After working 35.5 hours from Monday morning when I arrived to work until last evening when I left my desk, I was understandably exhausted. Unfortunately, I was not feeling well by the time I went to bed last night. (9pm!)
I drove to work, despite having a sore throat and a queasy stomach ... and I croaked through rehearsal with my before-school ensemble before I decided that I couldn't stay through the day. I adapted my lesson plans so that a non-music person could get through my classes (because I didn't expect that I'd get a sub who could read music, play piano, and sing) ... and then I drove home. I tried to take a nap but was unsuccessful.
My throat still feels like it's on fire and my voice is still terrible. I haven't finished my lesson plans for tomorrow yet.
The best part? (sarcasm) I was supposed to meet with my (strict) principal today so he could observe me tomorrow. He'd seemed irritated when he'd scheduled an observation for Tuesday (which was confirmed Monday) and I asked for an extension because I had evening obligations (part of my extra duties as a new music teacher) for 3-4 hours each night after school on Monday and Tuesday. I wrote him an email as soon as I got home, apologizing for leaving (due to my not feeling well!) and saying that I'd try to get my lesson plan to him this afternoon (I didn't) so we could meet and discuss it before the lesson that he was planning to observe.
I just got an email from him saying that my health comes first (!) and that he could certainly wait to observe me until I'm feeling 100%. I was so relieved that I burst into tears. If I feel the slightest bit better tomorrow, I will go in ... and I'll ask if he can come into my classroom on Monday or Tuesday. I really hope that one of those days works for his busy schedule. I doubt that I will be 100% tomorrow, even after I do get another good night's sleep.
---
I wonder how my kids behaved for the substitute today...
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Sunday, October 19, 2008
Ah, imagination
Estrella is now reporting from Grading Jail. Despite some productivity (50 papers) last night, she has spent the entire afternoon on an additional 140+ papers. And she's still not done. And ... she's gonna be collecting an additional 70 papers tomorrow from the remaining 2 classes ...
Question: Why is proper posture important for singing?
Answers:
"It makes your sining clearer and better."
"Because it makes you a singer."
"Your diaframe (stomach area) is your singing voice, and slumping over does not give your diaframe space to open."
"Because if your body is not straight, your vocal cords won't be in place."
Obviously, this is a topic we've gotta review. Again. :-)
Question: Why is proper posture important for singing?
Answers:
"It makes your sining clearer and better."
"Because it makes you a singer."
"Your diaframe (stomach area) is your singing voice, and slumping over does not give your diaframe space to open."
"Because if your body is not straight, your vocal cords won't be in place."
Obviously, this is a topic we've gotta review. Again. :-)
Saturday, October 18, 2008
"O Frabjous Day! Callooh Callay!"
*Title is a quote from an amusing poem by Lewis Carroll, set to music.
Today has been a glorious Saturday ... so amazingly perfect that I am still lazily lounging in my pajamas even though it is nearly 4pm.
I slept in until 9:30am (which made for a wonderful start to my day, as I have not been able to sleep so late in such a long time!) ... and I awoke, feeling quite rested and refreshed. Chai tea and yummy chocolate covered cookie bars from Trader Joe's were a delightful breakfast combination ... and then I borrowed my mom's current fiction reading (a quirky but fun book entitled Undead and Unwed about a designer-shoe-loving young woman who becomes a vampire).
By the time I finished the book, my family had left to go tailgating and attend a football game ... and I had the house to myself. I enjoyed a delicious lunch of celery with peanut butter, sharp cheddar cheese, a French roll, and a half-glass of wine as I watched the online episode of Grey's from two weeks ago. I talked with Westley on the phone for nearly two hours. I'm planning to watch last week's episode of Grey's...
Other plans (which may or may not include grading today ... perhaps I'll put it off until tomorrow) include: showering, eating an equally tasty dinner, and enjoying my down time without guilt. I've earned this day off. :-)
Today has been a glorious Saturday ... so amazingly perfect that I am still lazily lounging in my pajamas even though it is nearly 4pm.
I slept in until 9:30am (which made for a wonderful start to my day, as I have not been able to sleep so late in such a long time!) ... and I awoke, feeling quite rested and refreshed. Chai tea and yummy chocolate covered cookie bars from Trader Joe's were a delightful breakfast combination ... and then I borrowed my mom's current fiction reading (a quirky but fun book entitled Undead and Unwed about a designer-shoe-loving young woman who becomes a vampire).
