Well, heck, I'm WAY overdue for an update. Sadly, it seems I'm much more likely to blog when something pisses me off or I'm not have a good go of things than when I am. I guess when I'm happy, I'm happy and when I'm not the whole world needs to hear about it or something.

So here's the long awaited anticipated...

OK, whether you wanted it or not, here it is, the long overdue update.

At the end of August I started teaching at a new old school. New because it was different from last year, but old because I'd taught there before ('98-'99).

Simply put I LOVE it. It's not perfect, but it's wonderful.

I'm teaching AP B to 13 kids who are, for the most party pretty darn bright. I'm teaching 9th grade Physics to 57 kids who are squirrely ninth graders, some more mature than others, but nothing unexpected. I have noticed that they've been trained to say thank you to their teachers on their way out of the class, even if they've been a complete PITA in class and even after a test. I find myself waiting for one to say, "Thank you sir, may I have another." after a test. Hasn't happened yet.

There is one other teacher teaching regular 9th graders with me. It is an absolute JOY to have another teacher to plan with. His ideas with my ideas and we come up with some pretty darn good stuff to do with the kids. I'm more anal than he is, but I suspect that the planning on our end helps him a bunch too. We agree on almost everything, especially when it comes to teaching methods and content. What fun we're having!!

There is also another teacher teaching one section of AP B. He's on his way out, retiring after this year-he's almost certain, in fact he's telling the kids that I'll be teaching AP C next year. He and I teach and run our classes very differently, and so we both go about our business just fine. Yes the kids are getting a somewhat different experience, but hopefully they're going to end in the same place.

We have a 7 period rotating schedule with six classes per day, so days look like this (classes are tracks A through G):
ABCDEF
GABCDE
FGABCD...

You can see how it goes. Teachers teach 4 of the 7 tracks which means that we get 2 or 3 tracks of prep/student meeting time. It is nice to have that time and I've so far been mostly able to keep the work at school.

I have been getting in early, but they've also instituted an exercise program at the school with various activities each weekday morning (and afternoon, but I don't do the afternoon stuff). So I can just do cardio fitness stuff or participate in whatever's happening-which includes lap swimming and strength and flexibility training among others. So 2-3 days a week I've been doing that in the morning. Getting in early also means that I've got more time to get stuff doing, again helping with the leave work at work program.

There are two big downers that I'm dealing with.

First, the commute. Simply put, it sucks. It's about 27 miles one way, and depending on traffic, can take as little as about 35 minutes, but can take way more than an hour too. Mornings are generally better than afternoons. But I'm also heading out early morning. Afternoons, even when I can leave at 3:30 are not nearly as much fun. It's a bit odd, but when I've not been able to leave until closer to 4:15-4:30 traffic seems better not worse than at 3:30. One day I may learn the traffic pattern. There are many "secret" back routes, I don't know them and I don't know how much help they'll actually be, I really don't. They may move, but that doesn't mean they're faster.

Second, the sleep (or lack of it). My alarm goes off at around 5 am and am getting LB up at 5:30. I'm doing OK, mostly, it's rough, but I'm surviving. I'd survive better if I actually got myself to bed earlier, but I don't seem very good at that. LB, on the other hand, is short sleep and you can tell. We're working on improving the situation, but are also looking at some more drastic measures if necessary, hopefully we can get this under control a bit better.

That's the big stuff to update, I think. Nothing else major is going on, we're starting to get ready for Halloween (meaning I need to make LB's costume still!!).

I hope that things will continue to move along as they are right now and that the mildly bad/irritating things will improve.

If you've read this far, thanks!! I'll try to make the next update sooner and shorter.