There's always a next time!

I had my audition and interview today at FFCA charter school where I had my 2nd/3rd (last Fall) practicum.

For my audition, I taught a Chem 20 AP class. I was extremely nervous, not only because it was an audition for a real job, but for it is my first high-academic class. After about 10 minutes into the lesson though, I felt like I calmed down a lot while I was teaching. Despite spending a lot of my time in my last practicum trying to make my classes interesting by cutting down on lecturing and having more activities, I resorted to using my old teaching way: direct teaching. I wasn't quite sure how I would incorporate activities into the lesson today since it's a high school class and there was quite a bit of material to cover, but I tried incorporating some questions to get them thinking. Of course, about 30 minutes in, students were starting to get restless and in hindsight, I guess I should have addressed that.

After my audition, I went down to the office for my interview. I was interviewed by the two assistant principals since the principal himself had a situation to deal with. The interview was pretty much like the other two I had so far, but it was far shorter than I expected. I believe I was asked about 5-6 questions before they asked if I had any questions to ask. All in all though, I thought that things went alright, far from what I wanted, but acceptable. I managed, I believe, to answer each question fully and truthfully.

And unfortunately, acceptable wasn't enough. A couple hours after I got home, I got a call from the principal stating that they decided not to hire me. I have to admit that I was depressed for a bit. To cheer me up, I played some games and watched Ted (hilarious movie by the way). Looking back though, it's a fine time to reflect on my experience today and what I can do better if I have another audition in the future. I guess I could have incorporated my activities, even for a high school class, address behaviour issues and shut them down on the spot (something I tend not to do a lot unless the situation gets out of hand). It's an experience, and even though it wasn't a success, there's much to learn from that audition/interview!

And now just to wait and see what CBE's final decision is... maybe I should give them a call soon.