Workin'...
Being a teacher is a surreal experience at times. Once you get past the fact that you are ~$30,000 in debt and all you have to show for it is an 8x10 piece of paper with fancy printing on it, you come to realize you now have control over the future of the community around you. That's a chunk of responsibility that can go to your head fast if you're not careful.
On top of that, you go into this situation thinking "oh sweet, I only have to work 9 months out of the year!". It seems like a sweet deal, until you get done with your first year and realize there are no paychecks during the summer. Most teachers get a seasonal job during the summer in order to supplant their income. Yes, we can get that big check at the end of the school year, but you would be surprised how fast that goes, especially when you have to move across the state of Montana and petrol is pushing $4.00/gallon.
With that, you also have to plan out your year's curriculum. Some teachers fall into a habit of having the same lessons every year, and that's fine for some subjects like history, math, english, science, etc. For subjects that have multiple grades in the classroom like music, some change has to happen from year to year. My amazing flute player from last year could graduate, leaving me with a set of flutes that are pretty good, but not capable of the level of music I had been pushing for the last few years, and so I have to change tactics. My slacker trumpet player from last year could take private lessons over the summer or attend a summer music camp and walk back into my classroom tooting at a President's Own level, and I have to adjust for that.
I will spend every summer going through my room, deciding what needs to change, what needs to stay the same, adjusting my music selections, poring through years and years of music purchases and files, searching endlessly through online music catalogs to find the music that will fit my band this year, only to do the same thing again the next summer. This is on top of trying to possibly find a job, and maybe even trying to squeeze in a week of vacation at some point.
Am I being a kvetch about this? No way! I love my job. I love the look on a student's face when they get done with a song they've been working on for weeks, and the whole band hits its stride, and we all end the piece breathless and grinning because we all know we just rose to a new level of musicianship as a group. I love watching my kindergarteners dance around to the music I play for them, while they slowly grasp the concepts of beat and rhythm, as well as different styles of music, while they think they're just having fun and playing a game.
The rewards, that fulfillment as a person, is why I got into this in the first place. The money is nice, yes, and the work can sometimes be horrible, but in the end it's all worth it.
...Mr Know-it-All you think you know it all...