I'm pretty comfortable in my area, which is British literature, but if I'm called upon to teach something I haven't before, I study it. I'm better at learning than my students, and much more motivated! (And regardless, I'm confident that I know at least 90% more than they do about a particular topic.)
I'm very confident in biology, but I didn't start like that. What you teach in high school is 100 times more simple than what you learn in college. After graduating, I knew organic chemistry like the back of my hand, but I had to relearn mitosis. Of course it all comes back to you in a blink of an eye, but I definitely had to go back over stuff to teach just what they needed in high school and nothing more. Once you teach it once or twice you'll know everything in and out
I'm confident in my content area (history) and I haven't taken a History course since last Spring (I graduate this fall). I'm only spotty on African and Asian history. I know much more about American and European history.
I think it's a little silly to think, or for it to be expected, that a teacher will know everything in their subject area at an expert level. Are you, as a History major, supposed to know everything that ever happened in the world ever? That's ridiculous. I'm also a History major. My concentration was in European History and Latin American History. If my principal were to approach me tomorrow and ask me to teach an Asian History class, I would have to study it and learn it. That's just the way of it. Or, even better, I'm a History major who has been teaching Math for the past 5 years (go figure...). Now, I'm comfortable with Math, but there were things that I didn't remember how to do. Like circle geometry. Before I taught that, I had to brush up. The guy who teaches next door to me is a career-changer who was an engineer. He teaches general science. He's told me that he's much less comfortable when he gets to the unit on biology. Why? Because he studied physics and, to a lesser extent, chemistry. Not biology. I think the mark of a good teacher is not that you know the content area like the back of your hand (although knowing it is important - don't get me wrong), but it is in being able to learn it and present it in a way that is engaging to your students. You'll be fine.
I specialized in European history, but took courses on nearly every other geographical region and time period. At least once a week I watch a documentary on a favorite topic. I feel very confident about my history knowledge (some of my friends think its frightening how much detail I can remember). If I had to pick a weak spot it would be U.S. History from 1950 to about the 1990s. We always seemed to rush through it because my teachers spent so much time on other things. Suddenly we would have two weeks left before exams and still had 50ish years to cover. All teachers have to do is stay about a week ahead of their students, content wise. I could teach any history, political science, economics, geography, or government class confidently since I've taken those more recently, but ask me to teach sociology or psychology and you can bet I'd be reading the textbook every night.
I teach math. I feel confident but sometimes I will get asked a question that I either don't know or am not 100% confident in my answer.I always make it a point to get back to the class or student as quickly as I can with the correct answer. Occasionally I can figure the problem out on the board. I enjoy these situations. i think sometimes students want to stay in their comfort zone and work only the type of problems that they have been shown how to do. In math, this is impossible to do as there are an infinite combination of problems. What I try to model is the reasoning needed to think through to solve a problem and also demonstrate persistence in sticking with a problem until it is resolved.These skills are critical - maybe moreso than reworking the exact types of problems that they have seen done by the teacher. That is just "cut and paste" learning imo.
You'll be surprised how much you teach yourself as you go along. That's part of the fun of teaching actually--learning more and passing it along. Don't worry.
Wow...this is exactly how I felt last year when I taught middle school language arts and social studies. My learning curve went way up!!!
I cannot diagram a sentence and have trouble explaining the definition of the ablative case, but I can teach grammar. I haven't read every book, but I have a good grasp of literature and will happily add another selection to my arsenal. I'm a published writer but am still learning the best way to teach writing. I suppose it all depends on your POV.
I know with 100% certainty that I don't know everything there is to know about writing, reading skills, literature, and grammar. I am, however, 100% certain that I have the ability to find out the things I need to know and teach them to my students.
I have a PhD. in my subject area and have passed stringent exams in both American and European history in order to obtain it. I can lecture on most any topic in American or European history by just taking a look at my notes or in the rare case doing some research. I am a published writer, yet I am always looking for better ways to teach writing. However, I am constantly looking for new ways to teach this content to my students. I can always learn new ways to teach my students and lead my teachers, even though I have a terminal degree within my field.
I'm very confident in my MS English skills. But if I ever moved to HS and had to teach a more specialized class, like classical literature or American Lit before Civil War, I'd have to do a lot of refreshing. No one expects you to know everything about everything to be a teacher. You just have to know what you need to know - cold - before you teach it to the kids.
I have a background in Physics and have taught Physics, Bio and Earth Science. Biology was difficult, but successful. Earth Science and Physics I theoretically was an expert in, but am still learning new things every time I teach. I'm confident in my ability to guide students towards key ideas and important experiments, but no one is perfect.
I feel confident until we attend our weekly morning meetings (run by the P, VP, Reading and Math specialists) and then they always have a few things I'm not doing and I feel kind of incompetent. For instance, I thought I was great at teaching math because: 1. I do an interactive whole group lesson w/props and manipulatives 2. I have the kids work in small groups or partners while I circulate 3. I give independent work to those who "get it" and for those struggling I pull them to the back table so we can work in small groups 4. We come back to the carpet and review our lesson and I give homework that matches HOWEVER, I learned in our last morning meeting that I should be: 1. Scribing (writing for) my ESOL kids 2. Putting the students who are struggling on the computer for 20 minutes, while still finding time for them to be part of whole group, group work, independent work, and small group with me 3. Have multiple small math centers with differentiated work that reflects the curriculum in each Keep in mind we only get 1 hour for math and my state's common core focuses heavily on word problems and EXPLAINING your work in the written form. Even for advanced 6 year olds, it's a hard skill. (And to be honest, it's a hard skill for me as a teacher to teach because I did not learn that way in school and our old curriculum was mainly numbers, or reading a word problem then solving with numbers. We didn't require the kids to write about their solution)