By the time I finished the book, my family had left to go tailgating and attend a football game ... and I had the house to myself. I enjoyed a delicious lunch of celery with peanut butter, sharp cheddar cheese, a French roll, and a half-glass of wine as I watched the online episode of Grey's from two weeks ago. I talked with Westley on the phone for nearly two hours. I'm planning to watch last week's episode of Grey's...
Other plans (which may or may not include grading today ... perhaps I'll put it off until tomorrow) include: showering, eating an equally tasty dinner, and enjoying my down time without guilt. I've earned this day off. :-)
Friday, October 17, 2008
Lost Lustre
I've never been a huge fan of shopping. Sometimes the mood will strike or necessity will demand a shopping trip ... but I think I'd rather read a book or relax than drive to a people-filled place, find a parking spot, make my way into a store, try to find whatever I'm looking for, wait in line to buy my product(s), and then drive home. If I lived five minutes from a major shopping center, it might be different. As it is, I must drive at least 35 minutes to get to a mall.
Then I met "Tar-zhay" ... I don't really call it that, but that is how it was introduced to me many moons ago in a far away state.
I love this store ... the clothing choices have perked up quite a bit now that 1) they have some more classy designs and 2) they actually make some clothing in my (petite) size. And ... they have pretty houseware items ... and school/office supplies (with which I've been obsessed ever since I was a child ... is it normal to love legal pads and binders and paper clips?) ... and seasonal items ... and books ... and basically anything a person could want! Except ... their music choices are somewhat limited ... but I suppose that most non-music stores don't stock up on the non-popular classical music artists.
I have not been to a "T-Z" ("T-G"?) for a few months ... possibly since before the school year began. (Horrors!) Imagine my delight when I learned a new one would be opening not that far from where I work!!! Hooray!
Today we had an inservice day, and my content area sessions (fabulous) were not held at my school. However, the new T-Z was still virtually on my way home ... so I decided that I ought to stop by the super brand-new (as in, officially opened within the past week) location of my beloved store.
And now, my T-Z experience has been tainted. In fact, any of my usual shopping spots in that area are probably tainted now- forever- through no fault of their own.
I saw a student. One of my students. While I was on my personal time in my own happy little world in my favorite store. I am not a normal person any more. I am now a teacher. There will constantly be little eyes that spot me if I make an appearance in the community near where I work. With nearly 300 students, the chances increase ... and they will only continue to increase after our Winter concert when parents and siblings may recognize me ... and as I teach more and more students over the years.
I'm sure I'll get used to it in time, especially as I'm planning to move closer to my job within the next year or so ... but still ... it was quite shocking to see one of my students (and thankfully, for the first student sighting, it was a nice student) when I was not in TeacherMode but rather in Estrella-Mode.
Then I met "Tar-zhay" ... I don't really call it that, but that is how it was introduced to me many moons ago in a far away state.
I love this store ... the clothing choices have perked up quite a bit now that 1) they have some more classy designs and 2) they actually make some clothing in my (petite) size. And ... they have pretty houseware items ... and school/office supplies (with which I've been obsessed ever since I was a child ... is it normal to love legal pads and binders and paper clips?) ... and seasonal items ... and books ... and basically anything a person could want! Except ... their music choices are somewhat limited ... but I suppose that most non-music stores don't stock up on the non-popular classical music artists.
I have not been to a "T-Z" ("T-G"?) for a few months ... possibly since before the school year began. (Horrors!) Imagine my delight when I learned a new one would be opening not that far from where I work!!! Hooray!
Today we had an inservice day, and my content area sessions (fabulous) were not held at my school. However, the new T-Z was still virtually on my way home ... so I decided that I ought to stop by the super brand-new (as in, officially opened within the past week) location of my beloved store.
And now, my T-Z experience has been tainted. In fact, any of my usual shopping spots in that area are probably tainted now- forever- through no fault of their own.
I saw a student. One of my students. While I was on my personal time in my own happy little world in my favorite store. I am not a normal person any more. I am now a teacher. There will constantly be little eyes that spot me if I make an appearance in the community near where I work. With nearly 300 students, the chances increase ... and they will only continue to increase after our Winter concert when parents and siblings may recognize me ... and as I teach more and more students over the years.
I'm sure I'll get used to it in time, especially as I'm planning to move closer to my job within the next year or so ... but still ... it was quite shocking to see one of my students (and thankfully, for the first student sighting, it was a nice student) when I was not in TeacherMode but rather in Estrella-Mode.
10 years can be a long time ...
Yesterday, I spent two hours of my personal time crammed in the school's cafeteria with 300 sweaty adolescents jumping and gyrating to blaring music.
