Teachers

I've really been struggling the last couple of weeks with the teachers on my team. I wrote about it a couple posts ago, but I don't think it came across how hard this is becoming. It has gotten so bad that I talked with my principal early this morning about it so she would know what's going on and maybe give me some solutions.

Yesterday, we had a faculty professional development. Our principal started by doing some team-building activities. One activity required us to solve a hard problem but what made it harder is we had different personalities or jobs to perform during the challenge. One was the Leader, another the Harmonizer, another the Questioner, another the Antagonist, another the Helper. After the activity, we talked about the different personalities and our principal wanted us to think about what type of person we are on our team. I thought that I would either be a leader or a harmonizer. I was definitely the harmonizer last year on my team, even if that's not my natural inclination. As I thought about my other team members, the only role that they play is Antagonist. All 3 of them. It's always, "This is so dumb. I don't want to do this. Let's just leave early. Let's not collaborate until the principal comes so we have something to say while she's here." It's constant. And they sound like 5 year-olds!

That's when I really started feeling overwhelmed. I spent the rest of the afternoon quiet as they complained yet again about how stupid these team-building activities were. I just thought, yeah, you would think they're dumb, especially because you know it's for you!!!

I don't know. It's been hard to keep my spirits up. It's constant negativity and I'm starting to feel negative too. I hate that. I want to feel like I can control how I feel, but the negativity really just bears down on me and I can't seem to escape it.

Today was a bit better because I tried to avoid everyone as much as possible. But, I can't do that for 8 more months. I don't know how to deal with these people. I don't really have any validity in my opinions because they've all been teaching for longer, so I can't naturally stand up and take the lead. I have to be a follower, but I don't want to follow them. It's definitely frustrating.

My principal didn't have many suggestions but she said she would talk with some other principals who have had negative teams and see what they did to solve the problem. Luckily, I don't see them all the time, but literally, whenever there is a time when our kids our gone, they'll just come into my room and negative, negative, negative. And, it's not always about school either. There's one who tells me every single thing about her life and why her life is so much harder than everyone else's. It is wearing on me.

Anyway, I'd thought I would vent. I haven't done that in awhile on here, so I thought it was about time! Here's to another 8 months!