Doing Everyone Else's Job

That was the story of the week and it was a hellish one. I am about to halt my science curriculum for a while to work on math with my students. We have a high percent of kids who are looking like they will fail the Math TAKS test. When we got this news I felt that the best thing for the kids would be more time with math and offered to rearrange my curriculum to give time for math instruction. It's too bad that it has come to this but as Spence Rogers says "Our kids are worth whatever it takes." So here goes nothing. I hope it helps because the math teacher of most of my students is refusing to tutor due to "health issues" so this will be very important extra help for them.

I also received word that I am going to be attending Family Leader Meetings starting next week (our grade level faculty is broken up into families who have most of the same students and we meet each week to disperse info and talk about students). I'll probably start doing her duties as well. I'm not sure I'll be getting the pay for this but it needs to happen because our current family leader is having health issues that are affecting her ability to do the job.

My neighboring science teacher recently had liver surgery to remove some benign tumors. It was successful and she is doing well. Her long term sub however got "sick" for 2 days this week and didn't leave anything for the subs and here comes Jill to the rescue AGAIN. I also covered an ARD meeting for another teacher who just didn't attend on Wednesday. I was called to do it again the following day but my wonderful Assistant Principal told me I wasn't to cover for her again and that my conference period was mine. She really was the joy in all of this. She knows I will do what has to be done to get the job done but doesn't abuse that about me. She asks what she needs to of me and then lets me do my job and have the time I need. Thanks Karen! She makes my job good on those bad days. She has also had a really rough week but took it all in stride. When my rough week started to show up on my countenance, she made sure I was taken care of at work. She was meant to be a boss and is great at it.

Update

Things around here are pretty boring though I am happy to report that I have had my class of 15 Special Ed students reduced to 9. It makes life a bit easier. We also went down to Dave's parents' house today to meet Doug's fiance. It was nice. She seems nice but it's hard to really get to know someone in a few hours. It'll be fun to get to know her more at other family functions. It reminded me of how awkward I felt when I first came into the family. I always felt REALLY nervous every time Dave left the room.

In other news we had a nice Valentine's evening. We had an early dinner at the Olive Garden (courtesy of Doug's Christmas gift card) and went out for ice cream later in the day. I am so lucky to be married to a sweet and laid back kind of guy. We have our differences but my life is better with him in it.

Um . . . I think I've run out of things to say. I love you all. I'm not sure if I have any blog followers these days but it is nice for me to have a reason to keep up with my journaling

Life as usual

It's been a while since I updated but there's just not a lot going on. I am so jealous of all you who have kids to write about because kids stories are much better than teacher stories. Oh well . . . .

Dave started his first on-line Spanish class this semester. He has to take 4 all together and the ones taught on campus are ridiculously hard so he decided to do them on-line. It's pretty frustrating for him because it isn't something he's interested in at all but it's required for a BA. I hope he finds his groove in the on-line class so it won't be such a headache for him.

This weekend Dave's dad was finally able to bring us the entertainment center Dave built so we moved that in and got the old beast out (with some much needed help from Ben). I really like it. It's much smaller and fits our living room nicely. We now need to get another small storage something to get some now displaced knick-knacks hidden away.



As for me it's life as usual. We are doing some math testing for the first half of today. Our math teachers will take the data from this test to see how we think our kids will do on the year end state tests and then figure out who they need to target for tutorials in order for them to pass.

While nothing can be as bad as my first year teaching, I'm finding this to be one of my most stressful years. 25 of my 131 students are Special Education students with varying ranges of disabilities. In one class alone 15 of the 23 have accommodations and both of these numbers do not include ELL (English Language Learners) or dyslexic students. The paperwork and ARD meetings are endless and anyone who has taught Special Education students knows that many of them have also developed behavior issues which take up more of my time and energy. I feel unqualified to serve their needs (or even to keep all of the needs straight) in a class that still has others without disability who deserve my time too. Even with a co-teacher there's just not enough teacher to go around and it makes me sad for them.

In all of this stress I am grateful for caring family, friends and especially my husband. Dave has been so sweet in picking up the slack I'm leaving at home. He has taken to making dinner most nights which helps me out a lot. At work I hear a lot of people discussing the relationships with their spouses and I realize how lucky I am to have a husband who treats me with love and respect. He is truly my partner in life and makes my life better for being a part of it. I love him so very much and could not do it without him. Love ya babe!