Tales from the science classroom

This is kind of the way I feel right now. Oh heck, this is kind of the way I feel every summer. I have a lot I want to accomplish but don't know where to start first. Then I will work on something for a while, then put it aside and work on something else, and generally end up getting a bunch done but nothing completely. I absolutely need to change that this summer. I had thought that I would devote some time each day to a specific task. Like mornings I would spend lesson planning, afternoons I would spend working on my license, something like that. But I have realized that just distracts me even more. If I get into a groove with the lesson planning and then have to stop and switch gears I usually lose the train of thought I had. Same with the other way. If I've just spent a good couple of hours of lesson planning, then to switch gears to working on my stuff usually prevents me from getting much on that done. Plus I just found out yesterday that I will be going to school ...

This is what my brain feels like when I start to go through my electronic resources. I have collected so many over the years that sorting them out becomes a wash of noise that I can't separate things from. So what to do about this? I'm not sure exactly. Some of the resources are really, really good but with so many, I forget what I have or where they are located. Which makes having them somewhat pointless. I can't use them if I can't find them. So I'm thinking of dumping everything. Well, not actually. I will probably put them in a file somewhere labeled "OLD STUFF" and then start all over. I have an entire curriculum that I really want to use, but I keep getting side-tracked from it because I can't figure out where it is or what I'm to be using. So I'm thinking of setting up a Google classroom for next year with the units all set up and the resources I want to use all laid out and all I have to do is publish them. The other wrench that ...

Yesterday was the official last day of school. Wednesday night we had our graduation and yesterday was our awards ceremony and check out. We are done. The truth is though unless you are changing schools, teachers are not really done for summer. See my previous post with my summer goals. Still working all summer long, I just have the luxury of doing things when and how I want. I will need to go into my classroom too since it's not really as clean as I'd like it. Plus I want to move things around so they can wax the entire floor of my room. But again, I can do these things on my schedule and not someone else's and that makes all the difference. So I'm taking a few days to just relax and do things that are either fun or not terribly stressing. I want to work on my planner for next year - that's fun - and really work on organizing my electronic stuff - that's not too stressful. I may even consider working on my plans for next year. I have last year's it's ...

Since most of my goals for this summer revolve around my work, I decided to post them here. Get Arizona teaching license Complete 2 constitution courses Complete ELA course Take 2 Praxis tests Review/Clean up all teaching resources go through all electronic storage organize or get rid of organize everything (paper and electronic)  set up units for chemistry Use the website to set up units and store resources set up Google classroom for all classes  Preset some early assignments for the beginning of the year Develop a plan and system for grading and handling all papers that come with teaching Those are the main things I need to accomplish this summer. I may also be taking 2-3 week courses that will take up a whole lot of my time. And there is Mavy, I want to work with him a lot this summer. So it could turn out to be a very, very busy summer. I can totally do it, I just need to be organized and motivated. I'm very motivated so the organization will be th...

And I'm already making plans for what I need to do for the summer. I'm excited about my new attitude. I guess I wrote about it on my other blog, but my new attitude is awesome. I always look at summer as a time to do nothing so I get really resentful if I have to do things and I end up not getting much done because my mindset is that I should be doing nothing. Well, this year I'm going into the summer with a whole different mindset. This summer I get to do all the things I don't normally get to do. I get to run early in the mornings because I don't have to go to school. I get to work on my crafts because I don't have to work all day. I get to train Mavy a couple of times a day because I'll be around mostly. I get to read because I don't have to work. I get to revamp my courses because I have the time to think about them and decide what I want to do. So instead of a time where I get to be lazy and don't have to do anything, I instead have the time ...