Exam Fever: Teacher’s Edition

Final exams season can affect teachers just as much as it affects learners. The atmosphere of knowing that you have done all that you could usually doesn’t mix well with the anxieties of unprepared learners, and that just puts us in a complicated and confusing mood.

As a teacher, I think we try to balance between having high expectations and just simply managing our expectations because we know the inputs, the process, and the expected outputs. The process, however, is usually offset by things such as:

• The number of days absent/ sleeping in class – I have had learners who would have gone 3 weeks or maybe more without to school.
• Incomplete or copied homework/ exams/ assignments – I find it quite wild to have a learner who literally writes their name on a formal assessment and then goes to sleep without attepting a single question.
• Lack of self-agency – It can be pretty concerning to have the learner who is absent for days at a time, only to come back and not even be concerned about what they have missed; to have learners copy everything as though they are learning anything. I have experienced learners who are simply not interested in their own futures

I find it funny when the most inactive student requests a textbook the day before an exam (sometimes the day of, about an hour before). My inner teacher voice just says, “What are you honestly going to do with it now that you never did the entire term, let alone the entire year?” Maybe the idea of sleeping with the textbook under the pillow is taken a little bit too seriously.

When it comes to marking, sometimes it feels like a comedy because there are kiddos who really know how to make up the funniest stuff, especially when my made-up up analogy is used to describe a particular concept. At times, it feels like a tragedy, especially when you know that they know, but they messed up in the exam or were close but not quite accurate.

What we want to believe is that a learner’s marks aren’t a reflection of our teaching. This is one of the most difficult statements to believe. We also know that a learner’s intelligence is not purely academic. However, we want them to be successful in multiple spheres, and that includes academics paired/coupled with whatever else they want to pursue.

Exam season for teachers represents ultimate exhaustion from a year’s supply of teaching, disciplining, monitoring, encouraging, setting the exam, marking the exam, reporting, and every other duty expected of a teacher (paid or unpaid for) in between. This also includes being reprimanded for not getting classroom management right, forgetting to take attendance, or not showing up they way you might be expected to. It would be completely natural to question whether or not you’ll be able to do this again the following year, I know I do, I even question those “I’ve been teaching for 30 years+” heros.

The one thing to look forward to after these exams is the break a chance to breathe, reflect, and maybe find ourselves again (or re-invent, which is okay too).

Dear teacher, you made it to the end of another year.

Thank you for reading