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Goodbye to a Classroom
Sep. 10th, 2020 11:25 pmI had enough humour in me to pause in the doorway on the way out and sing a brief bit of Taylor Swift. "We are never ever ever ever getting back together."
Because that was it. One last dinosaur on the whiteboard (carrying moving boxes, natch) and I will never again set foot in room 103. Goodbye, lovely room! You were my home for two years, give or take a bit. I drew a great many dinosaurs on your white board and taught a huge number of lessons.
(For clarity, before I continue being slightly wistful and poetic, I still have my job. Our building is being torn down due to important reasons of "it's fucking nightmare old and falling apart" and a new building is being made roughly on top of the old one. This is why I *know* I'm remote until December, which is a wonderful gift in a time of massive uncertainty.)
Most of what I was doing was sorting through old papers, which I had shoved into a filing cabinet or my cabinet-cabinet or my desk or the back table and told myself I would deal with them "later". Today was a _lot_ of later. I kept less than a milk crate's worth of papers. I got rid of two and a half recycling bins worth --like literally, I snuck into other classrooms and stole their bins. Also, I should note that I was packing these bins *dense*. There was...a lot to go through.
Most of what I had was actually from my second year teaching, rather than the third (which is pandemicyear) or the first (where I floated between three different classrooms and only had a cabinet for over-summer storage, so did a better job culling in June). It was...really lovely to see work from that yearbatch of students, who I am finding I am missing the most --there were some really amazing kids!
I was happy too, for the chance to go through a huge amount of what I have done these past three years and...yeah. I done good. I have tried some wonderful things, I have accomplished some neat projects, I am doing a good job as a teacher! Like, I know last year fell apart --but that wasn't entirely or solely my fault-- and I know we're anxious as hell about this year upcoming (I have added three word-to-word language dictionaries and a pile of sticky notes to my supplies at home) but I _can_ do this and I _will_ do this.
I feel a little funny about the idea of a year without paper artifacts left behind, but that's just what it is sometimes. I feel incredibly sad about how I'm going to convert and create the things I do in person --there were a fair chunk of manipulatives that I packed up. We still haven't heard an answer about "can we use zoom breakout rooms", which means not only will I get to use the group work I've already designed, but possibly I can't even adapt it to a different form of group.
Reading more articles would be cool, except this year is my first year since the first year where I actually have new classes, and to go with that, the first time ever I have other teachers with the same preps. I'm going to have a _lot_ less freedom of content this year, it seems, but maybe I can still keep true to some of the things that I like. (And I get to work with Clayton, who has stars in his eyes --which reminds me that I should be idealistic too, and try my damndest to teach and well and not settle.)
Damn I'm going to miss Discrete Math though. I'm genuinely proud of what I created for that class, and now all that work is just...done. In a perfect world (which is so far from the current one that it's not even worth dreaming about) I would polish up some of those lessons and put them in an archive online for other people to use, but that sounds like a game for a day when I don't have to create all my lessons for this year anew.
Still, my biggest takeaway at the moment is an incredibly sense of relief that I am done moving _out_ of places for a while. Just the hotel left to move out of and then I will relax for a while. Or, you know. Learn how to teach in a pandemic, won't that be fun?
My immediate concern is putting myself to bed though, since I didn't get enough sleep last night and I worked basically an 11 hour day. Ta!
~Sor
MOOP!
Because that was it. One last dinosaur on the whiteboard (carrying moving boxes, natch) and I will never again set foot in room 103. Goodbye, lovely room! You were my home for two years, give or take a bit. I drew a great many dinosaurs on your white board and taught a huge number of lessons.
(For clarity, before I continue being slightly wistful and poetic, I still have my job. Our building is being torn down due to important reasons of "it's fucking nightmare old and falling apart" and a new building is being made roughly on top of the old one. This is why I *know* I'm remote until December, which is a wonderful gift in a time of massive uncertainty.)
Most of what I was doing was sorting through old papers, which I had shoved into a filing cabinet or my cabinet-cabinet or my desk or the back table and told myself I would deal with them "later". Today was a _lot_ of later. I kept less than a milk crate's worth of papers. I got rid of two and a half recycling bins worth --like literally, I snuck into other classrooms and stole their bins. Also, I should note that I was packing these bins *dense*. There was...a lot to go through.
Most of what I had was actually from my second year teaching, rather than the third (which is pandemicyear) or the first (where I floated between three different classrooms and only had a cabinet for over-summer storage, so did a better job culling in June). It was...really lovely to see work from that yearbatch of students, who I am finding I am missing the most --there were some really amazing kids!
I was happy too, for the chance to go through a huge amount of what I have done these past three years and...yeah. I done good. I have tried some wonderful things, I have accomplished some neat projects, I am doing a good job as a teacher! Like, I know last year fell apart --but that wasn't entirely or solely my fault-- and I know we're anxious as hell about this year upcoming (I have added three word-to-word language dictionaries and a pile of sticky notes to my supplies at home) but I _can_ do this and I _will_ do this.
I feel a little funny about the idea of a year without paper artifacts left behind, but that's just what it is sometimes. I feel incredibly sad about how I'm going to convert and create the things I do in person --there were a fair chunk of manipulatives that I packed up. We still haven't heard an answer about "can we use zoom breakout rooms", which means not only will I get to use the group work I've already designed, but possibly I can't even adapt it to a different form of group.
Reading more articles would be cool, except this year is my first year since the first year where I actually have new classes, and to go with that, the first time ever I have other teachers with the same preps. I'm going to have a _lot_ less freedom of content this year, it seems, but maybe I can still keep true to some of the things that I like. (And I get to work with Clayton, who has stars in his eyes --which reminds me that I should be idealistic too, and try my damndest to teach and well and not settle.)
Damn I'm going to miss Discrete Math though. I'm genuinely proud of what I created for that class, and now all that work is just...done. In a perfect world (which is so far from the current one that it's not even worth dreaming about) I would polish up some of those lessons and put them in an archive online for other people to use, but that sounds like a game for a day when I don't have to create all my lessons for this year anew.
Still, my biggest takeaway at the moment is an incredibly sense of relief that I am done moving _out_ of places for a while. Just the hotel left to move out of and then I will relax for a while. Or, you know. Learn how to teach in a pandemic, won't that be fun?
My immediate concern is putting myself to bed though, since I didn't get enough sleep last night and I worked basically an 11 hour day. Ta!
~Sor
MOOP!