In two weeks I am officially on vacation. Now I have to decide what I am going to do with myself over the summer. Any ideas?
Say “Hello” to Zoey, the most recent addition to the Burnett household. She’s adorable, and she knows it.
It’s hard to believe, but we are quickly approaching the end of the school year. Spring fever has officially set in. You know what I’m talking about. It’s when you can feel summer coming, and you can start to see the light at the end of the tunnel. It’s when you loose all motivation to do anything. What you may not have known, however, is that teachers suffer from spring fever too. I never realized that when I was a student.
When I was in school, the end of the year was always one of my favorite times. It was always full of excitement and anticipation. Now that I’m a teacher it’s a little different. There is definitely still a lot of anticipation, but it is overruled by stress and fear. The stress is brought on by deadlines, the fear by the thought that you haven’t done enough.
This year has been amazing. It was everything I thought it would be and more. I have learned more in 9 months that I did sitting through 4 years of classes. I could honestly not have been more blessed. As a first year teacher, I had it SO easy. My students are fantastic, I have extremely minimal behavior issues, I have the best assistant, and I am at a fantastic school. That being said, the thought of next year scares the you know what out of me. But I’m getting ahead of myself.
First I have to figure out how I’m going to say goodbye to 13 children who have changed my life.
Life is busy. If there is one thing that I have learned this year, that would be it. Every time I think things are going to slow down, something else comes up. I guess that’s just how it goes. We are struck by the unexpected, and life is throwing us curve balls.
Today was one of those days. One of those days where you wake up feeling crummy and want to spend the day in bed but it turns out to be completely worth it, and absolutely unexpected.
Let me preface by saying that my students have been struck by the flu plague. I have thirteen kids in each of my classes. The last two days I have only had five students in my morning class. But that’s not the point.
The point is that today, after seven months of class I finally saw that glimmer of hope. This year I have struggled with one student specifically. He has a very hard time in any sort of group setting, can not always control his emotions, is not showing the same level of maturity as the rest of my students, and refuses to participate in group activities. But today that all changed. Out of the blue he is singing and clapping and participating. He is writing and reading and recognizing. He is sorting and patterning and questioning. He is a completely different child. He is growing.
These are the moments that tell me that I am doing something right. That I am making a difference. These are the moments that I live for. This is why I do what I do. These moments don’t happen too often, but when they do it sure feels good.
I’ve felt really frazzled lately and I’m not sure why. Maybe it’s the stress of work and not knowing where I’ll be next year. Maybe I’m just crazy.
I got a haircut today. But not just any haircut. One of those haircuts that makes you feel like a totally different person and actually motivates you to want to make it look good. It’s a “sassy” haircut. I like it. We will see if I feel the same when I actually have to style it tomorrow.
Today I took fourteen four year olds to the zoo. I also took 10 parents. Sounds easy right? Well it wasn’t. Animals make kids go crazy, but the parents go even more crazy. It never fails that the hardest part of a field trip is getting the parents to listen. Maybe they should take some pointers from the preschoolers.
But hey, the penguins and giraffes were cool.
Today is my half birthday. This got me thinking. Half birthdays are not celebrated enough. My birthday is in the middle of summer so I never got to celebrate it at school. If we celebrated half birthdays that wouldn’t have been a problem. Just a thought. Birthdays are great. We should all get two every year.
Today I called in sick. Not awful, horrible, I can barely move sick. Just feeling really crummy sick. I actually think it’s just really bad allergies. I guess the doc will tell me later.
Calling in sick is weird. An interesting thing about being a teacher is that you feel extremely guilty when you are not there, at least I do. I am fortunate enough to have an amazing instructional assistant who is more than capable of running the show when I am gone. But I still feel guilty. Like I have abandoned her and my 26 little ones for the day. That is something that I had never really experienced with any other jobs. I guess that’s what happens when you find a job that really matters.
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