Sunday, March 11, 2012

Another week for looking forward

It's Sunday, and I am anticipating another week.  My students get a 3-day weekend; the faculty get a Monday ride to Charlotte for diocesan development.  I am not looking forward to the bus ride, but the inservice should be fine.  It never hurts to learn and relearn what I need to be teaching.  In my case, there is always one outstanding question: do I go to the high school math seminar or the K-12 technology seminar?  I usually go to the technology seminar since we have a total of 5 math teachers, myself included.  We shall see.

Last week seemed to be spring break for many of our alumni now in college.  There were several who showed up at the school last week.  I enjoyed spending a long time talking about college computer science with one of my former AP CS students.  After school on Friday, 2 more former Honors CS students came by to chat.  Frankly, I really don't remember them in Hons CS, but I do remember them in Algebra 2 (Honors or not, I cannot remember).  It's good to see them grow into their future, and it's great to know that my work was not in vain.  I think every teacher needs that now and then.

I chaperoned the Junior Class Retreat on Thursday and discovered that I have reached that age when I find I am older than I feel.  I jumped off a short wall with less grace than I expected to have.  My left leg landed fine, but my right leg kept on going to the knee.  Nothing really hurt but my pride and a small bruise.  Now I understand about those older people who try to do something again that they used to do well and end up with a broken bone.  Henceforth, all jumping off short walls will be done where the landing area is soil and not concrete ... just in case.

I'm back to feeling like a grading automaton.  If I'm not grading math, I'm grading programs.  If I'm not grading anything, I'm writing lesson plans.  It's just one or the other.  I also try to fit exercise into all of this, plus ironing my clothes and washing bathrooms and anything else I feel like doing at home to keep things in sync.  No wonder when the school year ends, I find myself at a loss for about a week with little structure in my life. 

No comments: