Professional Day #1

It's been a very long day for M-Dawg!

I got to school around 7:00 am - I didn't have electricity in my classroom so I ended up stealing a construction safety light contraption so I could at least start cleaning my desks and classroom. I don't have windows in my classroom so my room is completely dark. I'm in the middle of the building so it was pretty dark.

We had a 2 1/2 hour faculty meeting. Went over major changes and concerns from the previous year. The building I'll be working in has just started (in June) a major construction project. The construction will take at least two years so the building is a little on the rough side. The good news is that I'll only be in this classroom until December. After that, the entire freshman team moves out into the modular units (which are VERY nice by the way). We will be out there for the next year and a half.

I had lunch with one of my new colleagues in the history dept and a new math teacher. We chatted away about our impressions so far.

I had to leave for a freshman team meeting at 1:00. The team consists of a history teacher, math teacher, science teacher, English teacher, and SPED teacher. We all share the same students. I have four freshman classes so these other teachers share those same students with me. All of the teachers have a common planning block too! We discussed common goals for the school year for the freshman. We have freshman orientation tomorrow so each team teacher has to prepare a 30 minute activity for each freshman class to prepare them for their goals for the school year. I'm in charge of organization! :-) So, I'm going to do a little skit - I'm going to come in all disorganized with my backpack open with papers flying out it and all disorganized. Then, I'm going to break them up into groups and ask them to brainstorm ways to keep themselves organized on a butcher sheet of paper. After they brainstorm, we'll discuss some of the suggestions. I'll then demonstrate some techniques to help them stay organized for the school year: binder with dividers, agenda book, etc.

Afterwards, I went back to my room and guess what???? I had electricity! So, I stayed until 5:00 pm tonight to get things organized for tomorrow. I'm still not where I want to be for Thursday when school officially opens.

Looks like another late night on Wednesday -