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Having survived term 1

The first thing I did after the bell went on the last day of week 11, term 1 (aside from down an easter egg or 3) was to sit and brain dump a list of my reflections about how this term had gone.
Reflecting is something I see the importance in - it's such a great way for me to identify the things that aren't working as well as they should be, and recognize those things that went well.

Term 1 was hard. By the Friday of week 9 I was questioning how I would last through til the end (I think I was also questioning this on day 1 of term 1). Dealing with a whole new lifestyle, a new career, a new style of teaching for the school, a new group of 52 kids to get to know and try to form relationships with I was completely and utterly exhausted. Real life had slipped out of my mind and each moment of the day seemed to be devoted to trying to stay slightly ahead of the workload that threatened to over take me.


My to-do lists were intimidatingly long, my bedroom was getting ridiculously out of control with books and papers and certificates and rubber bands turning up at the most ridiculous of places.

Rather than describe every reflection I made (because there was a lot) I wanted to simply set a goal for term 2 and then remember some of the highlights I had in term 1.

My goal for term two is to find myself as a person again instead of letting teaching consume every part of me. Now that I see how easy it is to fall into this pattern of becoming a teacher and nothing else I am determined to maintain some sense of self outside of the classroom.


How will I acheive this possibly impossible goal?
  1. Keep one day of the weekend free from school. 
  2. Prioritise. There is a never ending list of things I could do for the class but I cannot do them all so instead of wasting time on those random unimportant tasks like creating pretty borders, I want to focus on those tasks that have to be done and that I don't necessarily enjoy doing. 
  3. Exercise for my sanity. Meditate for my happiness.
  4. Find amazing interesting not-teacher related podcasts to lsiten to on the way home from school.
  5. Maintain my gratitude journal and focus on those things that make me want to be alive.
What were some of my favourite moments from Term 1?
  •  Making pom poms out on the field in the evening sunshine with students and their grandparents
  • Reading stories to the class and cracking myself up to the point that the students can no longer understand me
  • The moment where I finally knew I had learnt all 52 names
  • Finishing our first massive piece of classroom art
  • Teaching some of my authors the game of awesome and seeing how much they loved it (link here)
  • Unexpectedly explaining to all of the yr 5/6 girls what happens during a period (this may sound like it should be a low moment but despite the initial awkwardness I ended up feeling pretty privelaged to be in a posisition to do so)
  • Having an unusually successful writing session all about monsters and marshmallows
  • Joining project wy and finding myself doing bootcamp at ridiculous hours with a bucnh of incredible kids and their whanau. 
  • Playing laser tag with the teachers at my school, and despite being a very sub-par player enjoying running around and hiding from anyone and everyone. 
  • Setting up a class library that I would have dreamed of as a student at school. Seriously there are a ridiculous number of books in our classroom. 
  • Learning how to use Aurasma and then getting students to use this app the next day.
  • Laughing away the stress of each day with some of the amazing teachers I get to work with.

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