Substitute Teachers Lounge
Substitute Teachers Lounge
Substitute Teaching: Short or Long Term, Elementary Middle or High
Ever wondered if short-term substitute teaching could actually offer more fulfillment than long-term assignments? Join me, Greg Collins, as I reflect on my substitute teaching journey since 2019 and share why I've had a change of heart when it comes to choosing assignments and grade levels. Through personal stories, like coaching younger kids in volleyball and attending high school events, I reveal the surprising reasons I now prefer the challenges of short-term gigs. This episode promises to give you fresh insights that might just inspire you to reassess your own teaching choices.
Life as a substitute teacher continuously evolves, and sometimes, so do our preferences. I'll discuss my shift towards elementary school teaching, driven in part by the pandemic's impact on student maturity levels and a personal connection to a school my grandkids will attend. Plus, I'll take you back to my early career in accounting to explore different perspectives on career contentment and advancement. Whether you're contemplating a switch to teaching younger kids or wondering if you should give older students another try, my experiences and strategies for growth could spark the change you’ve been waiting for.
This is Greg Collins. It is episode 264 of Substitute Teachers Lounge, july 30, 2024. I think it's going to be a fun one today because I'm going to change my mind on some things that I have previously reported in some cases years ago on this podcast, and it's going to be kind of interesting. We're going to talk mainly about situations where you're trying to decide if you want to substitute teach short-term or long-term. When you're trying to decide what grades you want to substitute teach, and if you're considering your options at schools where you thought you'd never go back to. I'm going to tell you the decisions I have come up with and why for all of those. Interestingly enough, when you hear my decisions, it may make you think you want to do just the opposite.
Greg:Substitute teachers loud. Listen to Teacher's Loud man. It is so crazy. Is my calendar really telling me that July is basically over and we're moving into August, school month? Back to school. I haven't talked to a whole lot of students who want to go back to school. I tell them that I'm ready to go back to school because I'm bored and I want to see them a lot more. I know I've talked to my granddaughter, who will be in the fifth grade and she says she's ready to go back to school. So we'll see how that works.
Greg:I was excited this past weekend the Bluegrass State Games were going on in Kentucky and it was high school volleyball weekend, and I went by to see matches for both of the high schools that I substitute teach at. It was so much fun to see those students again, because I hadn't really seen them since the middle of May and it was exciting to see them once again. I wish them the best of luck on their seasons and I miss all my students. That way. I got to thinking, though, you know, every now and then I'll take the time to glance back through the titles. You know, like I said, this is episode episode 264, so I can't believe I've recorded that many of these. I glanced through the titles. If I were being honest with myself, some of the titles I look at and think, hmm, what did I say during that episode? Because, you know, maybe I don't give some of my titles the most specific title. It's too generic. Kind of thankful for buzz sprouts, artificial intelligence. Now, because it's recommending titles to me based on the content. This one has to do with changing my mind on things. I'm going to go back to the furthest one back, because I know I didn't look up the episode number and, to be honest, I don't even want you I shouldn't say I don't want you to listen to it. Go back and listen to it if you want.
Greg:But we talked about short-term versus long-term. Now the differences for the most part are obvious, long-term, in my area especially. Let me give you my background again, because I started substitute teaching. It was actually November, so it was late beginning of this, you know, relatively the beginning of that school year, but the end of the calendar year and it was Before the end of the year. There was one middle school that already told me Greg, would you consider going long term right around February and March, because we have a lady leaving to have a baby and we know you like math, she's a math teacher. Would you consider it? And I did and I loved it.
Greg:Those kids and I know some of them are listening because they're going to be seniors this year it's so crazy to me. I still remember them from the sixth grade. I still have their seating chart pictures from the sixth grade Every now and then. I won't show it to other students, but I'll show it to them every now and then. We'll get kind of a chuckle of how much they've changed over the years. But I'll show it to them every now and then. We get kind of a chuckle of how much they've changed over the years.
