These past few months have seen a couple of my career goals come to light. I finally finished my Level I EMS Instructor. That took almost a year and a half to complete. The other is finally getting my own EMT class. I got a call the other week by the coordinator of the EMS program of the local community college that I have been teaching part-time for. It seemed like he was in a bit of a bind and my name popped up on his radar.
Apparently there was a course scheduled for this summer that didn't have a maximum capacity, or someone forgot to put a cap on it when they did the paperwork before the class began. Well, to make a long story shorter, there was over 40 students that showed up for the first day and no where to put them all. Hence why I got a call.
I had made it known that I wanted my own class for some time now, whenever the powers that be deemed me experienced enough to handle it own my own. Evidently, that time has now come. So for the last few days I have been running around trying to put a lesson plan together, go through all the presentations and generally getting everything ready.
The night before the first class I was nervous as hell. At first I couldn't really understand why. I had been teaching for some time now, and I knew that I knew the material. I don't have a problem with standing in front of people and talking. So why was my gut in knots and my hands all sweaty?
Then it hit me. This one was all mine. Whether the students pass or fail will ultimately rest on my shoulders. Plus, if I am ever to continue on to further goals, like being a training officer or a coordinator of a program, this was the first step. I figured that if I fuck this up, I probably won't get another shot for awhile, if ever.
Now I know that not all students will pass. The drop-out/ fail-out rate is almost 50% in EMT-Basic courses around here. I have dealt with problem students of many different types and been through many courses on how to deal with various learning styles, etc, etc.
As far as my teaching style...well...I try to roll with the punches that come and also try to get the information to the students in as many ways possible. That way, hopefully, most if not all will understand the material, pass the test and ultimately become good EMT's.
So..with all that in mind, I got some more work to do....
BRM
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2 comments:
Reading this post reminded me of the Emergency Care (a three credit course) class I took in college over a summer semester. Every time we moved into a new area of emergency care things in class, something would happen either at the restaurant where I was working as asst. manager -either to a customer, employee or family member of an employee -even when we got to the part on poisonous bites, etc. One of my cook's husband got bit by a rattlesnake on his thumb! It was like some system somewhere was giving me choice examples of broken bones, pulled muscles, upset tummies, epileptic people, you name it, each week there was some kind of emergency that entered our little corner of the world in some way or other! And the CPR test, when I had to do mine, I was so nervous, if that had been a real-live baby, it definitely would have died in my hands. That's how bad I did with that part of the test. Congrats on the class though and good luck with it too. I'm betting you'll do fine.
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