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And The Show Must Go On
§ 1. Last Wednesday, 200mar19, St-Joseph’s Feast Day, was my 50th day at Jean-De-Brébeuf high school, but it was also the end of my last three weeks replacement, with Fred’s secondary IV students; however, it’s only today, Friday 2008mar28, that I handed in the two exams I corrected for him and his students: oral and written comprehension exams, for a hundred and sixty seven some students, that is.
§ 2. I entered the 333 some results, into the lists I made on 8½ x 14” sheets, for a more generous writing space: those six class lists are into their 8½ x 14”, black folder, on the right hand, whereas on the left, are the 8½ x 14” class plans, with student’s color photos, each underlined by the student’s first name: that allows for efficient, personalised interventions: I’m quite proud of that useful tool, especially so, for a substitute teacher like myself; I left a similar binder to Sabrina, whom I replaced for over a month with her secondary III students.
§ 3. Moreover, most, if not all, of those 300 students, with whom I spent 50 days, love being named by their very first names; if you know their first names, you may create quite unique relationships with each student: first names are great ‘links’; they’re deeply personal, whereas a family name, delivered to the far end of the classroom, thus at high volume, has a more, let’s say, formal effect on a student: use with parcimony, if at all!
§ 4. Those 50 days, teaching full time, at Jean-De-Brébeuf High Scool, were a great look into that school, the best in town, they say, and also into my teaching practice; I spent most of my time, either in the classrooms, teaching as such, or else, at the ESL headquarters, on the third floor of the school. Since I don’t have a car, except for Communauto, I indeed stayed at school during my free periods.
§ 5. I thus had ample opportunity to enjoy babbling about teaching tricks or realities, with the well experienced and volubile Guy, who teaches mostly to secondary V students; the secondary III teacher Patrick also shared a couple of tricks, related to classroom dicipline and ‘orderliness’. At times, I also had the opportunity to practice my Spanish with a security guard from Columbia: he actually was doing a training within in CEGEP Program, as a youth intervenant; all that, not to speak of the refreshing conversations I sometimes held with students, other teachers or employees, and the direction people, like Lucie and Brigitte, whom I thank for their support.
§ 6. Nonetheless, during this now ended four-day week, I only corrected and rested, for the night Jesus was turned into the Romans, a week ago, I shared with him a fragment of the excruciating pain he ought to have suffered, when a Roman soldier pierced his Holy Heart on Easter Friday: I myself suffered an acute stomach ulcer, for ±40 hours, due to stress and worries and what nots… That quite Christian thought helped me through my ordeal; I feel much better a week later: since I ate well and slowly, chewed toroughly my food and slept a lot, thus, I suppose I will be in top shape for next week’s upcoming replacements: so far, I have two lined up, on Thursday and Friday mornings.
§ 7. Nevertheless, I now have to face the day to day substitute teacher reality, until another contract comes up, even though I do have a week long one, lined up, starting on April 11. So, in order to offer my services, I thus had to get back into creating a business card, problem which I hadn’t solved until now. Indeed, my 50 days at Jean-De-Brébeuf kind of inspired me into creating this:
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