November: Life and times of a sleep-deprived, overworked, underpaid, and crotchety-as-of-late public high school teacher

Old post from November 2012, Day in the Life of a first year MTC teacher. Good for you if you make it to the end.

5:00A.M.	Woke up suddenly and felt wide awake but not rested enough (or motivated enough) to want to get out of bed. Sometimes waking up before the alarm can be a start to a great day, one in which you are rested and ready to take on the world. The two previous mornings, I have been waking up way too early (3:00A.M. ish)  and am unable to fall back asleep for an hour or so. So when I see I still have 20 minutes until the alarm sounds, I try and snuggle under the covers and fall back asleep. Plus, the heater's not on so it is frickin' cold.
5:40A.M.	Snooze. Snooze. Snooze. Snooze on both MY phone alarm AND the husband's phone alarm, and suddenly it is 5:40 and we are late to rise, again. This is pushing the boundary of the absolutely latest we can get out of bed, but we are both just so exhausted to start the day any earlier.
6:20A.M.	Leave the house. Our ideal leave time is 6:00A.M. on the dot - and again we are pushing our limits. We both do not have to check in with the school until 6:50A.M., but since we are a one-car household and work at different places, leaving early is a must for both of us to arrive to work on time. Aaron drives, unfortunately for him. His back and neck are so tensed up at the moment that he cannot turn his head apart from moving his entire torso. But still he drives. It is dark outside, and cold. We pass the river on our way to work, my favorite part of the drive. I love watching the fog slowly rise from the water and catch in the moonlight.
6:35A.M.	We pull up to the high school and I exit. Aaron continues on 10 more minutes north to the junior high. One other car is in the front - Austin's - and the janitor is strolling the halls talking on the phone, as is his usual morning break routine. I sign my name on the sign-in sheet at the office and check my mailbox. Then I walk through the silent halls to the other end of the school towards my classroom. Once in my room, I turn on the computer, check email, write the daily objectives on the white board, change the date on the white board, lay out my supplies for the day's activities, print my lesson plan, straighten the desks, make a worksheet for intervention, and eat my breakfast consisting of a greek yogurt. I also open a white chocolate and coffee energy drink that I picked up impulsively at Walgreen's the night before. Holy buckets, am I exhausted already.
6:57A.M.	Administrator comes on the intercom for their infamous morning call to duty: "Teachers, please begin moving to your duty posts at this time. I repeat, students are about to begin entering the building, so please report to your duty posts at this time." All the teachers are stationed in the hallway in front of their classroom and must remain there until first period begins. I take a quick restroom break because if I am unable to sneak one in during lunch, I will not have another chance until the last period of the day.
7:02A.M.	My first student walks into the classroom. My first period is mainly composed of freshmen who are relatively harmless, so they get to chatter and hang out for the next half hour while I sit at my duty post at a desk in the hallway. Normally I take this time to review my lesson, plan questions to ask students, grade, or prepare materials for future lessons. Since we are doing an activity today, there is not much prep work demanding my attention.
7:27A.M.	Tardy bell rings and teachers attempt to shoo students out of the hall. The sophomore hall is notorious for having too many rowdy students in the hallway at all times. I also have to shoo a couple of students OUT of my classroom who do not have biology first period. For some reason, they just keep coming back.
7:35A.M.	Five minutes after first period begins, the principal comes on intercom and dismisses all freshmen to auditorium for assembly. Most of my classes are entirely sophomores, but first period is the opposite. I only have three sophomores present in a class of freshmen, who are now headed to the auditorium. I co-teach this period with Hanna Olivier, so she takes all of the freshmen down the hallway while I usher the sophomores back to class in an attempt to give an abridged lesson (when the freshmen come back it will be the sophomores turn to go).
8:00A.M.	The freshmen return and sophomores are dismissed. The period is effectively cut in half and all I can do is be flexible.
8:26A.M.	Second period starts. Of the sophomore classes, this is my favorite. In this period, there is a mix of ability levels, including a subgroup of special education students. Every one tries to do their best and is generally respectful. And boy, do they LOVE to talk. You get asked a lot of tangential questions while teaching, and sometimes these questions are actually born of student curiosity and a result of their minds taking the material to the next level. Relating cell division to cancer, for example. This class asks those kinds of questions, and I love it.
9:22A.M.	Intervention period. This is an extra period of the day devoted to remediation of core subjects and intense state test prep. Intervention is also shorter than any other period, involves no sort of grading system, and runs while the snack cart rolls down the school hallways selling cookies, hot chips, candy, gummies, and sports drinks. So, as you can imagine, intervention continues each and every day with students' and teachers' lackadaisical attitudes. The science department has put a lot into intervention this year. We actually make additional lessons for each day, a balance between reviewing the days' class objective and providing students with additional review in an area in which they are struggling. But still - no one looks forward to intervention.
10:05A.M.	Oh dear. Third period. Other teachers have glanced into my classroom and commented later that this period is "full of a bunch of assholes." I find it hard to argue.
10:58A.M.	The best time of the day - end of third period! I am constantly flustered by this point and have more than once flown off the handle at my incoming fourth period students. When that happens I do feel bad because I try to let things go at the end of every period. Luckily fourth period is a receptive bunch and knows that it's not them that is the cause of my mood. Today is a good day, though, and I am excited for the change in bells.