The sponsoring teachers for the event (the ones who got paid to be there because their student organization had planned it) had bribed us with free "unlimited" pizza, candy, and beverages. Alas, the students consumed all of the above before I had even learned it had arrived. No compensation (i.e. "free dinner!" - a very exciting promise to someone who still holds to the frugal philosophies of a college student) after all. :-(
When I first walked into the cafeteria, I immediately had flashbacks to my own middle school dances. Loud music, crowds of people. Guys in their own crowds, girls in their own crowds, rarely mingling.
My good friend in sixth grade arrived to our first dance (Fall 1996) in a lovely white party dress with matching heels and a fancy purse. She apparently hadn't gotten the verbal memo from the "big kids" (seventh and eighth graders) that everybody wore jeans to these events.
I remember the Spring of 1997 at one of the dances ... I wore a cute little orangeish/pinkish dress, except that the skirt part of the dress was actually skorts. (What would you call that?) I can distinctly picture this memory of listening to the Fun Factory's "I Wanna Be With You" song blaring in the gym (our dances were held in the gym at my middle school.) As the music blared, I was singing along, standing in a semi-circle with my friends, and I was positioned perfectly to see my little sixth grade crush (who is now a married father). I pretended I was singing to him and all my friends teased me about him.
I think back to my Eighth Grade Dance in Spring 1999 - the big formal event for middle school kids. It's a mini-Prom for teenyboppers. That night was the first night I danced with a boy. A friend from my community theatre group invited me to dance the last dance, and I accepted. He was nice enough, and we were friends- no romantic feelings whatsoever. We'd been dancing for maybe thirty seconds of the song (standing at least a foot apart with our arms awkwardly around each other) when another girl from our theatre group came over.
"C!" She said to him. "You promised to dance with me at least one song tonight, and they said this is the last song!" To me, she said,
"You don't mind, do you, Estrella?" She was a friend of mine too, and I was disappointed. This was the first time I'd ever been asked to dance by a boy, and I'd seen her dancing with other guys at the dance already. I said that it was fine if he wanted to dance with her, so he did.
---
Flash forward to 2008: Now I'm a middle school teacher, serving as a chaperone to kids who are not much different than I was a mere 10 years ago.
It broke my heart to see the kids without groups of friends ... one little girl sitting by herself, just watching the others dance .... the little boy who is so adorably awkward but so sweet-natured, the little bossy girl who was walking around by herself. The last child I described always seems so bored and unhappy in my class, and I've always gotten the impression that she doesn't like me. To my surprise, she came up to me and had a long and pleasant conversation with me. She seems lonely ... and I'm trying to figure out which kid I can move next to her in class who would easygoing enough that he/she would tolerate this little girl's bossiness and attitude and perhaps try to reach out to her.
Some kids actually acknowledged my presence there ("Hi Miss LastName!!!!"), and one of my sweet sixth graders even gave me a hug. ("Sorry I'm so sweaty, Miss LastName, but I've been dancing the whole time!!!") That little hug made up for the good/bad flashbacks and the lack of pizza. Still, I'm relieved to know that I'm already unavailable on the date of the next dance, so I won't be able to volunteer to help again until after the New Year. Darn. :-)
The sponsoring teachers for the event (the ones who got paid to be there because their student organization had planned it) had bribed us with free "unlimited" pizza, candy, and beverages. Alas, the students consumed all of the above before I had even learned it had arrived. No compensation (i.e. "free dinner!" - a very exciting promise to someone who still holds to the frugal philosophies of a college student) after all. :-(
When I first walked into the cafeteria, I immediately had flashbacks to my own middle school dances. Loud music, crowds of people. Guys in their own crowds, girls in their own crowds, rarely mingling.
My good friend in sixth grade arrived to our first dance (Fall 1996) in a lovely white party dress with matching heels and a fancy purse. She apparently hadn't gotten the verbal memo from the "big kids" (seventh and eighth graders) that everybody wore jeans to these events.
I remember the Spring of 1997 at one of the dances ... I wore a cute little orangeish/pinkish dress, except that the skirt part of the dress was actually skorts. (What would you call that?) I can distinctly picture this memory of listening to the Fun Factory's "I Wanna Be With You" song blaring in the gym (our dances were held in the gym at my middle school.) As the music blared, I was singing along, standing in a semi-circle with my friends, and I was positioned perfectly to see my little sixth grade crush (who is now a married father). I pretended I was singing to him and all my friends teased me about him.
