Oh my. So exhausted after two whole days of school. I must be doing it wrong. Of course, sleep is not my friend. I’m teaching a new engineering unit, so my brain decides to go over how it will all work, precisely, specifically, we move from this to that, over and over and over again…while I’m trying to sleep. Not helpful, brain. Not helpful at all. It’s OK…at some point, I will be so exhausted that I will fall asleep even though my brain is trying to do all the things. I mean, it can’t possibly DO all the things.
Speaking of the brain, our school district is back to trying to make us understand how our brains work and how we can work better HARDER because of it. Or better with other people? Much as I like the little brain quizzes (ok, 177 questions is not little, and it was timed, so you couldn’t rest or relax while taking it), I don’t really need the 3 AM email that says because I am STRATEGIC, I need to (OMG get this) SHOW MY WORK. I kinda wanna send that to my kids and all former and current male attachments, because that is all about how my brain gets from here to there with 17 thousand iterations that you didn’t see and you don’t understand. That is the random shit I say sometimes when my entire family turns and stares at me because we were talking about widgets and I’m now talking about cloud movement and there were actually connections between the two in my head, it’s like this crazy twisted ribbon of how I got there, and now I have to SHOW MY WORK and explain to y’all how I got there and you still think I’m nuts.
That however does not make my job easier at the moment. I did successfully post 24 videos of kids dropping egg supply pods yesterday. We did not use real eggs yesterday…practice run. Only one died…
Which is why we’ll be doing real chicken eggs in a week and a half. Hopefully the mess will not be too bad. Ugh. Some interesting designs though…
Mostly there were some big clunky noises though when they hit. So today we’ll redesign with some physics in mind. Hopefully. One class is decidedly “we just want to DO without thinking” so that makes it fun. Not. Gotta love middle-school kids…they do think they know everything even when they know they don’t. May today be easier than yesterday.
Artwise, I’m still ironing. I really thought I’d be done last night, but I went to the gym (very frustrating last two periods of the day, plus trying to plan some shit out without much help), then made videos for each period of all of their drops, then made a doc I need for next week that the stupid curriculum thinks the kids don’t need but they do. Their understanding of what my kids need is almost always off by about 5 years of ability. Which sucks. I scaffold like a bitch, but even that’s not enough some days. One of the brain quiz questions asked if I LOVE my job or DON’T LOVE my job. Right now, it’s a lot of the latter unfortunately. Just because of the planning taking SO MUCH time and having a group of kids that are really difficult all together in the last two classes of the day. Sometimes they’re awesome and I try to hold onto that as much as possible, and sometimes it’s a shit show. Too much of that. Makes you feel like you’re a shitty teacher no matter how many years you have in. So hopefully I will find more love for it; hopefully they will find their chill a little bit too. Too much drama.
So the ironing did not get totally done…but I’m close. Here’s Monday night…
I’m having a hard time picturing this one completely colored in my head. I am using some colors in places I don’t usually use them. But I think (hope?) it will work. Here’s last night…that big piece of blackish fabric is one that I’m kind of questioning, but I think it will work.
I thought about green instead, but there’s all these green hills behind and I didn’t want that part to fade into the back. I wanted it in your face. So we’ll see how that goes.
This is all I have left…
Not much. That’s tonight. Then I can start cutting.
Kitten has been bringing me socks and pieces of my wool stitching…mostly in the middle of the night while I’m sleeping, as she vocalizes quite loudly that she’s brought me my things. It’s been a while since she’s done this…I forgot how annoying and cute it was.
The socks I don’t mind. I wish she’d leave the wool stitching alone. She pulled one block out from under a bunch of other stuff. She does prefer wool to anything else. Weirdo.
OK. I’m not sure what I’m teaching today, because my late-night brain worried about all of it for so long. Sucks. I have to make kids read in both grade levels, which is always a challenge. I could just read to them, but that’s not as useful as their trying to read themselves. They fight it so much. Then pilates after school. Then probably I’m cooking tonight because the boychild is half dead with something awful (not COVID), and then I’ll get to iron. Depending on what school shit I need to do tonight. Which depends on how much I can get done during prep. Or something. I’m not even sure what I need to do at this point, my brain is so tied up in knots. It’s not SHOWING ITS WORK dammit. It comes to me that I spend a lot of time here showing my work though…I guess that’s a thing. Certainly gets it out of my head and into the ether.
Kathy Nida 