Loving Summer!

I made it through my first year of teaching with minimal drama. I certainly learned a lot and know that next year will be even better. I am loving summer vacation. I had the opportunity to keep my younger nephew, Benjamin, this past week. He is so cute. Chloe loves him and followed him everywhere. He kept telling me that Chloe wouldn't leave him alone. She was always giving him kisses. He would come and hug me and tell me he loved me while we were playing computer games, watching tv, or just hanging out. We played games at my house, went to the movies to see Up (3-D), went by my mom's office, went to the library, and spent many hours playing in the large blow-up pool my mom has for my nephews. Always busy and full of energy, that is how I describe Benjamin. It was interesting to watch him go full steam and then all of a sudden, if he got still, he would be asleep. The only little mishap - was that Ben through up one evening after going to the movie. I think the popcorn had too much butter on it for his little stomach to handle and unfortunately it would up all over my kitchen floor. For those who know me--this is not my strong area---however, I did get Ben out of his yucky clothes, in the bath, and then began to clean the kitchen. Thankfully my mom came and finished up the kitchen floor for me b/c I had had about all I could take. Oh, well. (Margaret - this made me think of Jeremy and pizza and root beer.) All in all, it was a great week. I am glad that it went well. It makes me think I can handle it another time. Now I am busy washing and packing for Hawaii b/c I leave in two days. I am so excited to see Sherry. Hawaii is second. I can't wait to just be with Sherry and hang out and talk.

I love birthdays.

April is such a full month. I know so many people who have birthdays during the last two weeks of April - including me. It is so fun to be able to celebrate with so many friends even though we are far apart. I hope everyone - Alice, David, Will, Margaret, Robyn, Dwayne, and Jason all have wonderful birthdays, celebrating with their family and friends. I am at my mom and dad's house today. My sister, Shelley, and her boys, Andrew and Benjamin, are here as well. We are having a small celebration tonight. Then tomorrow, after church, we are going to Macon, GA to eat at my favorite restaurant - Olive Garden. I can't wait. My mom and sister are attempting to make my favorite dessert, Chocolate Lasagna, today at home since Olive Garden no longer carries it. We will see how it turns out. I hope it tastes good.
My students can't believe that I am in my thirties. They keep telling me that they think I am only 25 or so. I just laugh and tell them I really am in my thirties. I can't believe we only have 30 days left of school. I really have made it through my first year. We selected room assignments for the new school on Thursday. I suppose this means I have a job for next year. According to the state, the schools don't have to give contracts to teachers until May 15th this year. It usually is April 15th that contracts have to go out by. We will begin moving everything over to the new school on June 5th.

I made it through!

I have made it through the first semester. Grades are posted and I am now busily preparing for the next group of students. I get three new classes of students on Tuesday and I get to do this all over again. I am excited about this new group and armed with all of the things that I learned by trial and error during 1st semester.
Here is a wrap of 1st semester--I had 80 students dispersed through three classes. I taught two tech prep classes and one college prep class. English classes are required to take an End of Course test administered by the state over things that 9th graders should have learned by this point. Unfortunately, teachers are not allowed to look at the tests. Only the past tests that are now published online. My students did not do as well as I had hoped they would. Everyone tells me that these students probably wouldn't have passed no matter who their teacher was, but it doesn't do much to help my feelings. I feel responsible for them. I had 35 students who failed the test out of 80. That is too high of a fail rate to me. As far as their semester grades are concerned, almost everyone passed. I had 2 in each of my tech prep classes who failed and will have to retake the test. This semester has taught me a lot and I hope that I will be even more effective this next semester.
This semester I will teach two college prep classes and one tech prep class. My class sizes are smaller this semester as well - at least for now until they start changing people's schedules around. I plan to handle the research paper process differently this semester as well as to work in a few additional grammar lessons. Stern Ms. Frazier will also start the semester off this time. I feel I was a little too nice to start with last time. I want to be a little stronger this semester about what type of behaviors are acceptable and not acceptable in my classroom.
Please continue to pray for me as I start this new semester and become involved in more students' lives. It was abundantly clear to me 1st semester that what I felt about the students, how I responded to them, and listened to them when they wanted to talk and even when they didn't want to talk is very important. I ask that I be able to interact in a manner that is caring and godly with each of these students - past and present.