I was talking to a teacher friend about a marathon she recently ran. She had a great run, and felt fantastic about it. She ran the 26.2 miles in 5:23:00. You would think that it was brutal. I’m sure it was. Then, she compared it to teaching. Actually, she said the marathon was easier.
After my day, I saw her point. I planned an after school floor hockey program, creating lessons, finding resources, sending the lessons to my supervisor, accepting feed back, making changes- improvements. I set up folders for my 11 most struggling students. The folders included all recent test information. I identified patterns in areas where students were struggling. Turns out we have some work to do with “applying and interpreting the concepts of multiplication and division as inverse operations to solve problems.” I also packed the folders with 100 sight words the students have struggled with, and the order in which we will study, practice, learn, and internalize these; 5 words at a time. I also picked the books that we would work through beginning next week, packing corresponding vocabulary activities into the folders along the way. I created 4 story problems and strategically ordered them so that the students will do one on their own as a pretest, 2 together, and one later to hopefully demonstrate that they have mastered the strategies to tackle these types of situations independently. I called two students’ parents, filled out the 2nd quarter academic awards, started my weekly newsletter, and emailed our school leaders about a piece of equipment that had been damaged during the day. I graded math assignments in order to plan who I would work with during tomorrow’s centers. I made copies, touched up lesson plans, and neglected things I needed to do for my self.
My own 5 and a half hour run began at 3:00… after an 8 hour day in the classroom.
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