So today was the day of awkward moments…

All of these comments came from my male students throughout the day.

1 – you look younger with your hair down. How old are you?

2 – You’re hair looks so nice down. You should wear it like that more often.

3 – and the king of them all… While discussing positive and negative reinforcement and punish as part of a lesson on operant conditioning in Animal Behavior. I was explaining the different types of reinforcement and punishment using an example of how I would reinforce the behavior of the class if they all turned their labs in on time. e.g. I would positively reinforce the behavior by giving candy. So I asked the class to give me an example of positive punishment. My biggest and brightest smart ass gave the following example, “If I did not turn in my homework on time you could whip me” Yes, he did say that. I had to turn around and face the board to collect myself on that one.

On another note, everytime someone asks me if I like my new job the standard response I have come to give is, “Ehh, I LOVE being in the classroom 90% of the time teaching and interacting with the kids, BUT I HATE the 900 hours of work I have to do outside of the classroom.” Some days it puts me in such a foul mood I feel bad for my roommate and Ben.

Good news though: I got paid! My biggest paycheck ever! (you have to remember I just graduated from college people) and I got a Satisfactory on my observation. (more on that later)!

This week was quite eventful! I felt disorganized and rushed everyday!

Tuesday I did my first observation of senior teachers. I come in early to observe the first part of the lab exerecise for the week. I was sooo bored and tired!!! Later in the day I observe a recitation period for the Regents Biology class. This teacher is amazing to watch and gives me a lot of good ideas on how to do things and expand on the lesson plans provided. So that is nice.

Wednesday I had my first informal evaluation by my AP. That was interesting. I wasn’t too flustered when she came in because I had heard from the other new teachers that she was going around this week. The lesson went pretty well. She had some good things to say and some concrete suggestions. It seems like I’m having trouble with the same things as the other new teachers.

Today was “freshmen friday” which equals chaos! This is the day the seniors pick on freshmen and play pranks in the school. Couple this with a fire drill one period and that means nothing got done that period. The halls were sticky and smelly from the maple syrup on all the banisters. The freshmen were covered in stickers, at least the ALL didn’t say vulger or mean things about them. There were goldfish in the toilets and lord only knows what happened out in the yard because it was COVERED in trash and paper. I had freshmen all day and they were all riled up from the commotion.

It made for a really long week, not to mention the pile of work I brought home to do. I have to make up my UNIT 1 test for regents bio and show it to my AP monday. I have to make my UNIT 2 exam for regents bio by mid-week and submit to my AP. I have to make my first exam for animal behavior and show it to my AP by the end of the week. I have to re-learn learning to teach to my animal behavior class next week and make the lesson plans and lab for it. I have to lesson plan for my other 2 preps as well. I have to review a text I got about animal behavior to see if I want to order it for the course – yes we still don’t have textbooks because I am finding out little bits and pieces of the process (that I am supposed to know intuitively apparently). I’m exhausted but still enjoying my job.

I had one student (a senior) tell me I was his favorite teacher and heard one of my freshmen in the hall say I was his coolest teacher so I have that going for me. So far I don’t have too many class management issues. One of my regents classes gets a little loud every once in a while but I can maintain control. My seniors enjoy talking a lot and lab Thursday was controlled chaos. It made me tired of my name because I heard it every 5 seconds with questions and stories about animal behavior.

My grad class is starting to require some reading and homework now too so I have to start keeping up with that on top of all my planning and such! AH! Soon to be overwhelmed!

I think the highlight of the week was getting to see Ben for the first time since Sunday yesterday evening.

I have been rambling for a while now…time for me to go relax some more in front of the TV.

I have never gone through so many emotions in one week as I did this week. I was terrified Monday as I was preparing lessons and handouts for my classes. Exhausted on Tuesday. Wednesday I felt like I was barely keeping my head above water and Thursday I felt great. Today I’m estactic it’s Friday. So I survived. I’m getting a handle on everything administrative I need to do each day. I’m getting to know my students and enjoying teaching them and talking to them. I’m getting to know which teachers will help me out and which ones won’t and who to talk to about certain things. I’m learning…I’m exhausted…I’m happy…all at the same time.

