Now the Live Entries Begin

I've finished uploading my entries from this summer. Now its time for the current ones to start. I'm going to attempt to stay somewhat current.

It's funny how my journal this summer and now this journal have been motivated at least partially least in part by my frustration with Teach for America (TFA). Today was the big group meeting for Round Zero, as TFA calls it. Registration started at 8:30am, which meant I had to get up at 6:45 to run. It turned out to be a nice run, but I sure wouldn't have minded going at say, 8:00 a.m. on my day off. Anyway, back to TFA...

The first session was about the importance of properly analyzing problems, their causes and possible solutions. Really? I had no idea it was important to do that. I felt like I was back at institute starting over again. Don't get me wrong, I think it's important to make "data-driven" decisions, especially when kids' educations are riding on the decision, but at this point I think my time would have been better spent worrying about my particular situation rather than working through scenarios. As annoying as that session was, at least it was with Scott, my program director (PD). I enjoy working with Scott a whole lot more than my CMA and others from the summer, which has made my post-institute encounters with TFA manageable.

Anyway, back to the SIX HOUR meeting today. The second session was on balancing personal and professional responsibilities. They made us list out things that stress us out personally and professionally. A girl I was sitting next to wrote something to the effect of having to come to work on Saturday just to be told I need to take time for myself. Seriously??? I subtly spent that session grading papers. I wouldn't be surprised if the TFA people saw, but at this point I don't really care. The afternoon sessions weren't too much better. At this point I want to work on my classroom or helping someone work on their specific classroom. The scenarios we have to read about and watch are nice for introduction, but at this point I want specifics. I think I came up with more things I want to change about my classroom during my long run before the session than I did at the session. Hopefully I'm just the crazy kid who didn't find it very useful and others got a lot more out of it than me.

In other news, the Cubs are going to the playoffs!!! Could 2008 finally be the year?

11 July 2008, Friday

LAST DAY OF INSTITUTE! I am so happy that this “experience” is just about over. A few people have said how its gone by so fast, in I guess in some ways it has – mainly how fast the weekends went, but I don’t think it went by all that fast. It was a lot of long nights, longer sessions, and challenging time in the classroom. However, I have managed to survive without coffee and, for the most part, not giving up my running time. It’s a miserable experience but I will leave institute a better teacher than when I came in – though that might not be saying too much. It’s amazing how much less bitter/angry/frustrated I feel since I’ve gotten slightly more sleep this week. This is not to say that I have suddenly changed my mind about anything else that I’ve written previously – I still think there’s a lot of things that could be changed about institute to make me a much better teacher than I am not – but when I get more sleep its so much easier to see things as less negative when I’m better rested. I wouldn’t call it “well rested” by any means yet but it’s beating the 5 hours I was getting the first couple weeks.