Substitute teaching allows a lot of good opportunities. You get to meet many people and see what they think, the ones you don’t immediately click with are forgotten, because in the long run it doesn’t matter. The school is, by and large, grateful if you’re competent enough to maintain discipline and finish the lesson plan for the day, and you can work when you want and take a day off when you have to. The hardest thing about being a substitute is the students you have to leave behind.

I think, as I go on in this work, that I am the ultimate soft-hearted person. I find it hard, once I’ve met a group of kids, to move on to the next class. I get worried about the individual students, for example a boy in third grade, who I notice is a good writer but completely dyslexic, so if he doesn’t get learning disabilities testing, it’s possible no one will even realize he has a gift.

Next I get worried about a girl who quiety admitted to me the other day that she kicked a boy, hard, when he wasn’t looking, so that he cried, but said she was sorry and asked please to give her another chance. If I was a permanent teacher I’d find out what was going on that made her so angry; as a sub, I just tell her not to do it anymore, and go on.

Then there’s a boy in third grade who broke into tears because he was going home – he said his mother yelled at him a lot because of his homework.  And  a very thin girl who’s very able in math, I think she should be referred to the gifted program – but will her regular teacher notice? She’s exceedingly unassuming. Another student loves to play soccer … I kick the ball with the kids a bit, I would like to see if his sports skills develop over the year.

In another class, I have them reading aloud to the group, a boy raises his hand anxiously, wants to give this reading to his peers a try, but he bogs down badly in the second sentence and collapses in tears. Oh my gosh … he needs emotional support and help with reading as well! I finish the passage for him, pat him on the shoulder, say it’s okay, not to worry, but I know it’s not okay yet. Someone needs to sit down and find out what’s going ono.

I’ve turned this question over in my head for weeks: do I stay on the substitute track or try to get a teaching credential? As time moves forward, and the deadline to apply to an alternative credialing program nears, it seems to boil down to a question of how I relate to students.  I have an impulse to follow up. Turning this over in my mind, I know what I have to do, apply to get into a credentialing program so I can have a chance at my own class in the fall.