Substitute Teachers Lounge
Substitute Teachers Lounge
Overcoming Bitterness: The Journey of a Substitute Teacher
The journey toward personal growth often means confronting and releasing the bitterness that clings to our spirits. In an open reflection, I recount my evolution from a younger self who clung to resentment, to now empowering players on the field and fostering forgiveness. It's a trek through the trials of perceived slights, from the sports field to the classroom, and the realization that sometimes even the most stoic teachers can acknowledge our worth. Listeners are invited on this path of self-improvement, learning that letting go of grudges is not just a release, but a gateway to inner peace and more meaningful relationships. Join me as we uncover the wisdom in choosing forgiveness over festering wounds.
Greg Collins, substitute Teacher's Lounge. It is February 27th, 2024. Leap year. That means we actually have two more days left after this one. I've got a full substitute teacher schedule this week.
Speaker 1:As most of you probably do as well, I'm surprised at the reaction to last week's podcast about regrets. Here's why I always post on our Facebook group, substitute Teacher's Lounge, what the new podcast is. But, to be honest, most of the discussion that comes up on there doesn't have to do with the podcast. It has to do with experiences they've been through. So I encourage you to go there. But this week I had a little bit more discussion and there was a couple of comments on there that I thought were sarcastic, and when I pointed them out I jokingly said well, you might not have listened to the podcast yet, because I actually talk about sarcasm at the end. And then I got to reading later and realized they might not have been sarcastic, maybe they're a little bit bitter. And I got to thinking and thinking more and I said you know what it is time to talk about what makes us bitter and yes, I am not a goody-goody on this. There are some things I'm bitter about too. Substitute Teacher's Lounge. All right, guys. So we're talking about being bitter today. That's a little bit different topic, isn't it?
Speaker 1:Let me mention next week possibly I might have a guest interview on here. You all know that I'm a big fan of I shouldn't say big fan, because I don't know it that well I like artificial intelligence. I like the concept. It can be abused just like anything else. You know that I've always talked about how my podcast provider, buzzsprout they have AI built into it now so that I actually record a podcast, load it and they give me like six suggested titles for the podcast and a full description and chapter markers. The AI actually decides on that and it's very rare that I go with something other than what they recommended. Sometimes if I got a title that I really like before I even record, I might go with that. But otherwise I really like the AI and I think we're gonna interview soon Hopefully even by next week's episode author of a book that has been written and I don't wanna put them on the spot yet since we haven't set anything up but it's an author of a book about AI and students and that kind of thing and we'll be more specific about that later.
Speaker 1:All right, bitterness. I will read you some of the comments. I'll read you one comment that was posted on Facebook last week concerning the regrets post I made about the podcast, and I think I'll save that for later. Let's start with some more of the simple things that if we're not careful, we're bitter about, and I'm not even telling you not to be bitter and I'm not even gonna tell you that I'm not bitter about it. But there's some things that have come up recently that made me think about it's time to record this topic. Let's talk quickly about the one I've probably brought up maybe 10 to 12 times over the life of the podcast, so I won't spend too much time on it now.
Speaker 1:But one of the most shocking things I had in my first week of substitute teaching now six years ago was that planning period. They went in and saw the planning and was period five. I even remember that day and I'm trying to think why are they giving me an hour off during the middle of the day? What am I supposed to do with that? And then I realized the normal teacher schedules not only allows that hour planning period to catch up on stuff, but it's not even enough. Teachers have to work when they're home late at school, all that kind of stuff, and for those of you that have done long-term teaching, you know the feeling. But I didn't feel like I needed it. I would read, and then, as the years progressed, all of a sudden, when they start taking your planning period away, well, it bothers you, doesn't it? So I'm here to tell you that I would be bold enough in another environment, outside of this podcast, to say not bitter about when they take my planning period away to cover for another teacher. But if I was honest with myself, I'm not bitter. I don't think. But guess what I've done? I've kind of moved a school that consistently takes away the planning period to the bottom of the list and I will accept substitute teacher jobs from other schools first and just leave them for my fellow safe. I guess you can call that bitterness if you want to, but that's the first thing, something that has come up in my mind more recently that I had never really thought about. I thought about doing a whole episode about this, but it's probably not worthy of a whole episode, but I was going to call the concept.
Speaker 1:Substitute teachers get bitter when they're not duty free. Every time I hear that phrase, I think of an old Seinfeld episode where they were picking up Jerry at the airport and George and Kramer were singing. I like to stop at the duty free shop. Of course that's not what we're talking about here, but I realized that substitute teachers get bitter about doing school duty, not so much the part where you go say all right, teacher says my duty is between second and third periods, hanging out, but in this hallway, usually across from the bar bathrooms or across from the staircase, something like that, just to make sure students don't get upset with each other and no fights pop up.
Speaker 1:The duty I'm talking about is when they say you've got bus duty in the morning. You got to be here a half an hour early. Or maybe even worse, you've got bus duty in the evening. You got to stay half an hour late and then, all of a sudden, you're mad about that. You signed up that job. You're bitter about it. They're not paying you for that, right. They're paying you most likely for the seven hours between seven and three. Okay, so you're not paid to do that. Should you be bitter about it? Well, I mean, there's an argument to be said, and I'm not even sure if somebody got brave enough to push the point with administration that says you're not paying me to go out and do before school or after school or during the lunch Even. I guess we can stretch it that far. I don't get paid for doing that. I'm a substitute teacher. I'm not a teacher. I should not have to do preschool or post school duty because you're not paying me, and I can see where you could get better about that. I probably won't, but I don't have kids at home. I don't have responsibilities in that regard. Sometimes I have to referee, so I'll maybe swap with somebody in the morning instead of in the evening. All that kind of stuff. It doesn't really bother me, but I fully support being better about it and trying to do something about it. So that's the second thing.
