That Feeling When You’re Finally Caught Up…
It’s been a busy Fall/early Winter…REALLY busy. The Fall is always busy for me, but this year was especially intense. Part of the problem was that I unintentionally overloaded myself with things I needed to do. This is the first week I am feeling OFFICIALLY CAUGHT UP with everything and it feels amazing. In fact, today was the first day all school year that I didn’t bring home my grading accordion file because there was nothing in it to grade! I think only a teacher can appreciate how truly incredible this is.
Some of the things outside of my normal teaching role that have been keeping me busy so far this school year:
A gradate-level Data Science course I took at a local university - now THIS was a challenge! I learned a lot and was exposed to many ideas I have never worked with before, but those projects ate up a lot of my weekend evenings and nights. This ran from early September until mid-December.
Umpiring field hockey games after school throughout the Fall
My role as the Lead AP Computer Science Teacher for the district - this was my first year in this role, and it has involved a lot of detail-oriented planning, reaching out to numerous people in various roles, reserving buildings/buses/snacks/etc, and more.
Running the school’s Math Team and the partnership with a local elementary school - one of my favorite parts of teaching, but lots of communicating, emails, keeping track of things!
Homecoming committee chair - me and another teacher planned the Homecoming dance in October, which involved weeks of planning
And of course, my amazing two kids and everything going on in their lives!
Christmas break really allowed me relax and wrap up a lot of loose ends, grade everything, get ahead with making copies (a first for this school year), and finally reflect on my curriculum and planning.
Today was the first time I logged into this blog and my Mathstodon account all school year, and it was great to revisit goals and ideas I wanted to incorporate this school year.
One thing I remembered finding this past summer were Math Menus that I had read about online. I edited a math menu on Parabolas that I had previously saved and forgotten about, and I am looking forward to using it soon in my Algebra II class.
I also read through a bunch of posts on my Mathstodon feed and found a reference to this recreational math book: Math Games with Bad Drawings. I just ordered it! I’m excited to add this to my collection of non-textbook math books and try some problems out with my middle school son and my students.