On Reviewing Student Speeches...

I've coached a high school speech team for nearly six years now and have been Ball State Debate's president for three semesters, so I like to think I know how speeches work and should sound. In all this experience though, I've forgotten that the fear of public speaking (glossophobia) cripples nearly 75% of the population. My first day in my mentor's classroom, I had to listen to narrative speeches done by juniors and seniors who didn't want to speak and especially didn't like the form they were following. Their speeches were clunky, unnatural, nervous. There wasn't eye contact. There were barely even original words, since students just filled in the blanks on an outline they had to follow unless they wanted to fail. 

While listening to the very first speech, I was bored. I felt like I was listening to a student who'd never heard of transitions. As they rushed through all the bullet points, I was zoning out. I had to consciously check back in and remember I was "grading" them based on the rubric that they followed perfectly. So it went for every subsequent speech. The speeches were dispassionate because they were told to be. The students were nervous because they're not speakers and haven't been given strategies for success. 

It's hard as someone who's coached students (just as scared) into success to not stop and beg them to throw out their standardized rubric. It's hard to sit through class "work" periods of just watching videos and not butt my way in, begging them to let me give them new strategies (or any at all!). I feel lost. I feel unsure. In other classroom observations, I've been sure of my place and I've felt comfortable with the students, but these ones are so different. They feel almost like they've been killed. 

When they aren't speaking or "working", they're listening to a teacher begging them to care, not about course content, but about her. When I tried to talk to some, they said "She'll pass me regardless; this is a blowoff class." Even in the middle school classroom, full of apathetic students, when pushed or provided with new, fun ideas, they worked. I'm lost in this classroom where the teacher has allowed and even forced apathy. I'm still dumbfounded that their speeches are fill in the blank. 

Overall, it makes me sad. This type of classroom is one I'm afraid of. Not one I'm afraid of creating because I hope to have open communication, but one I'm afraid of teaching in. One that was created without me that I have to fight to even get a word in. 

In many ways I'm glad this won't be the classroom I'm in for the next rotation, but in many more ways, I find it hard to continue going to this dead classroom full of pity and a teacher who's given up. I'm getting more apathetic towards my experience. I struggled to write my first blog post. I'm over it. I feel like my second rotation will be tainted by this one because I'll be wasting time meeting new students while still split into thinking about these students I wish I could save. 

In sum: this sucks. If I can say that.