Weekly Wrap-up for February 9, 2014: Stress.

This week was a big pile of stress at work.

It was our first whole week of school in quite some time, so that in and of itself was a bit draining. Then, Monday morning, my co-teacher for the AP U.S. History class I teach called to tell me she wouldn't be in. Normally, that wouldn't be a problem, except that it was her week to deliver content (we alternate weeks being the "lead" teacher. Whoever is leading delivers the main content and whoever isn't just acts as support-it makes our lives easier and it livens things up for the kids). So, Monday morning and my first hour prep were spent scrambling to reacquaint myself with the content-Gilded Age Politics-and pull an activity together. She was also out Tuesday and Wednesday, so I scrambled quite a bit.

I also had a challenging week with my 11th graders. We're pulling away from the literature units we did first semester (we read The Catcher in the Rye and Night) for some heavy writing units-Argument and Research. They were not so happy about the adjustment and what that meant for our time spent in class (because of the nature of the course, we spent a lot of time reading our novels in class, in addition to discussion, etc. They aren't used to homework!). Nevertheless, we got through the week and will get through the next few rough ones as well...we have the ACT test coming up in a few weeks, so I'm preparing them for that. Lots of impromptus and practice tests are in the future...

My sophomores started reading Of Mice and Men this week, which they are not too happy about. I'm trying to push more of the actual reading onto their shoulders so we can discuss and do other activities in class and they don't like it. In reality, as sad as it sounds, I'm trying to make up for the time we lost due to snow days, etc. They'll be okay, I think!

To compound all those issues, our gradebooks at school weren't ready until Friday afternoon. Thankfully I'm a pen and paper kind of girl, so I keep a paper gradebook as well. I was able to pass some things back before they were ever put in the computer, but it was still a pain to have that lingering over my head...and having kids ask why their grades weren't updated!

On top of all of that, I am lucky enough to have a local college student coming in to observe my classes (and me) once a week for third quarter. She's finishing her senior year and will be doing her student teaching next year, so my classroom is a place for her to start trying some things and interacting with my kids. She shadowed me all day on Tuesday and got to experience the full craziness of my day. Because I have prep first period, I go the rest of the day at warp speed! The kids were also crazy on Tuesday, so she got to experience that as well! I hope that she learns something from me and my classroom.

Besides school. I've been aching something fierce all week and by the time I got home Friday night, I was done. I collapsed in bed for a few hours, got up to eat dinner with Matt, then passed out some more. Yesterday was spent in a daze-sleeping, watching TV, and reading just a little (it hurt to hold the book open). I'm feeling a little better this morning, and once Matt gets up, we're going out to breakfast and then shopping for some things we need-laundry detergent being the number 1!

Reading has fallen a bit to the side. While I like Under the Greenwood Tree by Hardy and it's short, I haven't been motivated to pick it up this week. It requires a bit more of my attention. Yesterday I was in need of some comfort, so I grabbed Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone off my shelf and I'm already 1/3 of the way through it. I've been meaning to reread them, so I think I'll try and do that slowly over the course of the year.

Anyway, I hear Matt stirring, so I'm going to encourage him to get up a bit quicker-I foresee a delicious Sunday breakfast in our future. :)

happy reading!