Leaving It All On The Field

As far as the school year goes, winter break is halftime. I'm exhausted. I feel like I'm going into the locker room having left it all on the field.

After what felt like 12,383,908,786,358,213 years (give or take a few), the long wait for winter break is finally over. In a few minutes, the dismissal bell will ring and we'll all be running out the door for a glorious two weeks away from work.

I've been feeling that really prolonged kind of tired these past couple of weeks. The kind of tired that teachers feel after a few solid months of establishing classroom routines, figuring out the best ways to help students learn, continually assessing & giving feedback, communicating with parents, collaborating with other teachers, and getting involved with other facets of the school community behind the scenes.

It's been a crazy-busy first semester for me, and I haven't had time to blog about all of it. I'm on a district-level committee working on developing a new evaluation tool for the teachers in our district, necessary because of changes made to our state's laws. I've given up most of my lunches for Anime Club and to help students with re-taking quizzes, catching up on missing work, or getting extra help. For the past month, I've also been involved in a secret project (shh!) that I'm pretty excited to be a part of. I also had the pleasure of bringing my old math ed professor from MSU into my classroom to check out what I've been doing; and in turn, I had the pleasure of being on a guest teacher panel for his class of up-and-coming teacher candidates. We had great conversations about how to reach students and build relationships, and it was great to see him in action with a few of my own students. I'm still learning from him.

As the calendar year winds down, I find myself thankful for a break. I'm looking forward to spending time with family and friends, going home for Christmas, celebrating the new year with my wife, and getting the chance to relax and re-energize.

To all of my teacher friends, colleagues, and acquaintances, I wish all of you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!