My first day

It is all starting to hit me now, just how much work I have ahead of me. Today was my first official day as a school teacher in my own classroom. I went through the first aid and cpr training so now if you stop breathing I can help you!! THen I learned all about the online grading system that the district uses. I won't necessarily use all aspects of it because the parents of the students that I will be teaching do not use computers! However, I do have all the basic categories in which I am going to grade the students all entered in. That was a big accomplishement for me today. After learning all this I finally got to out and see my classroom. It is a bit smaller than I am used to being in but I have my desks all arranged, a bulletin board started and some pocket charts hung. I have a few things to bring out to the colony tomorrow that will help me with my set up. I am not going to bring out my library of books until next weekend so that I can teach the kids all the routine things that they are going to need to know to be successful in my classroom. It was a huge accomplishment to set my the physical structue of my classroom so that all the kids could see at least one of the whiteboards. They are set up in the corner-not the ideal way but definately relieved to have a white board at least. Tomorrow the other teacher and I will be setting our schedule and putting the curriculum in my classroom. I think I am going to introduce it to the kids gradually to not only keep myself sane but to not overwhelm them. There is no time for homework after they leave my class so that is built into the day. Interesting concept but I think I will get used to not having homework handed in every day. I haven't decided if I am going to have a long time at the end of the day for homework or if i am going to have two shorter periods throughout the day to do the work. It's all these teachery decisions that I have to make for my classroom to run smoothly. Hopefully I will have most of this figured out by tomorrow. We'll see. I have lots of planning ahead of me. Here are some pics to hold you over and curb your curiosity about where I live.