My goals for this weekend include setting up my gradebook, grading pre-assessments, and preparing the lessons for all my classes for the next week and e-mailing the new people that want to work in the animal room. I think I can do it and still enjoy college football all day tomorrow….

Thursday I was extremely overwhelmed. I got a lot of information but not the information I wanted. I came home exhausted, but still managed to make it out to watch the ‘Canes game! (GO CANES!)

Friday was worse. Somewhere between Thursday and Friday I got food poisoning or a stomach virus and managed to not sleep and make it to work on Friday. I got some essential information like the schedule of my classes and some bare bones lesson plans for animal behavior but still don’t have material for tomorrow’s research lit class or a text book for animal behavior. This is scary!

So now I have a friend in town on the long weekend and am atttempting to create 4 days worth of animal behavior lessons and pray that I get the Research Lit material e-mailed to me today like it was promised. I am going to lose my head this year!

I’m terrified for tomorrow. The first students I am going to meet are my senior homeroom students. I hope it goes well!

Yesterday morning I had new teacher orientation in the biology department at my new school. We got a lot of information about the Regents biology class we were all going to be teaching. I have tons of lesson plans to look over and tweak in the coming weeks. I didn’t get any information about the research literacy class I’m teaching though. The lead teacher for that wasn’t there but the lessons for that class are laid out for everyone just like the regents biology class is.

I got some surprising news in this meeting as well. 1 – I get an extra day to come to school before classes start. All the new teachers will be there an extra day to become familiar and comfortable with the school and do all sorts of administrative stuff. So that’s great news. 2 – I’m teaching animal behavior! We talked about me taking over the class down the road but the teacher who teaches it left and I’m inheriting the class now. It’s exciting and overwhelming at the same time.  I’ve only gotten animal behavior in bits and chunks from different classes I took in college. The teacher didn’t leave much about the class either except for an outline. The AP promised she would work closely with me on it. She did say they go to the Bronx Zoo once a week in the class which is REALLY awesome! So I get an extra challenge.

After leaving the meeting I feel a tad less apprehensive about the year now. Everyone seems a lot friendlier outside of an interview. 2 of my classes have all the lessons planned out; I just get to add my own flair here and there. My labs will be set up for me each week. I will get to know the AP very well as we work together to develop a curriculum for animal behavior. I’m staying pretty positive about it all and am still really excited for the fall.

Tomorrow I’m going to meet some other new teachers at the Central Park Zoo so hopefully that will be fun and I’ll make some more contacts in NYC!

So without training filling my days I’ve gotten a lot of things done that needed to be done – a very good thing. Our apartment is cleaner than ever. Sitting at home alone is quite boring though and I am starting to go crazy with all this free time. Now most people are wondering why I’m not going out and seeing the city but the city isn’t that fun by yourself and when its 90 degrees outside. Last night ben and I saw Cirque Dream Jungle Fantasy for my birthday and it was awesome! It was really nice to spend time with him. Today I spent the morning in Central Park. I LOVE THE PARK! I took over 100 pictures – I forgot how much I enjoy wandering around and taking pictures. I read under a tree for an hour. It was great! I don’t have too many other plans to see the city this week though. We’ll see what happens.

Yesterday marked the end of training. I finished all my work and turned it in on Thursday so I can not think about the teaching fellows for awhile. I feel like I have my life back but Ben is now busier than ever on the project he is currently working on so it doesn’t look like I’ll be seeing him anymore than our usual few times a week. I don’t have any big plans for my time off. Hopefully a trip to the beach. Catching up with some people who live up here that I haven’t even contacted since moving. Getting organized is high on the list. I’m meeting with my AP and department th 12th so after that I’m sure I’ll have plenty of things to think about for the upcoming year. But for now relaxing is high on the list!

