Good week
I'm having a good week this week. Maybe it just seems good compared to the almost unbareable week I had last week, but all the same, I'm smiling a lot.
I received some mail this morning at school and opened it with my nerves on edge. Last December I had to send in our paper to get critiqued. I was very nervous b/c it was the first semester I took over and was shakey as to how we did. Well, we placed First in overall, so I couldn't have asked for more. My editor in chief also got an "Outstanding Editorial" for one of her pieces as well, which is amazing, b/c only 10 are picked from the hundreds of schools that submit that stuff. I'm super proud of her.
I've had a lot of visitors the past few days; friendly faces from last year. We've done a lot of reminicing and it's a shame that it did take Kevin's death for us to start talking again, but I'm loving the reunion with some of my students. I feel like I need to constantly check up on them now for some reason and they have promised to stop in at least once a week.
I also did something today that is one of my favorite things to do all year. Every semester I give my students a sheet of paper with all of their names on it. I then ask them to write one nice thing about everyone in the class on it; most likely something they'd never actually tell the person on a daily basis. I do ask them to take it seriously, b/c if i didn't I'd have 30 pieces of paper that say things like "you're cool" and that's it. What i then do is wait for them to forget we even did that; really i wait til the last day and during the waiting process I combine all the nice things together for each student and then write them a goodbye letter as well. I know i teach English and that I should wish that they get some great American LIterature knowledge; but honestly this is the one thing I'm glad I do and the kids love it. There is so much negativety in the world and especially in the high school setting. It is so amazing what these kids think about each other and never tell them.
I love my job a lot this week.
I received some mail this morning at school and opened it with my nerves on edge. Last December I had to send in our paper to get critiqued. I was very nervous b/c it was the first semester I took over and was shakey as to how we did. Well, we placed First in overall, so I couldn't have asked for more. My editor in chief also got an "Outstanding Editorial" for one of her pieces as well, which is amazing, b/c only 10 are picked from the hundreds of schools that submit that stuff. I'm super proud of her.
I've had a lot of visitors the past few days; friendly faces from last year. We've done a lot of reminicing and it's a shame that it did take Kevin's death for us to start talking again, but I'm loving the reunion with some of my students. I feel like I need to constantly check up on them now for some reason and they have promised to stop in at least once a week.
I also did something today that is one of my favorite things to do all year. Every semester I give my students a sheet of paper with all of their names on it. I then ask them to write one nice thing about everyone in the class on it; most likely something they'd never actually tell the person on a daily basis. I do ask them to take it seriously, b/c if i didn't I'd have 30 pieces of paper that say things like "you're cool" and that's it. What i then do is wait for them to forget we even did that; really i wait til the last day and during the waiting process I combine all the nice things together for each student and then write them a goodbye letter as well. I know i teach English and that I should wish that they get some great American LIterature knowledge; but honestly this is the one thing I'm glad I do and the kids love it. There is so much negativety in the world and especially in the high school setting. It is so amazing what these kids think about each other and never tell them.
I love my job a lot this week.