John responded to Jeff:
Jeff,
I know I sound like a broken record these days, but I really want to emphasize that you need to be putting yourself first here: your job security, your mental health and emotional stability, and your family. No class or method is worth sacrificing these things for, especially a Latin 3 class. You are on thin ice with your AP, and he is already taking aim at the method. Go under radar, even if this means saying, “you’re right. I need to scale this back a bit until I have my skills together and don’t feel so overwhelmed, and focus mainly on introducing these methods in the eariler grades.” I do not see this as a compromise, because it will allow to continue your work in the long run, and when your current Latin 1’s are in year 3, this will not be an issue, AND your classes will be larger because of the larger retention rate that the method causes.
The martyr thing is not working for teachers, and it doesn’t help our students when we are on the verge of burn-out.
You are doing great work, Jeff, and I want you to do great work for the duration of a long and satisfying career. I also want you to enjoy your family. Stay strong, stick to what you know what’s right, but don’t kill yourself trying to do it all.
John