Greg:But in my area now which is different than what it was back in 2019, we get basically at my. My wife gets a little bit more because she's actually a credentialed retired teacher. I'm a retired accountant or retired anything else. So in the retired anything else category, we get $125 a day to substitute teach, no matter what level we're substitute teaching. But if we sign on long-term for 15 days or more this one I was just telling you about was seven weeks, 15 days or more we get kicked all the way up to 185. And it's pretty crazy that it goes that high.
Greg:And how can you turn down a long-term job? Right, because you know where you're going every day. You can plan your schedules better. You don't have to play that substitute teacher roulette anymore where you don't know what you're doing each and every day. You've got some place to go. You're getting money. You get closer to the students, which I think is important, especially from the educational standpoint, because once they get used to you more and more.
Greg:Now some people would say they misbehave the more they get to know you. That's an argument on the other side of the coin, but most of the time, once they get comfortable with how you teach, it's easier to teach them. I'll venture to say they even learn more if you're with them more. And that's what I said back in that episode, and I told you then that that's why I would always go with a long-term job over a short-term job. Well, I've changed my mind. I'm going to tell you why and I'm probably in the category that less than 5% of you are in that I'm retired and I wasn't a teacher before, so I have to do the education to get what they call my area and emergency certification each and every year that I want to substitute teach. You know I noticed I'm going to a little aside here. When I get start talking with my hands, I catch myself banging my desktop here and sometimes I can hear that on the show. So if you hear that, I apologize and I just did that.
Greg:So, but small part that I've changed my mind on about short term is one thing that short term has got going for it for me is I get to see different students every day. I have met thousands and thousands of students I've met. You'll meet more students in a given year If you substitute all the time you'll meet more students in a given year than the teachers, the regular teachers because they're teaching the same kids over and over again. You're teaching, when you're short term, different kids every day. You'll see some of them on a repeat basis and thank goodness because they let you know that they like having you there and that's the short term part. Let me tell you why I've changed my mind and again, this isn't going to be you, but this is what, and people are going to hear this. They're going to agree with me and I hate it that it's true, but there have been two long-term teaching commitments that I backed out of and, if I was being honest with myself, I backed out of selfishly.
Greg:Now there was a part of it that I just got fed up with some of the students in one of the classes and when I got thinking I got to do this for five more weeks. I don't want to do it. That was part of it, but sometimes it was just one of the times. Family got in the way and even though I couldn't help it, I realized I was going to have to take off more days to help with the grandkids and other situations like that that was going on. What should have happened in that case is I should have not accepted the long-term job in the first place, but I did. Then I had to tell them I can't do it anymore, and that's that one. One of the other times was selfish.
Greg:I'm retired, I wanted to do some things, things I decided I can't do this long-term anymore based on things I want to do in my life as a retired person. And, yes, most of it had to do with vacation, pleasure trips, all that kind of thing. So that's the reason now for the most part. Now, if there's an administrator out there listening, please don't say well, collins will never do long-term again, I'll go to somebody else. I kind of want to be asked and I guarantee you I won't immediately turn you down. I'll consider it, given the situation, the age groups and all that kind of thing. But for the most part I like doing short-term day by day now, because I get to meet so many students and I don't have to tie myself down. Secondly, age groups oh man, this is such a big one for me.
Greg:You've heard me talk about in recent podcasts how I think the pandemic has hurt the maturity level of some of these middle schoolers that I've got coming in. It makes me. Middle school used to be my favorite. I really can't say that anymore. Especially I did basically oh at least 85% high school last week because I was working with one volleyball program in the first half of the year and another volleyball program the second half of the year and it just made sense to teach more in those high schools. So I did. Once that was over, I did some middle school and now I'm thinking, all right, if I really think that the pandemic caused some of this, how am I going to test that? Well, here's how I'm going to test it.
Greg:Guys, I've got my list on a lot of elementary schools. Now they are on my list. I've got four of them in my area that I've clicked the checkmark. I assume my area is about like yours, where you click a checkmark of the schools you want to be considered for to substitute teach and those are the only schools that it lists for you. There's some. I don't go to Nothing against those schools, it's just different things, distance, that kind of thing. There's one elementary school that two of my grandkids are going to be at next year and it's on a bad day I could walk to it if I had to. It's just basically, I guess it's about a mile and a half down the road and I'm going to get into elementary school more.
