Time is flying by. I wish I could catch my breath.

We've been in school now for six weeks, and I cannot seem to get in gear. I'm in my new school, full of new ideas, students, changes, requests, requirements, and the like, and I have to be honest when I say that it's harder than I thought it would be. I love the new school and the teachers I work with on a daily basis, even if they aren't like the ones I left behind, but this is definitely the toughest job I've ever had. The students are somewhat different, but the rigor and class requirements are keeping me on my toes. Thursdays have become my late nights at school, working to prepare for the next week. Saturdays and Sundays have become just two more days to prepare and grade papers. It seems I spend more time at home working on the weekends than I do during the day just trying to keep up. Don't get me wrong--I'm enjoying the job as well. I just keep telling myself that it will all get better with time. Once I've prepped this year, I can make changes accordingly next year, and time won't be such a factor anymore. On the plus side, I am loving the drive time change. Instead of taking me 30 minutes to get to and from work, now it takes me 5 minutes! I've given myself the gift of time. :)

That's all for now. I don't want to appear as if I'm complaining. I just want to get some loads off my shoulders. Some days this is what I feel like:

Change of scenery

"Change brings opportunity. "
Nido Qubein

This is the sentiment I'm taking with me next year when I begin my new teaching position at Lee's Summit West High School as a Reading and English teacher. While this last week has had complete ups and downs emotionally, I feel as if this move is for the best for my career. Countless people, including administrators, have told me that I will never be a full-time Reading teacher here in this district. They just don't have the resources. I know all districts are strapped for money, but Lee's Summit has stepped up and said that they don't want their students falling through the cracks due to their reading abilities. This is what I went to school for, and I'm so happy that I will have this opportunity. I absolutely HATE the idea of leaving my kids and friends that I've met, but I know kids are kids and will be great at my new school. I also know that I will make new friends and meet up my current friends for some much-needed happy hours and get-togethers. :)

A new school means a new school mascot, colors, clothes, etc. I do love these colors!

On one note, I will usher out this year as a Bear and will come in to the new school year as a Titan. This also means I will have to move...again. Hmmm...this will be my 9th classroom in 12 years. I should probably be a master at classroom moving by now, but it never gets old. I guess I will have to just have my summer school kids help me at the end. Maybe I'll offer them extra credit!! :)


Thanks for all your "good luck"s and "go get 'em"s! I needed it, and I did!


Thanks!!

Need a new title

Since I've been at school this week, I haven't had time to sit down and write a new blog. Not that I have anything new or exciting to say, but I did want to write something just so I don't have to see my previous title of "Broken hearted" every time I log in. While I hope Arturo the best, and we have talked since the breakup about remaining friends, I just don't need to see the news flash constantly reminding me of one of the hardest decisions of my life thus far. I'm moving on, and I know he is too.

My classroom is finally beginning to take shape. Because I'm in the luxury trailer, the carpets weren't shampooed until this week, so I wasn't able to work at all until today. TODAY!?! School begins Wednesday, and I still have nothing ready to go. Due to back to school convocation and freshmen orientation on Monday, Tuesday will be it for me. The thought of only having one day to finish my room, laminate signs for this year, prepare for the beginning, make copies, and generally get my head back in the "real world" scares me a little, but I know Wednesday will come and go whether or not I'm prepared. That thought doesn't really help me either. :)

Back to school for Year #10!

I truly cannot believe this will be my 10th year of teaching. I remember student teaching at Parkview High School in Springfield, and that does not seem THAT far back. Hmmm...Derek, one of my first students, would be 27 this year. That does not seem possible! I always said that I wouldn't feel old until my current students were born the year I graduated high school. Well, that time is approaching. The freshmen I have this year were born back in 1995. Holy cow! Where does the time go?

I wish I had pictures to post of my new classroom (8th different room in 10 years, thankyouverymuch!), but I still haven't taken those yet. Good intentions aside, I just keep forgetting my camera. Maybe next week I can take pics while I'm there for Open House.

Some back to school thoughts:

• My body does NOT like to get up on Mondays, Tuesdays, or Wednesdays. I don't mind Thursdays so much because that's my shorter day. I only teach two classes that day, am off for my plan time, then school is over. Of course, I don't mind waking up on Fridays because it's Friday!
• More room in the classroom = less problems in the classroom. Since my kids can spread out just a bit and aren't right on top of each other, there seems to be less touching and griping with each other.
• I'm totally changing how I grade this year. The only grades going in my gradebook this year MUST fit a category (Participation, Portfolio, Essay, Project, or Test). That's it. No more grading random worksheets. If it's not a part of the above, forget about it.

