Graduate class #2

In my second class of the semester I learned several more tools to use in my classroom. The following day in my classroom of 7th graders I successfully got the class quiet and on task within 2 minutes simply by raising my hand and waiting. They had used that in 6th grade and knew right away that I was asking them to be quiet. Amazing! I'm realizing more and more that I spend too much time managing and not enough time teaching. My 6th period students are fully aware of this and I've taken steps to remedy the situation. I can see the well-behaved kids roll their eyes and wish for greener pastures. I ache for them to be challenged and to have a work environment that's more conducive to their learning. I want to give that to them. I also learned in my second class that there is a curriculum website that guides me through Virginia's objectives for my grade level and subject. I was excited when I heard about it and was eager to see the lessons that had been created for the subjects I was struggling to teach. I was sadly disappointed to find that the one activity that was listed for 12 weeks of curriculum was not up to par and was written for a 4th grade level. I did do the activity with my students but since they were 4 steps ahead of the activity they were bored and I felt it was a waste of time. Reading Understanding by Design I'm struck and saddended my my own level of misunderstanding and I feel every day that I need to relearn the fundamentals I missed in elementary and middle school. I fear doing my students a disservice or even causing harm by not fully understanding the topics I'm attempting to teach. I also am surprised by the other teachers who tell me 'not to worry about it', when I seek understanding of the topics we share.