Back in Iowa and Back to Teaching

I must say, it was very nice to have yesterday off, and very difficult to get up this morning and go back to school. I really enjoyed my days of sleeping in and not really having anything to do. That said, it wasn't too bad of a day. The kids were fairly well behaved, and for once I only had two students gone, instead of the five to ten I had last week on a daily basis. It was nice and sunny out today. Overall, not a bad day back from a long Spring Break.

I brought a lot of stuff back from home, and now I have to find a place for it all. It's a little disconcerting to say the least. Part of me feels like I should have just left most of it at home since I don't really need it here and it just makes for more stuff I have to move again when I move out of this apartment. On the other hand, some of it is nice to have here with me in the event that I would need it. Oh well. I'm a big packrat, so a lot of it is stuff I probably don't really need but have here anyway. I have been better at throwing things away, but not as good as I should be I guess.

We're working on poetry right now. I love poetry, but I really feel like we're squishing it all into two weeks. Really, poetry could go on for a long time, but I guess for now I have to do what the English team is doing. I went and looked at my new room today. It's nice. I'm excited to have it. However, it's again on a NW corner, so we'll see how warm it is!

I'm looking forward to it being warm for good. I think we have at least another two or three weeks of "cool" however.

Spring Break!

Well, it hasn't been a very exciting Spring Break. I have been able to move things out of my room and into boxes at least. My mom made the mistake of telling me I didn't have to get rid of anything, just put it all into boxes for later. It just needed to be "out of the way." So, that's where it all is. Out of the way in boxes for me to have to go through later. Great.

I went to see my godson on Tuesday. I was there pretty much the whole day. He remembered my name, which I think is impressive because I haven't seen him since Christmas. He's so cute.

I went shopping on Wednesday and found pretty much everything I needed to find. I found shoes for my friend's wedding in San Antonio this summer, and I found a shirt for my friend's wedding in September. It's very casual, so we can pretty much wear whatever we want, as long as it's green. All in all, it was a successful day.

I'm going fishing with my dad, my sister, and her boyfriend today. We usually go on Easter, but it's supposed to be cold and rainy this weekend, so we're going today when it's at least kind of nice. I'm kind of sad because it's supposed to be REALLY nice next week here - like 70s all week. Oh well. Maybe Iowa will have a warming trend as well.

Only 3 days left of Spring Break. I'm glad I have Monday off too.

Back in Kansas

I'm back in Kansas. I have to tell you, I am a bit disappointed. The weather was nice on Saturday when I got here, but since then it's been cold and rainy. Blah. I was looking forward to some nicer weather while I was home. I just hope it decides to warm up at some point this weekend.

Nothing very exciting has happened. We had a birthday party for my 16-year-old cousin on Saturday when I got back. Yesterday, we just kind of hung out on the couch and watched basketball games. We also went to see The Bucket List. It was a pretty cute movie, and it definitely had some "laugh out loud" parts in it. Yes, perhaps it was a bit cheesy, but aren't most "feel good" movies?

My plan for this week, other than sleeping as much as I possibly can, is to continue moving out of my old room since my mother has made it a storage closet,go shopping, and go see my godson and my friend's new baby. That should keep me occupied. Sunday is Easter, so I'll be out with my family. I hope we get to go fishing, but it looks like the weather may be bad...

I just finished reading Uglies by Scott Westerfield. While it's written for 7th graders, I really liked it. I need to go get the other two books to finish the series.

The Triangle of Students, Teachers, and Parents

I believe in a previous post that I may have stated that one should always believe a teacher over a student, or at least find out what really happened before you start saying that a teacher has done something to that student or that the teacher was wrong. Well, I may have to edit said statement. One of my advisees received yet another check today (he's on his 8th one, 3rd in a week) due to an incident in the locker room. His story didn't sound "check worthy," so I emailed the teacher to get his side. Perhaps it was the response that I received that made me a bit wary of what really happened - "As far as I am concerned there is only one side of the story when it is between a student and a teacher. I hope this clears things up." Ok now, there's usually two sides to every story - what one person perceives to be truth is different than what another person perceives to be truth. No, whether or not the "truth" is really the truth is what needs to be determined.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not trying to say that the teacher is lying, or that the student isn't giving me some story to try to stay out of trouble. It's just interesting to me because he came to me directly after lunch to tell me about the check, instead of waiting until I caught him and reprimanded him for it like he usually does. I'm just saying that the two stories are at the opposite ends of extreme, and I've never had cause to assume this child is lying to me. Either way, I know it will be taken care of at home, which is more than I can say for many of my students who may be in the same situation.

