I have to say, it sucks for me when I have to teach classes by myself. Today, two of the teachers I team-teach with got called out of school for meetings, so they asked me to cover for them. It's not that I don't like teaching; I like that. But if I can't explain things clearly to the students, if I can't answer their questions clearly, and if sometimes I just can't find the words at all to convey what I need, it's very tough.

Ideally, I could conduct these classes mostly in English. However, most of the students come from a background without much skill in English listening comprehension, so mostly I just get blank stares, and the time blobs by as if we're living in a lava lamp.

Most of the students have no clue how difficult it is for me when they won't say if they understand or not. I have no idea what to do in that case. I don't know if they understand, but won't say, don't understand the assignment, or just don't understand my Japanese.

Sigh... for the first time in, well, maybe the first time this year, I almost lost it today--wanted to explode or just sit down and give up. And so it goes...