I know I have more thoughts, but it's Friday afternoon and I am ready for the weekend. Tonight at 7:30 I am closing on my house re-finance FINALLY! It's only taken 5 months! Once I have closed on the house, I am meeting some friends for our first Back-in-school-and-I-need-a-reason-to party party. :)

Just FYI--I did join Nutrisystem back at the beginning of August but didn't actually start until school began last week. I have lost 4 pounds since then! Yea me! :) The food is surprisingly good (I've only dumped 1 thing--the mac/cheese with hamburger). I'm eating ALL the time and like the commercial, I can have dessert EVERY NIGHT! :)

I just flew back from Atlanta and BOY are my arms tired!

When I think about all that I haven't blogged about recently, my mind begins to swim. That's why I'm not going to stress about telling you every little bit of my summer, but instead focus on the major events. I feel like I apologize every time I get on here because I haven't been keeping up with my blogs like I thought I would, and I am going to stop apologizing. My friend Bonnie put it best when she said "I'd rather be living my life than blogging about it." Amen sister! Thanks Bonnie! :)

For starters, I just got back from a school trip to Atlanta where we presented and attended conferences on High Schools That Work. While I did see some interesting ideas (and people), one thought that popped up in my head quite frequently was how these "professional" people spoke. One woman was so bad that I began to tally each time she said "um" or "uh" during her speech. Before I left at the 30-minute mark, this professional speaker had said 165 ums or uhs. HOLY COW! I just couldn't take it any more. I had to get out of there!

Our group stayed at the Holiday Inn Select, and this was the view from our hotel window--the Olympic torch. How cool is that? Since I had never been to Atlanta before (I don't think just the airport counts.), I was super stoked to visit somewhere new. The following is a list of what I did or saw during my stay:

--LOTS of bad drivers. I thought the people down in Springfield were bad? Ummm...they don't have anything on the drivers in Atlanta. Chad, our administrator in charge and the driver of our minivan, couldn't let everyone else take control, so he felt it necessary to join the ranks of the other drivers. It didn't help, I have to say, to have a British speaker on our GPS who kept telling us to turn either left or right as we were passing THROUGH the intersection. Needless to say, we made LOTS of U-turns!

--Atlanta Underground is a place for food, fun, and weed. On our first afternoon in Atlanta, we ate lunch at the Atlanta Underground, a part of the city that burned way back in the day. Instead of tearing it all out, they decided to build OVER

this section. So now there's a cool little shopping and eating area. As we were making our way to Johnny Rocket's (it's called Rocket's for a reason! Ugh!) to eat lunch, apparently Justin, our second administrator on the trip, looked like he needed some weed. Some random dude offered him some pot! We are really hoping it was an undercover cop, and Justin passed the test. At least that's what we kept telling ourselves!

--The CNN tour was really cool. I skipped out on two sessions because one was with the lady who said um 165 times, and I just didn't care to hear that again. So I walked across the street to CNN and paid my $13 to tour the news. I couldn't take pictures inside the tour (I really, really wanted to take a picture of huge Anderson Cooper on the wall--YUM!), but I did manage to snag this shot from below the newsroom. The wall of windows below the CNN and globe is the actual newsroom where 90% of all CNN news comes from. While I was there, the weather man was getting ready to begin, and a news anchor was reporting behind the desk. I was able to get my picture taken from behind a CNN news desk as well. :)

--Coke World was not as cool as I expected it to be. For $15, I expected more. We did see a cute 4-D show (hence the glasses) about what makes a Coke so special. However, I was expecting more of a tour like the Anheiser-Busch tour in St. Louis where you see production from beginning to end. Coke World only had one little bottling tour that took less than 5 minutes to walk through. Boring! I guess the best part was tasting some Coke samples from around the world. The Korean one was REALLY good! :)

--My new favorite restaurant resides in Atlanta--a place called Two Urban Licks. This is what we drove up to, and my first thought was "Where the heck are we????" However, once we went inside, the place was totally rocked out! The food was unbelievably good--Calamari, tuna tartar, GIANT beef rib with homemade mac and cheese, oh man. My mouth is watering just thinking about it!

--The best part? Getting to know some more people from school that I didn't really know before this trip. They were a great group, and we laughed NONSTOP. "That's what she said!"

(By the way, I'm taking a Jessica Sprague online class on using frames and text with pictures. It's a cool class and I plan on taking more from her later on!)