In talking to the parent, he asked me why I believed the student over the teacher. I don't know. It's just that something about the whole situation doesn't really match up. The student may very well have been showing off and causing a commotion as he sometimes tends to do, but just the fact that he came to me and told me kind of puts a warning sign in my mind. Also, I guess I just really didn't appreciate the response the teacher gave me. To me, it almost says, "I really didn't need to give him the check, but I did, so this is what I'm going to say happened so that you and parents will punish him the way I think he should be since I have a chip on my shoulder about this particular student." Maybe not. I don't know what this teacher thinks about this student since I don't really work with him, but I do know some teachers tend to rag on certain students more than others. I know that I myself am guilty of that. I try to check myself and make sure I'm not always picking on those particular students or always showing my frustration, but that's not always easy either.

Either way, I'm sure it will all get worked out. I'm sure I'll get a report from the student tomorrow.

2 days until Spring Break (and only 50 projects to grade by Friday).

Sick of being sick...

I'm so tired of being sick. We are at 3 weeks, and it's starting to drive me a bit crazy. I was feeling a lot better, and then BAM! something hit me Friday night and has not gone away. What really irks me is that I was on antibiotics. Apparently, they weren't strong enough, so the doctor put me on something else. I really hope it works. I hate being miserable. It doesn't help with teaching either.

They always said you would get the sickest your first year of teaching because you're around so many germs all the time, and you're under a lot more stress. I thought I was going to be one of the lucky ones since I didn't get sick during student teaching, but obviously I was wrong. It takes 3 quarters to get to you, not just a semester...

At least this week is kind of a "down" week. I have stuff to grade, but teaching and assignments aren't really that bad. That's good, because grades are due at 3:00 PM Friday before we leave for Spring Break. I'm so excited about that. I'm not really doing anything exciting, but at least I'll get to sleep in and take a break from everything. I also get to be where it's warmer, so that's really exciting too!

I hope everyone else is feeling healthy. I'm going to go take a nap.

Reflections

So, I was thinking the other day. I decided that I would be a much better teacher if I actually felt like I knew what I was doing from day to day. Right now, I'm just trying to keep my head above water with the everyday assignments. Other English teachers tell me what they did and report what they're doing with their students, and all I can think is, "Wow, that sounds really neat. I should try that." The thing is, I don't have the time or the energy to do what they do on a daily basis. I sometimes feel like I'm cutting corners or not being the best teacher I can be because I'm not doing all of this stuff that other teachers are doing. However, the other English teacher on my team told me that a professor once told her it took 3 years to really get things figured out and be a really good teacher. That makes me feel a little better, but I still don't like feeling like I'm cheating my students. I want them to get the best learning experience they can, and I want them to feel like they actually learned something in English. I don't want them to feel like it was a waste of time, nor do I want them to go to 8th grade and have their teachers ask who their teacher was because it appears that they know nothing... I know we all have our own styles and expertise. I just hope I'm actually teaching my students something...

Despite all of that, I still love my job. I think the students are hilarious, even the ones that drive me crazy on a daily basis. With teaching, there's always something new and exciting going on. There's never a dull moment. The students always have some story to tell or something to relate to. It's quite refreshing, especially when they can make a real connection to something we're doing in class.

We're almost done with our Holocaust unit. I am a little sad about it because I love the book we're reading and the students are very interested in the book and the topic, but I'm also ready to move on to something else. I want to do some poetry when we get back from Spring Break, but I'm not actually sure what we have planned for when we get back.

I'm ready for some warmer weather. For me, March means soccer practice and rain and warm weather, not snow. I realize this is Iowa, but the snow can go away.

You know you live in Iowa when...

You know you live in Iowa when it is 65 degrees in the morning and then you get ice and 2 inches of snow that night. This weekend was absolutely gorgeous. The sun was out, the wind was a warm breeze, and you could almost go outside with just a sweater on. By about 3:00 Sunday afternoon, it'd turned cloudy and cold, and by 9, it was pelting down freezing rain and snowing. What a blast. I am definitely ready for winter to be over. It's supposed to be 45 this weekend, so maybe, just maybe it will warm up.

I finally went to the doctor last Friday. I had been so tired and my symptoms just kept changing and getting worse. The antibiotics seem be helping a bit, but I'm still really tired. Maybe that's just needing a break. I'm glad I only have to get through 2 more weeks.

All of a sudden my students have started deciding to not do their work on time. I hate late work with a passion. It doesn't make any sense to me that things don't get turned in on time when I give them plenty of work time in class. Oh well. It's their grade, not mine. I just have the headache of trying to make sure who has and hasn't turned stuff in and then grading it.

At least the sun is out. Perhaps that will get me out of this weird slump I'm in...