Summer is winding down and the kids on the streets are getting restless. This can only mean one thing: the school year is amazingly close. I can smell the cafeteria already.
The summer was a relaxing few months of, well, teaching. I decided to teach summer school (Algebra II) for about 15 students. I was reluctant at first, but then realized that I have nothing better to do. These students desperately needed the credit and I wanted to provide an opportunity for them to show what they can do--in a much more relaxed, open forum for learning. I taught M-F from 8:30-11:30, so it was a long day with the same students. We made progress and ended up mastering the five skills of algebra we sought out to learn: slope (rate of change), systems of equations, absolute value equations, inequalities, and graphing. There was great success all around, so the summer was rewarding. After school I would immediately sleep and eat.
This next school year will be a challenge. I will be teaching 10th grade geometry--a tested grade. The pressures and anxieties of standardized testing, and the rewards and consequences that come with it, will be in full effect. My students must perform. I'm ready for this challenge. I'm ready to lead my group of 100 students to mastery in all the skills they should develop by the end of the school year. It's going to be like a 162 game grind in baseball--winning streaks, losing streaks, frustrations, revelations, trades, injuries (absences), in-class fighting, and in-class celebrations. My only hope is that we as a class are clicking in full force come April (I can't help but parallel the 2007 Rockies, when they won 20+ games in a row or something to ultimately claim a World Series birth). I'm excited. Let's bring it.
Ding. Ding. Ding. Round 1.
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