every other day of the week is fine

Oh, what a dismal day to go back to school!
Snowing/raining, very windy & COLD.
And yet, things are looking up, as it's supposed to be 56 by Friday.

This week (Weds.) I will start taking over some of the classes - or at least the Group B classes. Group C has started their independent studies, so they will only be in the classroom on Thursdays, during which time we will have "All Literature Days." Our first all-lit day is next Thursday, and I am making a lesson plan for that. Since most of the students are working on The Great Gatsby, I figured I'd do some poetry from the 2os. I'm planning on making a poster or handout with the "Events of the Decade," so the students understand the time period during which the literature they're reading was written. Then I'll have them read a couple poems by Langston Hughes, one of my personal favorites.

Today I was mistaken as a student by a librarian. I was walking out of the library with some of my Group A students, and a librarian called after us in the hallway, "What study hall are you supposed to be in?" I turned around, smiled, and said, "I'm their student teacher - we're returning to [my cooperating teacher]'s class." She apologized quickly...

A student at my last placement also thought I was a fellow student. He said hi to me, saw my name tag and did a double take: "Are you a teacher?! How old ARE you?!"

At least this bodes well for my thirties and forties, right? :)

Happy Spring Break!
I have 2 weeks off in honor of Spring (can't say "Easter" at a public school).
In honor of Spring Break, it will be snowing tomorrow through Sunday. Boo.

My new placement is going very well so far! I get along really well with my cooperating teacher (a female this time), and the kids are great. This past week the students finished up a Holocaust unit, based on Elie Wiesel's Night. Very interesting discussions in all the classes!

My cooperating teacher and I are going to be doing something new this year. All the juniors took the English Regents in January, so we have split each of the classes into 3 groups. Those in Group A are the students who failed the Regents, Group B is students who passed, and Group C is students who got a 95 or higher. I have been working with Group A this past week, helping them revise and type one of their Regents essays. Group B is going to be doing literature circles, which I am definitely looking forward to! Lit. circles seem like they're becoming all the rage in education, so I'm excited to have a long term experience with that. The students in Group C are going to be working on an independent study with a novel of their choice (from a list, haha).

This is a really unique opportunity for me & I'm excited to see how it goes! I will be at this school until May 25th.


In non-academic news, this past weekend I went out to Michigan with a load of personal belongings & started moving into the apartment where Doug & I will be living! We're very excited - it is really cute!! It's the second story of this house in Plymouth:



The bottom floor is a massage business, which is nice because we won't have to worry about noisy neighbors, since they'll never be there when we're home.

I'm off to enjoy my spring break some more! :)