When is flexibility too flexible?

This month I am only teaching 4 hours a week because my seniors are doing student teaching at local middle schools. The Dean of the English department so kindly invited me to come and observe the seniors doing their practice teaching with actual middle school students. It is kind of exciting to witness the future lives of English graduates from our university.

However, I am mad.

This morning at 10 am I got a phone call. Tomorrow they want me to reschedule my morning class so that I can go observe a teaching practice at a middle school. My freshmen have a quiz scheduled for tomorrow and rescheduling is a bit difficult because it is a combined class of two classes, class 3 and class 4. Finding a time when they all can meet is a hassle.

Anyways, I told the department that they have to reschedule the class. If they can't, then I will teach it tomorrow at 8 am.

I teach two days out of five days. Why make a simple invitation complicated? My schedule is pretty easy to work around. Why do I have to be so flexible? Why do my students have to be notified at the last minute that their class is rescheduled? Why do we live in this land of unknowns where schedules are so flighty? Since I am the captain, will they want me to reschedule my classes again if the teacher's basketball tournament takes place during one of my classes?

April 20, 2009

I should have known that everything would work out. Having served 2 years already in Africa, I am a Peace Corps veteran. One major lesson that I have learned is that by being flexible, everything always works out. You just have to have patience to wait it out and see that everything always works out. There is no point in getting frustrated or mad at inevitable changes in schedules and last minute plans. Other cultures view time differently than America. Be flexible and go with the flow. It always works out.

I watched seniors practice teach. I taught my class on Friday. The freshmen weren't mad but fully understanding. And I played basketball during the weekend. Why get mad?