The View from the Classroom

School’s out for summer!!!!  School’s out forever!!!!!! (I wish)  

Now, just so y’all don’t get me wrong, I absolutely LOVE my job.  BUT, I didn’t totally get the summer break thing until I actually started teaching.  In my previous life, I was one of those parents thinking that year round school would be so AWESOME, a truly GREAT idea.  I mean, I wouldn’t have to worry about what to do with the kids in the summer or feel guilty for choosing to work when I could be at home being a "good" mom.  After all, I work the whole year, why not let my kids go to school the whole year?  Like I said…AWESOME idea.  

It only took 1 year of teaching to change my mind on THAT.   I mean, think about it, spring time, 12 & 13 year olds, hormones just kicking in, love is in the air (it’s definitely not love for their teachers), attitudes just starting to develop, standardized testing has been done for over a month so the brains that for some were barely functioning before are completely turned off.  Keeping them engaged in Math?  Forget about it!!!  I’ve been merely trying to keep my sanity!!!!!  

For the last six weeks, I have longed for this day, anticipated it, and wondered why it was taking so dad gum long to get here.  You know the feeling…just think back to childhood.  You ALWAYS knew the date and at some point you probably started counting down the days.  You started making your summer plans…where were the parties gonna be?  Whose house was everyone gonna be hanging  out at???  All those important decisions on how best to do absolutely nothing without being bored.  

As a teacher, it means some of the same things…a chance to do nothing if I so choose…to get into a morning routine that goes something like this…breakfast, read paper, workout, eat, do nothing, eat, do nothing… to catch up on the reading that I love to do…to hang out at the pool now that thought of being seen in a swimsuit doesn’t make me sick to my stomache…to cook real meals (not that I’ll be doing so with the contest coming up, but the thought of being able to is nice)…to actually have time to do all the laundry and cleaning so hubby doesn’t have to help out (yes, he gets spoiled in the summer)…to recharge my batteries so that come August 27 I’m fresh and motivated with my love for teaching rekindled, looking forward to teaching another group of AWESOME kids that I know will be eager to learn from me.  

The last day of school makes me feel like a kid again…I’m all smiles…just what am I gonna do for the next three months??????

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 23rd, 2007 at 7:52 pm and is filed under Just Thoughts on Stuff. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.