Greg:In fact, the way I'm leaning right now, I may want to start with the majority being elementary school, and I'm thinking this maturity level that I kept complaining about, you know, because of the pandemic. If I go all the way down to elementary school and now the kids I'm subbing in fourth grade were only what would that be? It's five years ago now, right, so they would have barely been in kindergarten or somewhere in that area. If then and maybe they missed, even though they were cooped up in the house too that was so young that maybe it hasn't hurt their development as much, and I want to put that to practice. So I'm thinking this up. It's less than a month away. This upcoming year, I may actually lean more towards elementary school and, to be honest, part of it has also has to do with I helped the area high school volleyball coach with her summer program again this summer and I enjoyed that so much. We did well. We were 5-1, I think, by the end of the season. And I enjoyed it so much not because we were 5-1, but because I really enjoyed working with that age group. If I enjoy it that much, I've got to test it out in the classroom, right. So I've got some.
Greg:I told you that, even though I said I might try it someday, that I don't think I could ever teach elementary school. I am challenging myself. You don't have to, but I am challenging myself to do elementary school. In fact, if I was being guessing, if I was a betting man and I do sometimes, but I don't think I can bet on this I would bet that the majority of you listening are elementary school favorites. That's where you like to go most, and I don't know if that's true, but we'll see. So this might be one of those that I tell you why I'm going to go to elementary school. I'm going to branch out those of you that have been doing elementary school. I might not have motivated you to try middle school or high school, but either way, that is another reason I am changing my philosophy about substitute teaching this year and then the last one I'll talk about. This came up as well during this summer volleyball program because I was working with the younger kids. So the oldest one in my group was actually going into sixth grade next year and the youngest we actually had some that are going into third grade that did really well. They did shockingly well, to be perfectly honest. I enjoyed that age group Again. That's what's driving me towards elementary school.
Greg:The other side of the curtain in that gymnasium were some of the kids that I had taught all the time, and every time I see them, mr Collins, when are you coming back? They know some of the reasons that I didn't come back to their school for a while. In the first place, some of the students just kind of rubbed me the wrong way and I knew I had other options. So I decided not to go back and you know they asked me to come back and even to the point of saying don't let those other students don't hold it against us because of those other students and that kind of. I'm an old man, man, my heart gets broken easily these days with kids of that age and I'll probably go back. So I said I might not go back to that school until some of these students had grown up. That's not the case. I'm going to go back to that school, I'm going to give it another try. To be honest, I might even seek out classes that I know these students are going to be in and see if they have an extra level of maturity that's helped them and if maybe I have another year of experience that has helped me and made me realize, hey, this isn't such a bad gig After all.
Greg:You know, one thing that I've done is I've thought a lot about things that have happened. Did happen when I was like in junior high and high school back in my day. Happened, did happen when I was like in junior high and high school back in my day, and it wasn't that indifferent than even I was a pretty good kid. But I gave substitute teachers a hard time sometimes and I think back to that and think what was I thinking? Why did I act that way? Of course I'm 66 now. I mean a lot of that comes from just maturing. But that's the three things that I'm going to challenge myself, challenge yourself with other things. You heard the reasons why I'm changing, why I'm going to concentrate on short-term substitute teaching, for the most part, elementary school teaching hopefully for the most part and going back to some of the middle school classes that I said I probably wouldn't go back to for a while, because I need to challenge myself, challenge yourself, I mean.
Greg:I remember I had a boss back when I was 30. I was an accountant. He was the controller. I worked for him in an assembly plant and he would occasionally make comments about how somebody was down on the assembly line and was asked to move into a management position and he didn't want to and my boss was giving him a really hard time. I mean, how can you not move forward to higher paying jobs that challenge yourself more Well, people are all just different. He was happy where he was. You get more headaches in a management position. Same way here. Challenge yourself. If you've got it easy right now, try something more difficult, see how it works out and, I hope, as we get back in man, what do we got here? It is july 30th, what is it? Are we three weeks away? Some of you maybe even sooner than that, some of you may not start till september, but either way, we got to be thinking about our strategies as we enter this new substitute teacher year.
