I'm officially a teacher. On Monday, my 4 person collaborative group and I met and taught the 17 beautiful second-graders we are teaching this summer, and meeting them and working with them makes why I am here and doing what I am doing so tangible.
It's hard, I'm not going to sugar coat it. I get up at 5 every day, on the bus at 6:15, and don't get back to campus until 5. I work on lessons as soon as I get back, and sometimes I have sessions at night. We have our rough drafts for the following week due along with our final drafts and prep materials for the following day lesson, so there's always something to be done and never a stopping point. I haven't gone to bed before 12:30 any night, with the more likely sleeping time has been 1 or 2. That is an average of 3 to 4 hours of sleep a night, and by Thursday afternoon I am delirious.
We teach one subject each week, and then rotate the next. This week I taught math, and next I will be teaching a morning block of phonics and interactive writing. When we're not teaching, we're learning through curriculum and literacy lessons, corps member adviser sessions, or lesson plan creation at our school sites. Lunches are generally working lunches.
We get observed once a week, and I have never seen a better way of giving feedback than the TFA way. My adviser basically watches my class and writes down practically everything I say and do and then everything the students say/do in response, making the feedback debrief probably the most useful thing I've ever received. I can target the areas I need to work on with such precision because of this process, and am so excited at how clearly I can see my areas for improvement and the steps I need to take to work on them. I'm guessing this will make my learning curve high, and I can already see huge progress in my lessons and in my execution in the classroom.
It's hard, and I love every minute (except the bus ride). I don't even want to think about how tired I will be in 2 weeks, but I never dread waking up in the morning, and as soon as I see my kids, all my energy rushes back and I just get caught up in their bubbling excitement.
Kyle, we'll see if I get to blog again. It's doubtful.
