I said that I was going to give myself a week off from thinking about school, but I only made it five days. And I still thought about school, anyway. I just didn’t act on my thoughts. I’m feeling excited again, and that’s what’s really important.
The week of telling myself to let it all go helped, but the excitement is also partly due to a call I got from my administrator this week. She called to ask what I want to teach this fall. We hired a new full-time social studies teacher, and she wanted to know if I had any ideas for English electives I could teach instead of some of the history I’ve been doing. She suggested creative writing, and I jumped at the chance to teach that again.
Depending on how she sets things up, that still left me available for one more elective. Our school is almost entirely at-risk students, so I suggested a basic composition sort of course that would partner with our Reading Apprenticeship and Academic Literacy. That class is meant to help struggling students become better, more enthusiastic and active readers; I could do the same sort of thing, but with writing. She said, “Composition doesn’t sound interesting. What if we call it ‘Writing in the Real World?'” How perfect! I’m envisioning a course where students learn about, discuss, and write about topics and issues that interest them. I’ll put Get it Done! to good use. I’ll badger @ShariHales for some of her argument writing resources. Maybe we can make websites, or at least a class blog, or we could write to politicians or local businesses. Maybe we could even do an ethnography. I have so many ideas!
She hasn’t sent out the final schedule yet, so I am not even sure that I will get to teach those classes. That would probably stress some people out–not knowing what they’re teaching in 3 weeks. I’ve also been working on redesigning my American History class all summer, and now, that might all be for nothing. I should, perhaps, feel disappointed. Designing two new courses should also feel a little overwhelming.
Instead, I think this is just what I needed to get excited. It has reminded me of one of the things that I love about my school: the freedom to teach something that I want to teach. I also enjoy unit planning. I like getting to create my own curriculum. I can’t wait to get started!