Tuesday, June 24, 2014

Changing tides...yet again

So another school year has passed, and my job is changing yet again.  For the past seven years I have taught in my district, but I have never had two years where I’ve actually taught the same grade levels or subjects.  Every year something has changed.  That kept me on my toes and kept things from getting stale, sure, but it has also made it so that I never know what to expect and have never been able to flesh out my program completely.  I’ve dealt with it, but it’s been frustrating.  I’m going to try to remember back all those years, despite having a faltering memory these days, just to lay out the details for myself.  I already feel like I’ve forgotten what I’ve done because of all of the changes.

2007-2008 - DK-4 General Music, 3/4 elective choir, Title One supplement
2008-2009 - Sp. Ed. Preschool-1 General Music, 1st grade Spanish, 5th General music
2009-2010 - Special Ed. Preschool-1 General Music, 1-2 Spanish
2010-2011 - 2-4 General Music, 2-3 Spanish
2011-2012 - 2-4 General Music and Spanish
2012-2013 - 2-5 Spanish, 2-3 General Music
2013-2014 - 5th Spanish, 2-3 (only part of 3) General Music, 4th elective choir

I think I have it down right, although it seems even more overwhelming looking back.  Guess what I’m teaching in the 2014-2015 school year?  As far as my schedule shows right now, I’ll be teaching K-3 “Technology” (by which they pretty much mean keyboarding) and 4th grade music.  If I’m lucky and motivated enough, I’ll also be doing an after-school 4th and 5th grade choir, out of the goodness of my heart and to help improve my sanity, since my choir this year was one of the best parts of my job.

I didn’t want this entry to be a rant-fest, and I realize that that is what it has become.  The one thing that keeps me going, despite the fact that I’m assigned to teach a subject I’ve never had the desire to teach and have never been specifically trained to teach, is that maybe I’ll be able to spend more of my out-of-school time enjoying non-school-related activities.  Since the majority of each week I won’t be teaching a subject about which I’m passionate, I’m hoping that I’ll be able to focus more on enjoying my non-working life.  One thing I do NOT want to do is end up devoting all of my time outside of school to trying to get my mind around teaching kindergarteners to type.  Another thing that keeps me going is that this assignment is hopefully temporary.  There’s a possibility that I’ll enjoy it immensely, but I highly doubt that, and I can always hope that I’ll be back to teaching general music all day in a couple of years.


Meanwhile, I’ve devoted about 0% of the first two weeks of my vacation to thinking about next year, since it’ll probably only get me down.  I can only be thankful that I have not been assigned to an even more unpleasant position and wonder why I decided I needed to be certified in so many varying subjects. :P  End unexpected rant.  On to better things.