First Day

Tomorrow will be my first first day ever.  Last year was a bit of a mess with me coming in 5 days late and having to catch up to everyone else in a new school as a new teacher.  It's still hard to believe I did that: taught 2 subjects, new school, new state, started late, moved the week before, etc.  Those were and probably will remain the two hardest weeks of my life.

This year, I get to start new with the same subjects and the same setup.  I had the whole summer to think about what I wanted to change and spent the last week planning those changes.  I've had some long nights this week, but it doesn't worry me like it did last year.  I knew this week would be busy and that I wouldn't have more than a couple hours between school and sleep.  I didn't expect it to be quite as chaotic as it was, but I've accepted that's just the way it is and probably will be for the beginning of the year.  I think I'm ready to start implementing my changes tomorrow and I'm hoping for more success than last year.  At least I know I won't be worse, and I thought I did alright last year, so we'll see.

Last night we had our Meet The Teachers night and I got to meet many of our kids and parents.  From what I could tell, they seemed like great kids and I'm looking forward to starting the year with them.  I felt prepared for the night until the first student came in.  It was then that I realized how personal teaching is and how different every student is each year.  The more students I met though, the better I felt.  I loved greeting them and their parents, asking them how their summers were and if they felt ready to start again.  It was good to talk to 6th graders again - they're still kids, but they have a little bit of maturity coming through that doesn't show in their younger brothers and sisters.  I think they'll be a fun group.

Right now, I feel good.  I feel like I'm prepared for tomorrow and for next week when I start teaching actual content.  We'll see how things go tomorrow.