This week I missed two days of school for the beginning of the 5 day training I'm attending about the Reading Assist (RAPS) program. It's for teachers in the Brandywine school district, but they also invited one person from every private school that's in their district's boundaries. It was at a nearby high school, and IT WAS SO FUN!!!!!!!!!! Yes, that's right. It was very fun. I was like a kid in a candy shop....talking about phonological and orthographic processes and debating how many phonemes are in the words pneumonia and folk. Any guesses? Huh? (I think it was 7 and 3.) Plus we started half an hour late, got a 20 minute morning break, an hour and a half lunch break, lots of candy, AND we got to leave 45 minutes early. Man. I got to experience what it was like not to feel exhausted at the end of a weekday.
I was (of course) feeling kind of anxious going into it...I didn't really know how to get there, I was scared I was going to be late, I had trouble working out transportation to get there and back, and I didn't know anyone. But it all worked out. I even went to Starbucks with the people who sat at my table, and we discussed lots of educational things. Did I mention it was great?? I learned a lot about what's happening with public education in Delaware, which I didn't know any of. Some people had some really good ideas for how Urban Promise can utilize some of the district and state resources that we are currently not doing at all.
At the end of the first day I sat under a tree outside reading my training manual and eating a little Milky Way Midnight waiting for James to pick me up and take me back to school. When I got back to school I got to see some of my students at after-care and heard straight from them about how bad they had been. Strangely, I didn't really care at that moment. I went in my classroom and found broken pencils and torn papers and that someone had written on my computer monitor with a pencil. But I still didn't care. Then (after killing some time) I went to my staff meeting. I walked in to the library and everyone looked so serious. I felt like they were glaring at me. No one smiled. Rob was talking about our new Head of School (more on that in a minute). Then we started talking about some other stuff and I felt my stress. level. rising. By the time I left the meeting, I felt super stressed and cranky and frustrated.
So what do I conclude from all of that? I'm not sure. Maybe I should be a reading specialist. Maybe Urban Promise is not a great working environment at the moment. Maybe I just need summer vacation. Definitely I love chances to learn new things. Definitely I want to stay in education, and probably not as a classroom teacher.
Enough on that for now. I have 5 days of school this week (my last 5 day week!), then the next week is our trip to the zoo (which I got a grant for from Target) and then 3 more days of RAPS training. Then Memorial Day and 6 1/2 more days of school. I can do it.
Yes, we did hire a head of school for next year. I am excited and hopeful. I also think it could potentially be a very hard transition for us teachers who are used to doing things our own way with no one really supervising us. But it is necessary, and I think it will really help improve our school.
I had a very quiet and relaxing weekend. I can always tell when I'm in a well-rested and healthy mental state because I can come up with creative lesson plans. This week we're going to try to do a fun unit on imagination. I planned a bunch of crafts (yikes!) and even a costume party on Friday. We'll see how that goes...
Sometime this week I need to write about my field trip to Winterthur Gardens and a tour group full of senior citizens glaring at me while I physically restrained a child throwing a tantrum. It still stresses me out just thinking about it!
I was (of course) feeling kind of anxious going into it...I didn't really know how to get there, I was scared I was going to be late, I had trouble working out transportation to get there and back, and I didn't know anyone. But it all worked out. I even went to Starbucks with the people who sat at my table, and we discussed lots of educational things. Did I mention it was great?? I learned a lot about what's happening with public education in Delaware, which I didn't know any of. Some people had some really good ideas for how Urban Promise can utilize some of the district and state resources that we are currently not doing at all.
At the end of the first day I sat under a tree outside reading my training manual and eating a little Milky Way Midnight waiting for James to pick me up and take me back to school. When I got back to school I got to see some of my students at after-care and heard straight from them about how bad they had been. Strangely, I didn't really care at that moment. I went in my classroom and found broken pencils and torn papers and that someone had written on my computer monitor with a pencil. But I still didn't care. Then (after killing some time) I went to my staff meeting. I walked in to the library and everyone looked so serious. I felt like they were glaring at me. No one smiled. Rob was talking about our new Head of School (more on that in a minute). Then we started talking about some other stuff and I felt my stress. level. rising. By the time I left the meeting, I felt super stressed and cranky and frustrated.
So what do I conclude from all of that? I'm not sure. Maybe I should be a reading specialist. Maybe Urban Promise is not a great working environment at the moment. Maybe I just need summer vacation. Definitely I love chances to learn new things. Definitely I want to stay in education, and probably not as a classroom teacher.
Enough on that for now. I have 5 days of school this week (my last 5 day week!), then the next week is our trip to the zoo (which I got a grant for from Target) and then 3 more days of RAPS training. Then Memorial Day and 6 1/2 more days of school. I can do it.
Yes, we did hire a head of school for next year. I am excited and hopeful. I also think it could potentially be a very hard transition for us teachers who are used to doing things our own way with no one really supervising us. But it is necessary, and I think it will really help improve our school.
I had a very quiet and relaxing weekend. I can always tell when I'm in a well-rested and healthy mental state because I can come up with creative lesson plans. This week we're going to try to do a fun unit on imagination. I planned a bunch of crafts (yikes!) and even a costume party on Friday. We'll see how that goes...
Sometime this week I need to write about my field trip to Winterthur Gardens and a tour group full of senior citizens glaring at me while I physically restrained a child throwing a tantrum. It still stresses me out just thinking about it!
Comments
Interesting typo in this statement at the end of your post: "...a tour group full of senior citizens glaring at me while I physically retrained a child throwing a tantrum." I'm guessing you actually restrained, but what you'd really like to do is exactly what you said, retrain!