Weekly Wrap-up for March 18, 2012.

I am surrounded by piles of essays on Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men (96 to be exact), so I know I will need to cut my blogging time down this morning. While it isn't possible to finish all those essays today, I do need to get through a full class set by Tuesday morning. But after just a few, my mind wanders in a million directions and I see images of Lennie and George everywhere.

School is finally starting to settle into a routine. My body is still adjusting to the sleeping schedule, as well as being a little more intense in my actions each day. After being off work for 3 1/2 months, it is a little tough to be mentally "with" it. I know it is just a phase and once I am used to everything, it'll be fine. I'm sure that transition will be this week. It also didn't help that in my first two weeks we had conferences twice, as well as all the state testing. Another teacher said that the weather is throwing everyone off. We've had a week of 60 and 70 degree weather, making it feel like May. It has made the teachers and students anxious...even though we have months of school left. :)

In my classes, I did a project all week with my junior English class on Night. It was a preparatory step for their essay they are starting tomorrow, so I hope it helped them think about theme. My sophomores spent the first three days of the week revising their essays. THAT was a fun experience. I met with each of them for a few minutes to talk about some of their issues, so I HOPE that this pile of essays are improved from what I saw.

And my elective class started the unit on The Hunger Games. We read Shirley Jackson's "The Lottery" as a way to get into the idea of utopia vs. dystopia. They really liked the creepiness of the story, so that was good. We also spent a day discussing the background of the novel-setting, main characters, etc. as a way to get them used to some of the ides. We started it on Monday and they have to have part 1 finished by tomorrow's class, as they have a quiz. They're enjoying it so far. I have a few who are hesitant about it, but I think my own excitement about teaching it is inspiring them at least a little. We also started the game I created on Friday, so I will make sure to share a bit more about it later this week.

So, with all that school stuff going on, I haven't had much time for reading OR blogging. I think I logged into blogspot twice all week because I simply didn't have time. Now that things are calming down, I'm going to reinforce the idea of having balance to get back into blogging and reading on my own on a regular basis. That being said, if you have an awesome post from this past week, please link it for me below so I make sure to go visit. My reader is a little insane with the number of posts to read!

I did manage to finish A Clockwork Orange on Friday night (my thoughts will be up tomorrow), and I started Verne's A Journey to the Center of the Earth yesterday morning. I'm really liking it, but I figured I would since I loved 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea so darn much. I've set aside Nicholas Nickleby for a couple months. I don't have the focus to get back into it, so I think picking it back up in May or June is a better idea.

Lastly, I announced two big events taking place. One, the Clarissa readalong, it coming up rather soon. If you missed the post, you can read it here. Basically, Jillian, Adam, and myself are going to try reading the entire novel in the month of April (thus why I am putting off the Dickens title). We have a few other people who might be joining in as well.

The other big event is "A Victorian Celebration," taking place in June and July. I know it was early to announce, but I was a bit excited about it, so I wanted to spring it on everyone early. :) I have great plans for stuff during the event, as well as some prizes, etc. There is no minimum number of books to read for it, so if you are thinking of tackling a Bronte, or Trollope, or Collins, that is the time to do it!

I am also joining in on an event hosted by O at Delaisse. We e-mailed a bit over the last week or so, and she announced this week a readathon of Joyce's Ulysses this Bloomsday (June 16). She is far more eloquent than I could hope to be in her explanation of the event, so traipse over to her blog if you are curious about the event. Basically we will be attempting to read all of Ulysses that day in celebration of Joyce.

This week my plans are merely to finish the Verne title, as well as starting one of the other novels I had selected for Adam's Magical March Event. I'm leaning towards the Wells, simply because I haven't read something by him in a long time, but I might change my mind. ;)

Happy reading everyone!