#2ndyearteaching

Today was the Thanksgiving lunch at school, where families are allowed to come eat with their students. Each grade was assigned a 40-minute window for this so that parents can know when to come and so teachers will still have their normal 40 minute lunch time. Usually, the kids get 20 minutes for lunch and 20 minutes for recess. That equals the 40-minute break for teachers.

3rd grades time was 11:50-12:30, so I brought my class to the cafeteria promptly at 11:50 and put them in the lunch line. That’s when I normally walk away and let the lunch monitors do their job. But today, a lunch monitor came up to time and said “What grade is this?! There’s supposed to be another 2nd grade class before your class!” So I said “Wait what? It’s 11:50 and this is 3rd grade’s assigned time to eat.” Then this lunch monitor keeps bitching at me about how “Well we are running behind schedule and second grade has just now sat down to eat” (which is 20 minutes late BTW) and “your class can’t be in line yet they need to wait outside in the hall”.

Well at that point I was PISSED. I was thinking “Okay FIRST OF ALL, YOU guys are the ones running late and that’s not my fault. I followed the schedule I was given. SECONDLY, if you are running over 20 minutes behind schedule, maybe make an announcement over the PA system instead of yelling at teachers when their class is already in the lunch line?” This is exactly what I said to the lunch monitors, “I am confused because I had NO IDEA y’all were running so far behind schedule. I was told to come at 11:50, and it is 11:50. You really should make an announcement over the PA system so that teachers can know to expect to have their lunchtime changed.” Then I walked off and grabbed my class out of the lunch line.

THEN we had to wait IN THE HALLWAY because we didn’t know when the cafeteria would be ready for us. Obviously, with all of third grade in the hall it was rather noisy. I know parents were pissed too, because most of them were trying to come during their lunch break and with the changed times that didn’t work out anymore. When my class finally got called into the lunch room at 12:15 (TWENTY-FIVE MINUTES after we originally arrived), I got to leave and start my lunch break. At 12:35, the students were told by the lunch monitors to return to the classroom. WHAT THE HELL. I got 20 minutes to eat my lunch and have a break. I’m pretty sure that’s illegal. Also, the students only had 20 minutes with their families. ALSO WHAT THE HELL. Another teacher was eating lunch with her daughter, and wasn’t in her room. So her whole class was just lined up outside, with nobody watching them, because nobody even told us that the kids were coming back!!!! The lunch monitors just sent them to walk back on their own. THEY ARE THIRD GRADERS. THEY CANNOT HANDLE BEING UNSUPERVISED. 

The whole situation was just so dang frustrating.

I am almost done with all my lesson plans for next week! Normally, I don’t get the plans emailed to me until Thursday evening so this little jump-start is nice. Especially considering I’m having a half-day on Friday so I won’t be able to make any copies on Friday. I’m going to try to get it all done tomorrow after school :) That way I can just enjoy my weekend!

As a side note, I had a very challenging day today personally/emotionally. I had a panic attack for the first time in a long time this past weekend (thanks to the newest movie in the Saw series coming out soon - ugh). Ever since then, I’ve had a hard time sleeping. My husband had to wake me up one night because I was screaming in my sleep. So of course, last night I tossed and turned all night. I kept having this repeating dream that I was making coloring worksheets for my students with the mask on it (like seriously WHY). Then this morning, I was innocently scrolling through people’s Snapchat stories and BAM! There the mask was again. So I had ANOTHER panic attack this morning. Somehow I managed to pull myself together and continue getting ready for work. But I swear I couldn't stop shaking the whole time. If I took sick days, I probably would’ve taken one today. All throughout school today the image kept popping up in my mind at random times and I would have to take deep breaths to calm down.

I’m just more frustrated with myself than anything else. I feel like I have to avoid simple tasks such as TV and social media now. And I’m also annoyed that this is messing with my sleep, which I normally LOVE sleeping. It’s just that 2 panic attacks in one week is really messing with my head.

Last week, I was up at school past 5pm on both Tuesday & Wednesday trying to “lesson plan” with another 3rd grade teacher. And by lesson plan, I mean watching her chat on the phone for 30 minutes and do various other tasks that are not, in fact, lesson planning. After she gets off the phone, she mostly just uses the lesson plans from the previous year word for word and I just have to sit there as she reads over everything.

On top of that, I realized as I attempted to follow the lesson plans this week that they are absolute GARBAGE. I mean they are just all over the place! Jumping from one thing to the next with no rhyme or reason. No guided practice, no independent practice, no closure. I’m just mad at myself that I didn’t notice it sooner. I felt so bad for my students today because I submitted them to that mess. I had to re-work today’s entire lesson during my lunch break after it was a catastrophe with the first group. Maybe the more experienced teacher in the cluster can somehow “decode” the plans she wrote to make sense in her classroom, but I certainly can’t.

I took a half day a few weeks ago when my parents visited, so I figured I might as well use up the other half. It’s super easy to be out because I already had the sub plans written for what we do basically every Friday (testing, testing, & more testing). I’m justifying it because at this point last year, I had already taken 1 full day to go to North Carolina for my grandma’s birthday. So I’m right on track with that. And I’m pretty sure I didn’t even use up all 5 of my personal days last year. I had at least 1, potentially 2 that rolled over into this year.