Misadventures in Substitute Teaching
Feb. 11th, 2026 10:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gremdarkIt's been a while since I've felt the urge to post on the internet diary-style, but I'm processing something this week.
Over the last couple of weeks, I've been substitute teaching in our local public school district. It's the first thing resembling a full-time job that I've held since before I got so sick in 2019, and I'm hoping it'll give me a sense of whether the alternative certification program I'm pursuing is the right fit for me.
The adjustment period has been significant, but not unmanageable. I've taught before, but that was one-on-one pandemic teaching. Managing a 25 kid classroom is a different beast altogether. Still, I thought I was doing okay before Friday.
On Friday, a student called me a faggot. Shouted it out to the whole class, in fact. I think I would have shrugged that one off by itself, but other students used similarly homophobic and transphobic language towards me throughout the rest of that day. I taught five classes at that school. This happened in three of them. One student called me a "birl," which is not a word I'd realized had made it to this side of 1995. But there you go.
I'm visibly queer in the southern United States in 2026. I've been called slurs before. Not since I was eleven years old myself have children that small used hate speech towards me. It bothers me to know that eleven year olds in my neighborhood have that language on standby, that its use feels normal to them.
I'd like to think I covered it well in the moment, keeping my head high and taking down names and details for their regular teacher to punish. But that night, and in the days that followed, it felt like I was carrying a lead weight on my shoulders. It's taken days for the exhaustion to diminish.
Logically, I know that it's normal for that sort of language to wound. That's the point of its use. I know I'm not weak for feeling its impact. At the same time, it's hard not to reproach myself for not having a "thicker skin."
Tomorrow and Friday, I'm subbing for a G/T teacher who runs small group pullout classes at a K-5 elementary school. I'm hoping it'll be a good mental reset. But we shall see.
The adjustment period has been significant, but not unmanageable. I've taught before, but that was one-on-one pandemic teaching. Managing a 25 kid classroom is a different beast altogether. Still, I thought I was doing okay before Friday.
On Friday, a student called me a faggot. Shouted it out to the whole class, in fact. I think I would have shrugged that one off by itself, but other students used similarly homophobic and transphobic language towards me throughout the rest of that day. I taught five classes at that school. This happened in three of them. One student called me a "birl," which is not a word I'd realized had made it to this side of 1995. But there you go.
I'm visibly queer in the southern United States in 2026. I've been called slurs before. Not since I was eleven years old myself have children that small used hate speech towards me. It bothers me to know that eleven year olds in my neighborhood have that language on standby, that its use feels normal to them.
I'd like to think I covered it well in the moment, keeping my head high and taking down names and details for their regular teacher to punish. But that night, and in the days that followed, it felt like I was carrying a lead weight on my shoulders. It's taken days for the exhaustion to diminish.
Logically, I know that it's normal for that sort of language to wound. That's the point of its use. I know I'm not weak for feeling its impact. At the same time, it's hard not to reproach myself for not having a "thicker skin."
Tomorrow and Friday, I'm subbing for a G/T teacher who runs small group pullout classes at a K-5 elementary school. I'm hoping it'll be a good mental reset. But we shall see.
no subject
Date: 2026-02-12 12:13 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2026-02-12 04:55 pm (UTC)*hugs*
no subject
Date: 2026-02-12 08:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2026-02-13 02:32 pm (UTC)I hope the subbing yesterday and today was/is infinitely better.