Correct Me If I’m Wrong, But I Thought That Teachers Actually Spent Time With Children…

Maybe it’s my misunderstanding, but I thought that TEACHERS spent time working with CHILDREN. I know that sometimes we are also required to meet with parents, colleagues and administrators…but in general, we spend our days with the KIDS. TEACHING. CHILDREN.

Let me explain why I’m confused. Today I sat down to work on finalizing my plans for next week. I have a little system…I sketch out the week roughly on Tuesday and on Thursday, I finalize everything so that Friday (afterschool of course) can be spent getting everything together. Brilliant, I know. I can almost smell the glue sticks now…

(I know I am implying here that I love working with my little friends, but don’t get me wrong, I also love some alone time with my planner, a big stack of post-its, a clicky pencil and, on a crazy day, a Sharpie. You know what I’m talkin’ about.)

(I loves me some organizational tools).

(I am completely aware that this makes me slightly less than cool).

(I know this because of the look I receive when I admit this to non-educators, like my husband, whose eyes just kind of glaze over and I can almost hear him mentally reminding himself that he loves me despite this Staples-related obsession).

But on this sad Thursday I stared at my planner in disbelief. First, I have math professional development meetings all morning tomorrow, so no teaching. Then, there is no school on Monday (whoo-hoo!! I didn’t say I loved kids EVERYday), so no teaching. On Tuesday we have art related professional development all morning, so no teaching. On Wednesday, we have a half day and a concert in the morning, so no teaching. On Thursday, we’re going on a random field trip with no connection to any sort of theme we are studying in school- planned by Ms. Weavalicious-, so no teaching. Oh, but I do get to teach next Friday. And I’m sure the kids will be at their best after a totally unstructured week full of substitutes and bullshit work to pass the time until I come back from where-ever I am.

You can see where my confusion is. You see, out of a possible 35 periods of instruction next week, I will only be teaching for 17 of those blocks. That is less than 50%.

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