We had our first OFFICIAL teacher workday today. This morning we sat on small child-sized lunchroom seats for our first meeting of the year. Luckily our group was at the back of the room so when my "sit-upon" became numb and my back started yelling at me I just stood up for awhile. Our new administration has made a lot of very positive changes. A couple of the changing have me scratching my head going huh? Over all though the changes are just what was needed. This principal seems very matter-of-fact and no-nonsense.
We have a couple of new team-mates in second grade this year. One is a brand new teacher. Brand new and I am not sure she had enough time in the classroom as a student teacher before this, or maybe she was just not paying attention in class. We are surprised by her questions on a daily basis. She has been assigned a mentor and I hope that her mentor can help. It was a first for me to be asked "Can I wear my gym clothes tomorrow." That was for our first day today. No you cannot EVER wear your gym clothes to school, I've seen them. Okay I put it much nicer than that, much much more diplomatic. The problem is unless I provided a pictures with multiple examples of appropriate and inappropriate I don't think she would understand what professional work wear would mean.
I am apparently the most technologically literate person on our team. I spent a good hour inputting schedules into our Google Calendars. Our administration doesn't want to be handed papers. They have tried to do more and more electronically. I created Calendars for three grade levels last year so I created a couple again for our team. I had to input all of the scheduled times for us six second grade teachers into the schedule. It is great now that it is done, but it was a little bit of a headache to do everyone. It is done though... I think.
A colleague is struggling with a mentally ill family member. The family member has had to be hospitalized a couple of times just this summer. We are trying to be a support for the colleague. It is sad to see how our brain and chemistry can significantly impact daily life.
The smoke has been constant from these summer wildfires. Today it rolled in thicker than what it had been. It is not fun with my asthma. I try to stay indoors as much as possible. However, as school starts I do not know how much that will be possible.
My class size is about 20 right now. It is a very nice size. I hope that we don't get many more new students. I was apparently given another challenge this year. Sigh.... Some of the behavior sounded familiar to a major challenge I had last year. I hope I am up for this challenge, because last years challenge still gives me nightmares.
Tomorrow is back to school night and I am almost ready for this. I have a couple of things to finish printing and many things to label before tomorrow night. Tomorrow we have the whole day to work in our classrooms. Back to school night starts at 4 p.m. and ends at 5:15p.m. It is earlier than last year, but we will get home at a reasonable hour.
I have never looked forward to snowfall as much as this year. It really can't be winter soon enough for me! The locals predict an early winter as the mice and spiders are already trying to move inside. I am good with this prediction! Let it SNOW! I saved the music teacher from a stink bug. I don't know if she paid attention to my stink bug removal technique or if I will be called upon again to remove stinkbugs. When I taught in the boonies this was a regular occurrence. The students were trained to NEVER step on them, notify me, and let me capture in a plastic bag. If they stepped on it we had to relocate for a period of time. The music teacher felt someone stalked by the stinkbug. It was a rather large one and not intimidated at all. I was able to remove it and release it without any toxic fumes. Unknown skill sets not covered in teacher education classes. I am pretty adept at emptying mouse traps too. UGGH
Well I am going to attempt again to sleep. I'm going to have to prop myself up to get some air in to sleep tonight. I did change my heat pump air filter as it has been filtering a lot of smoky air. This might help filter out some of those particulates. I am excited to begin another school year. There has so many changes in the right direction that will really support teachers and make the classrooms and building a safer environment for all. The first 3 weeks of school we have a lot of mandatory testing to complete again by state law. It is tough to get that all done while still establishing classroom procedures. I am trying to move most of it to the second two weeks, so that the first week I can really establish my expectations! Here we go again!!
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