I just can’t believe how finding the Invisibles is changing my work days. This is my first year as a full time teacher at a private school, and it’s been HARD. I’ve done difficult things before but nothing was as beyond my control and depressing as teaching at this school, for many reasons. Out of desperation, I began searching and praying for something that would help me. I found Ben and the Invisibles on YouTube…
About Donavan, he is the first OWI I’ve tried with the class. The biggest contributors to his creation were two kids I’ve had significant problems with. It really did take a leap of faith for me to do this. I thought I would be standing in class without anything to do with them after ten minutes. NO SO! Indeed they put so much into this! There are other details about him they came up with. It was interesting how sure they were about their answers. When the artist asked the class if he should have hair, they were sure he shouldn’t. They really cared about his age (17).
Interestingly, Donavan resembles the artist to me. She put glasses on him without asking anyone. She was my biggest adversary when I started doing TPRS recently, saying openly how much she disliked it. So, her attitude is different now moving to CI…with our own creation.
I showed him to another class (a class that gives me ulcers, they’re so rude) and they wanted to begin making things up about him and adding details. I didn’t let them and told them we will make our own this coming week. A girl from another dreaded class saw him posted at the front of the room and began drawing a character on the whiteboard. I assume she took my praise of him as a challenge, as is mentioned in the Natural Approach book.
I am trying not to devour the book but am going slowly through it. We will begin our workshop on Tuesday. I’m actually excited about my job now, whereas I was counting down the days for the end of the year, applying to other jobs all over the place, lamenting not being a student anymore. Now, I’m re-upping my contract at the end of the month because they are allowing me to do this.
I’ll let everyone know if they eat my lunch on Tuesday, but I’m actually feeling somewhat confident.
To be continued…
The Problem with CI
Jeffrey Sachs was asked what the difference between people in Norway and in the U.S. was. He responded that people in Norway are happy and
