Weathering The Storm

Listening to the thunderstorm outside my "office" window while working on my lesson plans for this week. Seems very fitting that we'd have rain to "cleanse" the week away. It's been such an overwhelming and hectic week. I have great students and I love them dearly, even my 3 peas in a pod. It just seems like the workload is drowning us. I feel like just when I get the opportunity to lift my head up, a little more work downpours on me. Funny how rain pours out all over the ground and when the ground can't keep up with absorbing, the water begins to puddle. Sometimes I feel like that's how things are happening around me. Just one big puddle. I'm attempting not to work myself into the ground, but I'm "trying to absorb the water being thrown at me". All kinds of things like SLTs, PGPs, Pre-tests, VAM, Compass, CVR, CCSS, and the list of acronyms goes on and on. 

My biggest stress of the year is the fact that I changed subjects. Now I'm not only planning for a subject I'm not as familiar with, but I'm also planning for twice the amount of time. I spoke with a co-worker today about how long it's taking me to write lesson plans. She assured me that I'm not alone and we are all facing this. She pointed out to me that we are doing 2 weeks worth of lesson plans in one week. When she said that to me the light bulb went off. No wonder it's taking me forever to get the lesson done! 

I find that I'm in unfamiliar territory. I am not as "comfortable" in ELA as I was in math. The main reason I moved from math to ELA was to incorporate my technology more. Well it's tough planning for technology based lessons. It's especially tough when you are learning the content as you go! I feel so unprepared for this challenge. Technology should be my only saving grace. I find that I'm having to make sure to incorporate my ipads on a regular basis. So for this week's lesson, we'll have the ipads in our hands at least 3 times this week. I'd say for our first story that's pretty good. I've managed to create several handouts, powerpoints, rubrics, and activities over the course of this lesson plan. 

 I know there will be dry spells where I can breathe again, so I'm hanging on to the promise of that. I'm trying to be cautious of not working myself to death. Because I don't have a family to come home to, doesn't mean that I have to be married to my job. Who am I kidding? At some point we are all married to our jobs. Being a teacher means learning and growing in the places you feel inadequate. Always trying to stay ahead on technology. I know there will be a time when I can settle down and not spend so much time writing lesson plans. I just have to weather the storm right now while I'm in it. I'm thankful for the ups and downs in life because I know they cause us to grow. As teachers we are always trying to better ourselves professionally as well as personally. I'm sure there will be a great amount of growth that takes place this year. I'll be honest, though, these growing pains sure are tough right now.