Quote from: Beej on September 10, 2013, 04:05:08 PM

Quote from: Mattaru on September 10, 2013, 03:24:50 PM

I did this last year. One lesson across two schools with levels adjusted.
That means this year I had to make a fresh batch of lessons instead of being able to reuse my old ones from last year.

I asked to teach from the textbook this year. Saves me a big a headache on thinking what I should teach this week.

Interesting... I was under the impression that teaching from the textbook was the bigger headache. Are you the exception or is that the general consensus among foreign teachers?

As someone who has to plan up to 10 different classes per week without any textbook or guidelines whatsoever, I think going by a textbook would be a huge timesaver. Maybe it's not as much freedom, but too much freedom takes a lot of work. Not to mention that maybe half of my classes are multi-level.

Used to teach from the textbook, now I have to pull something out of my ass for every class. I need to make between six and twelve unique lesson plans a week, and up to four of those have to be adapted for 2-3 levels. I really miss the texbook; it took a lot of the thinking and effort out of lesson planning. Complete freedom at times is mind-numbing, and if a lesson isn't a hit it's all on your shoulders which can feel shitty at times. I've learned to always have backup lessons on hand just in case the kids aren't having any of it because it's not entertaining or too hard/half the class time is consumed by some sort of school whatever no one bothered to tell me about/ the difficulty is too low and they burn through it with ample time to spare.

I just make sure I plan a few weeks in advance now.