Mysterious ways

My job description says I'm a teacher of Biology/Marine Science, but I much prefer teaching Biology.  Last year my colleague and I worked out a cooperative plan - she prefers to teach Marine Science, and feels less comfortable teaching Biology. So she agreed to teach all the Marine Science in all 3 grade levels (10-12), and I would reciprocate by teaching the Biology curriculum to those same students. Perfect!! Now she's moved on to greener fields!! So I'm the only Marine Science teacher and must also teach Biology to one of the Marine Science classes + Biology to another non-Marine Science class.

Sucks!!!! Not really!!! Since the Marine Science is a Magnet Program, I'm based in the Marine Science lab all the time - even for the 2 Biology classes!!! Most teachers have to 'float' at some time!! Not only that but this magnet program can have a maximum of only 24 students - so my 3 classes have 18, 19, and 24 students respectively, and 32 for the two Biology classes. Compare this with most of the other Science classes which have 36-40 students!!! And this is for every Science class!!! This school has too many students!!! And they're so big!!! Bigger than the teachers!!! My colleagues are really stressed!!!

Today I walked upstairs to find an item in the Biology lab I had last year.  There was a group of noisy unruly students outside and a larger number of similar students inside!! Apparently the teacher was absent and a student prefect had been sent to supervise them!!! The poor girl could not manage!!! It felt like there were about 50 students (14 year olds) in the group!!! No exaggeration!!! She finally went to complain to the administrators who advised her to bring the entire group down to them. The only thing I could do was to help her to herd them there, before returning to my own small class downstairs!!!!

The Lord does work in mysterious ways!!! So I'm isolated downstairs in the Marine Science lab.  So I have to find the resources by myself to instruct these students - but there is so much on the Internet and so many innovative ways to present it!! The students are enjoying the subject!!! They even prefer to remain in the lab with me during lunch break, rather than going outside with the rest of the noisy student body!!! Thanks HFU!!! So we have to go out for field activities - we enjoy this!! Since the classes are small, and behavioral concerns are virtually non-existent, I can do HFU work while they are working quietly on their own assignments, or when I have a non-teaching period, but still based in the lab!!!! Thank you Lord!!! How did you know just what I would need!!! Doing a rigorous online program while trying to teach 6 large classes for 3 periods/week each would have been a killer!!! And my first impulse was to say no when I was asked to take the Marine Science classes this academic year!!!!!