pumpkin time

1st math test of the year (Data Analysis & Statistics): finished writing.
1st science quiz of the year (What is Physical Science?): needs to be corrected.
Lots of miscellaneous papers in my school bag: have been put off yet again.
Unit Plan for the next 3 weeks: so not even started yet.
The idea of crawling into bed at 4 o'clock tomorrow afternoon and staying there: YAY FRIDAY!

My greatest pleasure in life now: going to bed early.

on the job again

Today was the teachers' first day officially back on the job at ye olde John McDonogh #32 Literacy Charter School (one of oh-so-many exciting changes that have been going on while I've been in my summer hibernation). There was so much at the morning introduction that I had to take notes. Now that I look at my notes there is so much that it seems best to list the highlights:

- we have three (count 'em - 3) assistant principals
- a reading specialist!
- a Spanish teacher
- a full time middle school art teacher (who lives across the hall from me and I already like her a lot)
- 2 extra social workers
- parents will be required (to the best of the school's ability) to volunteer 1 hour per week
- community service and service learning focus in learning
- 90 minute planning periods!! (though only three days per week)
- TAP (Teacher Advancement Program) in full swing means performance-based pay
- lots of toys and new technology

As for the state of my affairs, this year will be a year of big changes and big challenges. It never seems to end. I suppose that's the way education should be - how exhausting. And awesome. As I mentioned before, I will be teaching 6th grade math once again with the added challenge of teaching 6th grade science (chemistry and physics - my two least favorite sciences). Because I am the science teacher I was given a Promethean board in my classroom, which is quite possibly the most exciting toy-tool that any teacher could ever have.



It makes planning lessons seem so much more exciting, quizzes less of a pain in the ass, and technology in the classroom that is a thousand times more useful to me and my kids than a couple of computers that only get used for MySpace and other illicit non-educational purposes. I am probably speaking technology teaching sacrilege to say so, but I hate having PCs in the classroom and I am happy to have them removed. That being said, our school has laptop carts now (a laptop for every student in the class with a wireless connection - sweet!) which I certainly plan to put to use.

The daily schedule looks slightly more sane on paper, but we shall see. We continue to work on a block schedule (90 minute periods) and I'll have three classes. The upcoming class is supposed to be fairly small so I believe I will have an average of 10 kids per class period which, when you think about it, is absolutely unheard of in a public school like ours! These estimates, however, will probably end up being closer to 15 per class which is still more than educationally reasonable. No word on the numbers of kids with exceptionalities yet, but I hope to get access to files and names by mid-week.

Still debating how to juggle my two subjects. Last year, for the brief and completely overwhelming period that I had both subjects to teach, I had two classes on three hour blocks and tried to split the class time with absolutely no success. I think my best bet is to teach math MWF and science on TTh. This strikes me as the sane way to go about things. Yes? I wish I knew more experienced teachers out there on the vast interwebs who might give a little input on such things. But this is, alas, a blog mostly for my own cathartic benefit with a tiny readership. And I am a terrible networker.

The process of putting up bulletin boards and attempting to arrange my classroom today lead to more chaos than progress. But I'm excited. Things are new and strange and seem to be moving even faster - yet the school appears more prepared in general than last year. Better prepared. Better equipped. I can't find the actual listing at the moment but at the beginning of last year #32 was at the very bottom of the barrel in New Orleans according to the state tests. After just one year, it is now in the top 30% of New Orleans schools. Which is just huge. Granted, that isn't even remotely good enough when you consider the state of New Orleans test scores. Still, there is momentum.

Gotta keep running.

t-minus 8 days

I've fallen off the face of the earth, swimming in the abyss of time and heat and paralyzing fear and pure laziness that has been my summer hermitage. But is the eve of my return to the working world.

I get a brand new batch of children on August 11th. Math and Science (for real this time). I've got the same classroom, more work, less kids, and one week to get ready for the insanity. Here we go again.

cleaning up, clearing out

This paperwork disaster is my classroom. No more bulletin boards, no more posters, no more students in desks. Just lots and lots of paper. This is me trying to get organized on multiple levels. The first is making sure I have enough evidence to back up the 20 F's I gave out (that is, for a little more perspective on the numbers, equivalent to the entirety of my homeroom class this year). Two kids to a desk--that's eight per group of four desks--with their tests and quizzes and class assignments stacking up as I clean out what's in my desk and my file cabinet. There is more paper at home.

The rest of the papers piled up in my room are worksheets and assignments that will be reused in the future, organized mostly by subject (fractions, decimals, place value, geometry, multiplication practice, integers, etc) so that I can put together the beginnings of a filing system which will hopefully make planning that much easier for next year.

And yes, there will be a next year. I just signed my new contract today. I've been told I'll be teaching science in addition to math. I sincerely hope this is not true, but at least this time I have two-and-a-half months warning to try and become a physical science expert before the kids find me out for the fraud I am.

i's gonna be edukatin ur childruns!

it's drizzling here in nola, something that rarely happens. we get humid and we get torrential downpour, but a pleasant summer showers come few and far between. so while i am watching it rain i've been a studious grad student at the library, leaching UNO wireless internets and making copies of periodicals for class work.

oh, right, and today i got a job. i like to think of this as my 'real' job. which isn't to say that what i was doing before i quit the corporate box world for greener and more challenging pastures wasn't a real job. it is just that life in a law firm always felt so temporary, as in 'this is what i'm doing until i find something to do.' when people asked me about my job, i couldn't pretend that it was interesting or important. life as an administrative assistant was hardly what i'd expected of my post-college existence (especially when so many of my contemporaries were doing way hipper things). but today has changed all that.

yours truly is a 6th grade math & science teacher. at a school in my 'hood, no less!

because i have to get familiar with two curricula (wasn't expecting to teach science at all) it is that much more imperative that i find some work space at home to do my teacherly duties. trust me, no work happens while sitting in bed surrounded by knitting projects, watching tv on the internets, eating ice cream and painting one's toe nails.