This weekend I did some tourist-y things for the first time since we’ve been here. On Friday night we went MoMA. It was free after 4 so it was PACKED! It was a good opportunity to become familiar with the museum and what they had but hard to look at and appreciate the art with everyone there crowding around and talking. Ben and I plan on paying one day and going back to appreciate everything. I can’t wait to get to see all the photography up close and the new exhibit on modern housing.

On Saturday we went to Coney Island for the Siren Music Festival. Once again it was PACKED. It took over half an hour to get food and beer from Nathan’s. We finally got our food and enjoyed our famous Nathan’s hot dog. We caught parts of a couple of the bands playing and then walked the boardwalk so I could actually see the water for the second time since we’ve been here. I must say I was quite disappointed. I couldn’t even smell the water over all the people and/or pollution. I could hardly see the water through the solid blanket of people on the beach. But it was nice to get a fresh breeze in the heat. We made it back to the stage to see all of the Helio Sequence set – really good. And then stayed at the stage and moved forward for the Broken Social Scene set – AMAZING! I was kinda upset that they only played an hour like all the other bands that day but they were still amazing. The hour and a half loud train ride home almost ruined the day though. Ben and I both got home with huge headaches thanks to the rude people beside us yelling and carrying on over the noise of the train the entire time. Pretty good day overall though.

I’ve got my Sunday routine down now. After lunch I start laundry and do my homework while I do the laundry and am normally done by the time its time to do our weekly grocery shopping and cook dinner. Doing all my work in one day makes for a long day but it is worth it not to touch it Friday or Saturday. It normalizes my life not to do school work for a couple of days.

Tomorrow I’m trying something daring – I’m going out on a school night! (gasp!) So I had extra work to do yesterday and today but I’ve got it all done squared away so I am free to leave school and go to the concert tomorrow night and hopefully be ready for teaching (and final observation) and presentation in class on Wednesday. We’ll see how it goes!

I don’t remember the last time I looked forward to every single weekend like I have been since training started. The week is exhausting! Everytime Friday rolls around and I have a half day of classes I couldn’t be happier because I know I wouldn’t be able to make it through a full day. I’ve been really good at following my rule of no work until Sunday. It’s really helped me destress every weekend and have a good time.

Today I’m really excited because we’re going down to Coney Island! YAY! and there is a music festival going on down there that we’re going to check out! It has the makings for a great day!

Today was my first full lesson, planned and performed, all by my lonesome. It was also the first time my field visitor observed my teaching. He gives us feedback on our lesson and teaching and other things after each observation (there are 3).

I taught the students about graphic organizers. This was not my choice, the teacher I am working with wanted me to cover it. It is helpful for them on their exit projects though so I can see where he’s going with it. Any way I used what we call the workshop model. Meaning I told them about a graphic organizer, say concept maps, and then modeled how to make one in front of the class with their help (guided practice), and then assigned them to do one on their own (independent practice). And then I repeated that 3 times for the other types of graphic organizers presented to them in the book. I scored major brownie points for using the workshop model because that is what our field visitor modeled to us on Monday and what the DOE is all about right now. It lent itself well to this lesson but I don’t think it’s practical for all lessons.

Anyway there were no HUGE problems with it or the students. 2 students got in a heated debate about the amount of contact in football and in basketball while we were making a compare/contrast table for the two sports. That was unexpected and escalated way farther than it should have. After they were settled back down though they did pretty well the rest of class. The period my field visitor observed like 3 students decided they didn’t have pencils so I had to lend out my only pen (because my pencil wasn’t returned in the earlier class) and my field visitor actually had to give one of my students a pencil because my teacher didn’t have any. Yes, I shouldn’t give them pencils and in my own class I wouldn’t but it’s not my class and my teacher didn’t set any rules about that sort of thing. Other than that there were no issues. I got really tired of teaching the material and hearing myself talk by the 3rd time around so I kinda feel bad for those kids because I wasn’t as into it anymore. But my field visitor had quite a few positive things to say about my lesson and my technique and gave some good feedback on what I can do to improve some things. So overall I’m happy with it though. I’m being observed again on Monday and plan on teaching them bar graphs and line graphs so hopefully that will go as good or better.