Friday, February 22, 2008

I think some divine rapport has equalized me with them

The morning meeting with the parents went better than I'd anticipated. Everyone was cordial, and nearly everyone was reassuring and calm. One mother seemed a bit anxious, and asked lots of questions concerning my readiness. (Honestly, does anybody except teachers get that kind of interrogation? This is my job! I know how to do it!)

I pointed out to her that the transfer of power was not happening in a vacuum: the in-house substitutes, the reading coach, the whole kindergarten team, the Vice-Head, and so forth were all supporting me. And then I capped it off with, "This isn't my first job, you know." She deflated just slightly after that.

In the afternoon, I met with the PITA parents, the ones who'd sent the three-page jeremiad. The Head and VH had intimated that if things got rowdy during that meeting, they were going to invite the parents to leave Prestigious. But they were very appropriate and calm, and I made some reassuring teacher noises about their child's reading behaviors and phonemic awareness, and that was that.

Monday, I'm in there as the teacher for the next six weeks. I'm not too worried; the K team is letting me coast and feeding me the plans, and the floater's going to try to hang around a lot, so it shouldn't be okay.

1 comment:

Churlita said...

You'll be fine. I hope you used lots of big words during the meeting. Those kind of parents seem to be impressed with that.