A new start..

Well, summer has finally ended for me, so to speak.  I went back to work yesterday for the first time since late May.  Pre-planning.....such fun!  I am beginning my second year of teaching at the small private school I taught at last year and I couldn't be happier right now. 

The summer was long, tedious, and somewaht boring for me for the most part.  The reason being, I was "stuck" at home quite a bit and it was too quiet!  Though I had plans to "see the world" this summer, I couldn't travel due to the crazy high expense of airline tickets. My mom, my siblings and my children live in other parts of the world (except for my oldest daughter and her family, who live about 14 miles away and with whom I did spend much cherished time this summer), and trying to make plans to get to visit just didn't work out.  My granddaughter visited from California and we had a wonderful time.  We swam in the pool, shopped at the mall and toured all the great spots here. When she left, I spent lazy days at the pool reading and sunning, worked out at the gym, shopped a bit and I did spend a few wonderful days with friends at little lunches and dinners as well, but most of the days were long and the nights were even longer.  I got completely out of my routine, stayed up very late  watching TV and reading, slept much too late in the mornings and generally got melancholy by the time mid-August rolled around, so to say that I am grateful to be able to get back to work would be an understatement!    

I love teaching and I am enjoying getting my classroom ready for the new school year.    I ordered new versions of books for each class I teach, but next year the State will be updating the Social Studies curriculum and I will need to change books again, so I didn't go all out with brand new books, just updated and more comprehensive ones than what I had used last year.  I have to prepare new lesson plans and I had started doing that earlier in the summer in order to get ahead and stay in practice. I teach grades 6 through 10 and teach three different subjects.   I am finding the 9th grade lesson plans to be the most challenging.  These students in my 9th grade class are bright and curious and will be taking World History this year.  I strongly dislike the subject of World History, finding there is almost no way to make it as interesting as I would like it to be.  This class of new 9th graders were in American History last year and we had a great experience.  None of them made less than an 'A' in any semester.  They were involved, engaged and frankly, they were my favorite class.  Thus the dilemma: keeping them interested and engaged this year with a subject I detest.  However, I am a very positive person, and I know there is a way, and I shall seek and find it!  I will also spend a lot of time praying for wisdom and guidance to help make World History exciting and challenging for these bright kids.

Because my school is small and I am the only Social Studies teacher in Middle and High School, I will be teaching most of the same students that I taught last year, but I will have a brand new 6th grade class.  I CANNOT WAIT for them to arrive!!  I LOVE teaching 6th grade. They are impressionable, are young enough that they still want to learn and they soak up the knowledge like sponges.  I love molding their minds!  They too will be studying World History (from the beginning of civilization to The Byzantine Empire), but I seem to find this earlier era of that subject easy to teach and enjoy.  Last year my 6th grade class loved learning about ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, Greece, Rome the Vikings, and the Byzantine Empire.  We also had fun with "early man", as we discussed how he evolved from a hunter/gatherer to a farmer to a craftsman and trader and how he discovered how to make weapons and fire, clothing and housing.  They also loved learning about how civilization actually began and how education and writing came to be.  They were so much fun to teach.   The other classes (8th and 10th) will be learning American History (on different levels) and that is probably my favorite subject, so I feel confident that it will be a good year for them.  7th grade will be studying Geography.  The class is very small and I find the subject of Geography easy and interesting to teach, so I am looking forward to it as well. 

So...here I go....diving into the tasks at hand....getting the classroom ready and preparing lesson plans...as well as meetings, training and other tasks. 

Here's to a great year with all my classes!

Happy Tales!