After grading all exams and looking to accepted ratios, it seems I am an effective teacher so far. The amount of pass and fails were well within the normal ranges except that I had no fails in my AP classes. This is not because I am such a perfect teacher. It is because those students are advanced placement students. High performance is expected.
In my non-AP classes my ratios remained good. I had three failures but those were due to absences or tardiness and makeup tests will be available. I had several (mostly in languages) that were close to failure. I will review the exams with the students to understand why their scores were so low.
A teacher told me, it is rare that the student is bad; it is usually the teacher. The teacher fails to understand how the student learns. It becomes necessary for the teacher to adapt themselves to the student. It is not always so easy to do so. It can be quite complicated or even seem against everything a teacher is taught of what teaching is. As an example, I have a student who it seems ignores me during every class. He does work from other classes , pausing occasionally and seems to pay attention before returning to being distracted.
I discovered this student has severe ADHD. He can accept new information very quickly but just as quickly lose track of the class. He has accepted the information but without more that quickly follows, he loses interest. I must regain his attention. When information is new I say zhǎnshì (zhan3 shi4, I show) at the beginning to get his attention. It is short but enough to stand out as not common enough to be ignored. The other students think it is only my version of umm. Imagine the frustration of feeling you are being ignored while teaching. His scores have gotten higher so I must assume this method is working.
So, I am pleased I am not a horrible high school teacher.
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