11:01A.M.	The fourth period bell rings at 11:01 and we head to lunch at 11:04A.M. This leaves just enough time to get the stragglers to class and take attendance before lining up to lunch. Even though I only have nine students when they are all present, I am a stickler for my lunch line. Wise previous teachers have said that a lunch line is the window to a classroom's soul, and I take that to heart. Single file. No talking. No touching. As long as no one is malicious, I deal with talkers in gentle reminders. On crazy days or when students are feeling especially defiant (this was a regular occurrence in the beginning of the school year), I will walk them back to class and start again as many times as it takes to get to the cafeteria in silence. At lunch, teachers have to monitor students. A couple of times per year, the administration will insist we sit with our students, but that only lasts about a week due to student AND teacher disgruntlement. We pass by the restrooms on our way back to class, and once I get the class back in the room, things generally proceed without incidence. This period has a break down of half A/B students and half consistently failing students, which can make it tough to reach every student at the appropriate level.
12:35P.M.	Fifth period. I don't have enough space or energy to write about CJ, but find me in person if you want to hear stories. All of my attention is usually focused on him this period, and I find it exhausting. No teacher has found a way to work with or cope with him, but he is not someone you can just ignore. God, I hope he passes the state test (so I will not have him again).
1:31P.M.	Sixth period is my SPED class. As part of an inclusive classroom atmosphere, special education students are meant to be incorporated into and work with students of all abilities. Unfortunately for me and them, the administration has decided to put all but four of my SPED students in a big group together, and place them into a class in which the rest of the class probably should be receiving certain accommodations as well. This leaves me with the SPED students who are generally impeccably behaved (save for the tall senior who likes to try intimidation) but cannot keep up with the material, and the second half of the class who are behavior nightmares AND who also cannot keep up with the material. I do have an inclusion teacher who does not cause outbursts or disruptions. Mostly she sits in the back next to the tall senior and takes notes along with the students. I desperately want to co-teach with her, but neither of us has any idea as to how. For this period, I generally have to cut some of the notes out and define words that other classes already know. I am not sure if any of them will pass their Biology state test at the end of the year, but I can hope and try to help as much as I know how.
2:27P.M.	I say goodbye to sixth period and hello to planning period. Sweet, sweet planning period. Normally sixth period leaves me exhausted and my room a mess. Once, I barely had time to get all the students out of the door before bursting into tears (just once so far this year). During my planning, I: prepare for after school tutoring on Monday and Wednesdays, meet with PLCs on Tuesdays, and tidy up/grade/lesson plan on Thursday and Fridays. Today is a Wednesday, so I must prepare for after school tutoring by creating a worksheet. I wait until right before tutoring to make the worksheets mostly because I cannot find time otherwise, but one benefit is that I can see where students are struggling during the day and then create materials to be most effective with review.
3:15P.M.	Still on planning. Finished the tutoring worksheet and now I finally have time to use the restroom and pick up tomorrow's copies from the library.
3:25P.M.	Classes are dismissed and teachers must follow students out of the building to report to bus duty. I float around the main entrance and front sidewalk to keep students off of the grass. Once the buses pull away, teachers gather to chat in small groups. That is, until the administration calls state tested teachers back inside to begin tutoring because there's "too many students in the back hall" and things are gettin' crazy.
3:30P.M.	Tutoring begins. Biology and Algebra generally have a lot of students staying after (because we bully the freshmen into coming, saying if they received less than 80% on something then tutoring is mandatory...threats which can only be backed up by phone calls to parents and not much else). To help with the load, Biology and Algebra will take half and switch groups halfway through. This means that I do not see the students for quite as long, which makes it less like a regular class. We receive a small amount as payment for tutoring, but only for an hour. Technically we should be done at 4:30P.M. but athletes have practice until 5:00P.M. and all after school students ride the same bus. So every Monday and Wednesday, the school gets a free half hour of duty from the teachers to add to the above-and-beyond pile, but we do it because we have to.
4:45P.M.	There is a call over the intercom that buses are not here but teachers can start dismissing students to the front of the school to wait. We finish the problem we are working on and head to the front of the school to wait with students.
5:20P.M.	Buses left at 5:10 with students, but our group of state tested teachers gathered in the front of the school always inevitably leads to a discussion. Maybe on the days events, or student progress. More often on where people are headed to for dinner. Aaron does not have to tutor, but he is nice enough to wait around the middle school and pick me up at the high school when I am finished. After going back to my room and quickly packing up for the night, we finally leave the school.
5:35P.M.	Drive the 10 miles from Sardis to Batesville and get home. On the way, we call Dominos and place an order for medium veggie pizza and breadsticks for delivery. I change into my pajamas, sit by the small gas heater in the living room, and catch up on the day with Aaron until the pizza arrives.
6:23P.M.	Finish up the pizza, and start reworking my lesson for tomorrow. There is always something to change or make. Can't forget about making intervention, too!
8:00P.M.	Start making the portfolio for my observation tomorrow. As part of the new MSTAR evaluation system, the administration would like me to gather various documents including: teaching philosophy, tests, lesson plans, documentation of parent contact, among other things. MTC has put us through a lot of evaluations already, so I am not as nervous about this formal observation from the school as I otherwise would have been.
9:30P.M.	Tear myself away from the computer and do just a tiny bit to get ready for the next day: wash dishes, pick out clothes for tomorrow, brush teeth. Waste time on my phone checking tumblr and playing games.
10:20P.M.	Finally in bed, later than I hoped.

And repeat.