College ramps up as the Sub jobs ramp down

Another week with bronchitis; at least I had Monday off from classes.

With the girls gone, my son and I watched movies, played games, ate out and played tennis (even with bronchitis and lots of pollen outside).  I also got all my homework done, and my portfolio – the last outside-of-class assignment that I need to turn in.  Over the weekend, I also did a training session for the Ghana Wheels for the World team (of which my son is a part).  We had a great time.

School continues.  I didn’t realize until this week that I had signed up to do my two major presentations next week while my parents are here.  This means that I’ll need to put all my effort in this weekend so I will be free when they arrive.  I did my minor presentation on “Plessy v. Ferguson” on Thursday and it went well.

On Tuesday and Thursday this week, I did exit interviews for 8th graders at the Middle School.  I had done this in past years and really enjoyed it.  I enjoyed it again this time and it was made extra special because half the students I interviewed were from my student teaching class.

I also had an opportunity to sub in Music on Tuesday.  The Middle School has two part-time music teachers and both were out this day.  The electronic substitute management system couldn’t figure out that only one sub was needed so two subs were called and I got the latter half of the day.  This was fine because I could still interview in the morning.  I got to the music room early, played with all the instruments, which was a lot of fun, then looked at the lesson plan which consisted of silent study periods.  How boring!  I decided to give my half of the day to the morning substitute if he/she would take it.  At break, I found the guy who was subbing the first two periods and asked him if he wanted to do it all day.  He did, so I gave it to him.  It turned out that this sub was the “magician” guy that I had so often followed in other sub jobs.  Recently, the kids have started to ask me if I knew any magic tricks because their last sub was a magician.  He was a hard act to follow.  He was a really nice guy who had just started substituting, now that he had retired from his 30 year job.

Tuesday really wiped me out so I put myself down as sick for Wednesday.  On Wednesday, I turned in my portfolio at NHU, but not until late afternoon.  I also discovered that in order to get my ART credential (in addition to my Social Studies credential) I would need to do TPA#1 for Art, but not TPAs2-4.  Darn! More writing!  But at least it was only one TPA, and it was the easy one at that (I find out if I passed my Art CSET on Monday evening).  On Thursday, I interviewed again and was let out a little early because they had run out of students to interview.  I went home and took a nap.  Friday, I turned down three sub jobs, though I was tempted by the half day Social Studies assignment.  I really needed the rest from Thursday.