Just Another Average Monday

Last week I was beginning to feel really run-down: tired and cranky, frustrated with my lack of progress and not knowing everything when I need it, and basically needing a break.

On Friday I went to an all-day workshop on teaching reading, then drove two and a bit hours to a tiny country town for a two-day conference. Friday and Saturday nights were spent at the "local" with lovely like-minded educationalists, while Saturday and Sunday were spent with said educationalists in various workshops, followed by driving home, thinking about the planning I needed to do, and not doing any of it.

And so I find myself back at school, having had no real downtime, but somehow feeling a little re-energised. School today was uneventful, but I was in a better frame of mind, so even though I dealt with some of the same behaviour challenges and the like, I feel better about it. Maybe that's just because we've moved onto a new unit of work, and I'm kind of hoping that a lack of interest in the material could have been one of the problems in the last unit - hopefully I can inject a little more interest into the next unit of work (part-Ancient Greek History, part Australian Government).

Highlights of the day:
"Miss, does the Government help pay for school?"
"We love you Miss!" (yes, really. :-))
"Miss, how did the Labor party sack Kevin Rudd?"
From the same student: "Miss, why did Gough Whitlam get fired?"

On a little tangent: "Miss, if the Queen goes to McDonalds, does she get it for free?"

One week down...

Well I've just finished my first week of being a teacher - minus the students. This week, "Week 0", was all induction and professional development sessions, curriculum planning meetings, year group meetings, new staff meetings, and so on. I found most of the sessions really useful - although I can see that for returning staff they could feel like a waste of time. I certainly got value for my time though - getting to understad the whole school curriculum philosophy, their use of the Learning by Design framework, dipping my toe into Cooperative Reading and more.

I have my very own classroom (lucky me!) only two doors down the corridor from my staffroom, which is REALLY convenient. I spent a couple of hours in there making it 'mine', rearranging the desks into sets of four, taking down some old student work from the walls and generally tidying up a little. I'm really excited to have an interactive whiteboard, TV, video/DVD player and computer in the room - although I'm not planning on being a heavy ICT user until I'm much more comfortable in my style of teaching, it's great having these resources in there. Especially the IWB - I find I use it mainly as a projector at this stage, displaying Powerpoint prsentations, but after I get some more training on the Notebook software that could change.

By the end of the week I actually feel quite comfortable at the school, and as though I've got a fair idea of what I'm doing this term (or at least next week!). But I haven't clapped eyes on a student yet! So the real test is still to come. I'll TRY to do a weekly reflection on here I think, but it'll depend on my time management skills. Wish me luck!