I think back to my Eighth Grade Dance in Spring 1999 - the big formal event for middle school kids. It's a mini-Prom for teenyboppers. That night was the first night I danced with a boy. A friend from my community theatre group invited me to dance the last dance, and I accepted. He was nice enough, and we were friends- no romantic feelings whatsoever. We'd been dancing for maybe thirty seconds of the song (standing at least a foot apart with our arms awkwardly around each other) when another girl from our theatre group came over.
"C!" She said to him. "You promised to dance with me at least one song tonight, and they said this is the last song!" To me, she said,
"You don't mind, do you, Estrella?" She was a friend of mine too, and I was disappointed. This was the first time I'd ever been asked to dance by a boy, and I'd seen her dancing with other guys at the dance already. I said that it was fine if he wanted to dance with her, so he did.
---
Flash forward to 2008: Now I'm a middle school teacher, serving as a chaperone to kids who are not much different than I was a mere 10 years ago.
It broke my heart to see the kids without groups of friends ... one little girl sitting by herself, just watching the others dance .... the little boy who is so adorably awkward but so sweet-natured, the little bossy girl who was walking around by herself. The last child I described always seems so bored and unhappy in my class, and I've always gotten the impression that she doesn't like me. To my surprise, she came up to me and had a long and pleasant conversation with me. She seems lonely ... and I'm trying to figure out which kid I can move next to her in class who would easygoing enough that he/she would tolerate this little girl's bossiness and attitude and perhaps try to reach out to her.
Some kids actually acknowledged my presence there ("Hi Miss LastName!!!!"), and one of my sweet sixth graders even gave me a hug. ("Sorry I'm so sweaty, Miss LastName, but I've been dancing the whole time!!!") That little hug made up for the good/bad flashbacks and the lack of pizza. Still, I'm relieved to know that I'm already unavailable on the date of the next dance, so I won't be able to volunteer to help again until after the New Year. Darn. :-)
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Still Treading Water ...
Aack! More than two weeks since I've posted! I haven't neglected my blog like this since my 5-week European studying/backpacking adventure in summer 2007.
Yes, I'm still treading water on the job. My work hours this week alone have been:
Monday- 8am-8:30pm
Tuesday- 7am-5pm
Wednesday- 8am-6:30pm
Today's hours will be: 7:30am-6pm (Why oh why did I volunteer to "chaperone" an after-school event today?!)
In addition to my lesson planning (which actually takes the least amount of time; I'm sending constant prayers of gratitude in the direction of AlmaMater and GradSchool for preparing me so well), I've got so many time-consuming additional tasks:
Yes, I'm still treading water on the job. My work hours this week alone have been:
Monday- 8am-8:30pm
Tuesday- 7am-5pm
Wednesday- 8am-6:30pm
Today's hours will be: 7:30am-6pm (Why oh why did I volunteer to "chaperone" an after-school event today?!)
In addition to my lesson planning (which actually takes the least amount of time; I'm sending constant prayers of gratitude in the direction of AlmaMater and GradSchool for preparing me so well), I've got so many time-consuming additional tasks:
- adapting plans for students with IEPs
- grading papers/classwork/ daily participation grades
- entering in grades on the computer program
- attending and holding extra rehearsals to prepare my students for upcoming performances/auditions
- creating my curriculum from scratch (well, I have a district-wide curriculum, but I'm designing my own program ... all based on the repertoire and the skills I believe students ought to be developing-- no textbooks in my class)
- emails/contact with parents (huge! I had no idea how many parents would constantly have questions or concern ... and wait until their little babies don't get the "easy A" they expected in my class when report cards come out!)
- handling extras like uniforms, trip-planning, etc.
- assisting with fire drills and other necessary time-wasters
A few bright spots in the past couple weeks:
- Seeing Westley two weekends in a row
- Having my principal walk in and sit in on a (fantastic) lesson for 30 minutes with my most musically-talented class doing fabulously, hearing him sing along, and watching him grin as he left
- Treating myself to a well-deserved latte before school this week
- Finding the perfect pieces with fit with the theme of my concert
- 100% of my kids who auditioned for a select out-of-school group made it!!!
- Unexpected hugs and smiles from happy students
- Getting caught up on some yucky grading
- Getting a note from my principal saying that he'd stood outside my door on another day during another class and had "heard angels singing"
- Learning a few more teachers' names
- Letting myself "sleep in" until 5:45am yesterday morning
- Having a little time to read for pleasure
All in all, still loving it ... even though I am a little tired. :-) I'm earning every penny of my salary (and more, I think)!
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