching and how it feels to guide a group of students.

In Hip-Hop we are on our final project -- The Music Video. I placed all students in groups of 5 or 6 to create 6 groups in each class. After my second class yesterday, Lisa, one of my stronger students came talk to me about wanting to form her own group rather than go with the one I selected. Really, there's a group of 3 that want to work together. I spoke with her buddy, Adam the day before and told him the same thing. I got a little angry when he and another woman sent the third to talk to me AGAIN. The 3 worked together on their poetry assignment and I would like them to try working with others. In fact I let the students pick their own groups for the Hip Hop Poetry.

I can see Lisa, Adam and Lucy's argument -- as strong students they do not want to be burdened by those with less experience. They want to be able to push themselves and don't want to be responsible for putting their project together. However, the weaker students need a little push. And I don't think forming their own group will do it.

Lisa was understanding and very complimentary about my teaching. I always take that with a grain of salt -- because SHE WANTED SOMETHING. But the long and the short of it is that it's just too late to make any more changes.

There were 2 students in my first class that each either emailed me or spoke with me the day I made the assignments, so I was able to move things around without much trouble. The one guy, Alex spoke with me in class said that he had been working with Paul already and would have liked to be in his group. I told him that there was a method to my madness and I would prefer to keep him where he was. However that evening I got an email from Holly asking to be placed in a mixed gender group, since she was with only women and wanted a new challenge.

Since I was changing Holly, I thought I could honor Alex's request, as well. However, once I made those changes, I got an email from Paul asking to keep Kai the guy I switched with Alex. Oy, the drama! So, I switched the guys back. Yesterday in class, Alex came up to me to ask what was going on. Since his emails all bounced back, I was not surprised when he said that he was not aware of the online conversation with Paul and Kai. Alex was in Paul's poetry group, so I figured that it would come up in conversation. Or perhaps Alex was playing dumb.

Ah, the endless curveballs, mind games and decisions. I put my little foot down.