I've Been Displaced

At the beginning of this week, all teachers received notice that there would be personnel cuts in many of our county's schools. On Wednesday, I found out that I would be one of the teachers to be involuntarily displaced. They do not have enough students to justify keeping me and 20 other teachers on staff, so we are being sent to other schools to fill open positions. I am not angry about this development...I am mostly stressed out that my job status is relatively uncertain at present, and I am sad to be leaving the people here.

This school has been a wonderful place for me to grow and improve as a teacher. I received my SIOP Model training here, I've had the opportunity to teach new material, I've had more support than I could have hoped for, and I've had resources (adapted versions of texts, a wonderful Media Center, awesome suggestions from other teachers) that have made all the difference in my teaching.

With this weighing on my mind, though, I still have a job to do. Today in SOPH LA, we played Julius Caesar Jeopardy. It's always fun to see how competitive the students get when it comes to winning extra credit points for their test. It always happens that the losing team sees how far they are behind the winning team, so they kind of give up on trying to answer the questions. So, one of my students suggested that we have the "Double Jeopardy" question next time on which the teams can wager as many of their points as they want...so the losing team still has hope that they may come out ahead. Great idea! Why didn't I think of that before? See...even as teachers, we are always learning. :) Tomorrow, the students will take their Julius Caesar test, and next week they have to present their projects for this unit. After that, we get to start our unit on Medieval Lit and Dante's Inferno! I already have some great ideas for helping the students understand the content and language of this piece, and a friend shared a project idea to really immurse the students in Dante's hell. Exciting stuff!

In my JR LA class, we read "The Story of an Hour" yesterday. We had some great discussions as we read the story bit by bit. The students asked so many questions and had great ideas when it came to analysing the images and irony in the story. Today, they answered some comprehension and critical thinking questions about the story; tomorrow they will write an essay to defend this story as a work of Realism based on 3 tenants: a) realities of everyday life, b) illusion vs. reality, and c) how society and environment affect individuals. They aren't going to like the fact that they have to write an essay, but that's just too bad. :) Next week, we'll finish Realism and start on the Harlem Renaissance! Yay!

The stress of being displaced is definitely weighing on my mind, but I know that these students still need me right now. I have to do what's best for them. As long as I keep that in mind, it will all turn out alright in the end.