Saturday, January 30, 2010

I've been a bad blogger :=)

Goodness . . . where has the time gone? It's 2010 and I haven't posted once on this blog.

I went out to Arizona to be with my family over the Winter break. Mom and Dad are early retired and traveling around the country in a 5th wheel camper full-time. They are spending the winter in the Phoenix area and are LOVING it! :-) My sister and I flew out there to be with them for Christmas. We had a nice visit with them and seeing the sites around the Phoenix area. I also got to see some high school friends that settled out there and we had a mini-reunion one evening. :=)

The school year is VERY busy. I feel like I don't have time for anything anymore. The transition program is eating up whatever time I have in and out of the classroom. I'm somewhat ignoring my other classes because of the transition program. The behavior has improved tremendously in those classes (which is great for my mental health) but the emotional stuff these kids deal with on a daily basis is tough to deal with from a teacher side. I get too emotionally involved with these kids (I care too much). You may be saying that's a good thing but it can be a bad thing too. I take a lot of this emotion home with me at night. :=(

As mentioned above, I'm ignoring my other classes. I feel like I'm not doing a good job teaching my other classes. Luckily, the local history class sorta runs itself now. But my other World History courses including the Honors class, seem to be struggling. My midterm exam scores for the college prep class were bad. Only two out of 24 students passed the midterm exam. I gave them a study guide, reviewed with games prior to the exam day, and told them to study. I even went over ways to study for tests. When I asked them if any of them studied for the exam, only a few kids raised their hands. If they don't study and put the effort into the class, how are they going to pass for the year? I've tried to step up more the past week to put more energy and time into teaching better lessons.

The Freshman House teachers seem to be more divided and cliquey this year. We now have mostly young teachers (under the age of 30) in the house and there is a lot of immature behavior that happens during common planning meetings. I'm the oldest member in the House at 38 years old. I don't have the patience for the behavior anymore. Add to it, that some of the teachers are dating each other and bring their personal business to the meetings. I find it unprofessional and annoying. Those of us that are older find the behavior inappropriate. We are trying to figure out a way of confronting the behavior without having to go to the administration about it.

My school is starting up the accreditation process with NEASC (New England Association of Schools and Colleges). I'm a co-chair for the curriculum committee. Didn't realize how much work running this committee entails. Wow! And, we have a few complainers and whiners that like to make it a "bitch session" every time we meet which is SO counter-productive. Luckily, my co-chair and I nip the behavior in the butt right away but it still makes for a stressful meeting.

I'm helping out with a Junior Olympic volleyball program on Sundays so this also takes up some time. I'm enjoying it and getting a lot out it in terms of learning new drills and tricks of how to break the game down to help the girls understand the game. The league is going to pay for me to get IMPACT trained too (it's a good thing to have on your resume).

Harvard Model Congress is coming up so I have to get the kids ready. My co-advisor isn't very helpful so it falls on me to do everything.

So, as you all can see (for those of you still reading this blog), it's been a very stressful and insanely busy time for me.

Positives:
*Transition kids LOVED the Holocaust unit! We are started a unit on Genocide in the 20th century. Kids are really getting into it. The final assessment will be with the students to create a Museum of Tolerance.
*The teachers on the transition team have been great! Very supportive! We all work together as a team. We've all been going through a lot together with this program but we've helped each other out and stood by each other the whole time.
*Looking forward to a Feb break with no HMC (this year, Harvard Model Congress is the week after Feb break so I will get an entire one off from school). :=)
*Hoping for my AP European History proposal to go through the School Committee on Wednesday (I have to present my proposal on Wed night). If I get the green light, I can sign up for AP training this summer. Yahoo!!!! :=)
*The Assistant Superintendent is finally forcing the Middle Schools to teach World History Part 1 in the 8th grade year so now we won't have to teach two years of World History in one year. I've been attending numerous meetings to help with the transition of this scope and sequence. The Middle School teachers want us to hand over all of our lessons, activities, and projects. I don't mind giving them some of our stuff but we had to take the time to create all of this work too. No one handed us all the work. I guess they are all "stressed" about having to teach new curriculum. Welcome to our world is all I have to say. I get so tired of the high school teachers being held accountable and responsible for teaching curriculum and not the middle school folks in my district. Why is that they get to teach whatever they want and we can't????? I'm thrilled that the district is finally holding them to a higher standard.

We are at the half way point of the school year. Hope all is well with all my teacher peeps out there! :=)