Speaker 1:One thing that I this was just personal and you guys would not have reacted the same way. I was at a middle school once and I felt like still feel like I have a good relationship with that principal and that assistant principal and I just made a comment about the language. It wasn't. You know, we go back and forth about language. This word was bad, this word was not Now this word's acceptable, and we go on and on. I've told you this before, maybe just one other time that the word sucks was as offensive back in my day as some of the other words you could have used.
Speaker 1:Whether it was one word that a student was using in class that made me uncomfortable, it would vary as far as whether it makes you uncomfortable, so I'm not gonna bring it up here. But one thing I was bitter about I sent it to the principal and assistant principal just to see what they thought, and I was gonna support whatever decision they were gonna tell me to do, and they didn't tell me to do anything. They chose not to get back to me at all. Well, you know, to me that's not a good answer. I wish they had been more specific to me than that and, I'll be honest, I was a little bit bitter about that. Why don't you at least tell me where a school stands?
Speaker 1:Topics like this have come up on the Facebook group for substitute teachers lounge and people would get in there and say, oh, our school has a policy against this. Well, I'm sorry, you might think they do and they might think they do, but they really don't, unless that policy outlines each and every word that that student is not allowed to say in the classroom, because if you don't outline each word then it's just as subjective as it always was, and some teachers would allow it as just common language. Some would be offended. So that can be a very hot topic. So I was a bit a bit, a little bit bitter about that. So maybe you've been bitter about not so much an answer from administration but a lack of answer from administration. So I wish sometimes that would go more smoothly.
Speaker 1:Now, on our substitute teacher Facebook group, I'm gonna go ahead and share those comments with you now and I will not give you the person's name, but they did post it publicly on the Facebook group. You're allowed to go there and join. All comments are reviewed by me before they're allowed on the Facebook group. I will say, just as a reminder to those that listen here that are also part of the group I usually don't I don't. I very rarely allow links to other pages. I had one the other day that was sure to fire up a lot of people and I don't. That's not a reason I wouldn't let it be allowed, but it was more of a topic that for every negative article you could find, you could always find positive articles. So I would rather the people on there in their discussion say I just read an article about this, here's my opinion of it, and then I would let that go. I don't like it when people post on there anonymously, mainly because I'm one of those that feel like you should stand behind what you say. But I am empathetic to those of you that don't want to post your name because it's more specific to a situation that just happened to you and you don't want to the school to accidentally see what you posted.
Speaker 1:So I had posted the podcast episode notification last week. The title was called substitute teacher regrets and here's one of the comments Regrets what regrets? We regret nothing and hold ourselves blameless. We blame the students, their parents, no child left behind, administration, occasionally the teacher and capitalism. We have nothing to regret. Now that's got sarcastic overtones, but yet sarcasm is serious. I made the comment back. It's ironic that you say that, given the final discussion in the podcast about sarcasm, and the more I got to thinking about that. Even if that was meant to be sarcastic, it was meant to be truthful as well, because do we often blame others?
Speaker 1:I had a situation this weekend where I was referring where one coach was upset about one of the line judges and he told me between games. He said could you change that line judge? Well, if he hadn't lost he wouldn't have told me that. And I told him. I said not only do I think she's done a good job, I agree with her In this case. This was a tournament where one of the off teams, one of the teams that isn't playing at the time, they're the ones asked to do the line judging. I thought she did a great job.
Speaker 1:I tend to be a player advocate in those types of situations, but any conversation with a coach I never hold it, or maybe it's best I say I'm never bitter about it. There's some that bother me a little bit more than others. If you listened to the podcast a couple of weeks ago about where we talk about pickleball and the comment the guy made to me that made me feel I might have been a little bit bitter about the situation he put me in, but I got over it. In this situation I wasn't bitter against that coach, I had forgotten about it, but I know after the match which they won I could just tell by his reaction. When I walked up and said good game coach. He just kind of nodded and I could said you know, he's a little bit bitter. I'm not saying even at his age I wasn't that way.
Speaker 1:I have definitely gotten less bitter. I don't let things bother me like I did in my 20s, 30s and 40s and 66. Now my kids can tell you stories about where I overreacted, sometimes badly, and I'm glad I grew up from that, grew out of that stage, and that I really don't let things bother me like that anymore. So right now I know you can think now about things you are bitter about in the school system. It sometimes involves administration. It sometimes involves the way teachers either perceive you or you think they perceive you. Now there's some that I think don't perceive me well, but to be honest I mean there's just some people, teacher or otherwise, that you know their demeanor is to walk around with what appears to you as a scowl on their face. They may love you as a substitute teacher, they may love you being in the building, helping those students, but you know they're just a type of personality that they don't talk about it much. So I would.
Speaker 1:I can think of things that I'm bitter about and I try to improve them. I never hold a grudge against somebody. Maybe you know I think about referees that I've worked with. I'll say it like this, and it's no surprise. There are some referees I would prefer to work with over others. I'm getting more into coaching now, and I would. I'll be honest, man, I like the coaching side of it better than the refereeing side of it, but I still enjoy doing both. But we're gonna have situations that make us bitter. Think about it, try to improve on it. It'll make you feel better inside, because when you're bitter about something and see that person, it's just gonna well up inside you again. So try to get over it, try to be forgiving, given the situation, and hopefully we can get all this bitterness behind us.
