Yeah. I said that! (Or wrote it, actually… but we won’t nitpick about it.)
So, this week has been moving along way too quickly. Between trying to get my room ready and trying to get my curriculum ready, I feel like I’m running around like a chicken with my head cut off. There’s always so much to do to get ready for a new school year! But that’s not very positive to say, so I won’t go into that.
Anyway, I was asked to be a team lead this year.
For those who don’t know what I’m talking about, essentially in middle school, we have “teams”. Up until this year, each team had 1 science teacher, 1 social studies teacher, 2 language arts teachers, and 2 math teachers. Teams would then share the same students between them and could talk about best ways to help the same students, etc. (The two LA and math teachers were there because SS and science would switch off every other day with the kids for a 90 min period, where math and LA got the kids every day for 90 minutes.) This all changed thanks to Gov. Perry and state budget cuts. (Yet another thing I will try to refrain from going into detail about here.)
This year, a team ‘should’ be 1 science, 1 social studies, 1 LA, and 1 math, all for 50 minute periods, and seventh grade ‘should’ have two separate teams. Due to weirdness and scheduling problems, we are the seventh grade super team. Before the scheduling issues came up, I was asked to be the head of one of the two teams, meaning that I would be in charge of meetings, reminders, keeping consistent policies, passing along information, etc. But when the scheduling wouldn’t work out, I figured it wouldn’t happen.
But my principal did want me to still participate with the campus leadership team stuff over the summer, so I did. And this past week, as I was talking to the awesome girl I work with who was our team lead for most of last year and would be again this year, she mentioned that she was trying to talk to the principal about doing a co-team-lead sort of thing. Or that I could have it all, because she didn’t think she could do it all on her own. So I opted to co-lead (because I didn’t want all that solely on my shoulders, either!).
Today, in talking to one of the assistant principals about a unrelated subject, she paid me a nice compliment by saying that this year, the principals put a lot of thought into choosing who they would like to be leading the teams, where the previous year was more just trying to fill positions. She continued saying that I and ______ were chosen because of our dedication to our students and coworkers, along with how we’ve handled ourselves and situations last year. And that was really a nice thing to know. (Especially because this AP is usually very stoic and doesn’t throw around compliments freely. She then mentioned that since we were both “mild-mannered” people, we needed to stay firm to what we both felt were best teaching practices for our kids and impart that to team as well. lol.)
So, despite all the times when I feel like I am putting it all out there and nobody has noticed or cared, they were watching. And I was making a difference and a positive impression, and it wasn’t just a random happenstance or lack of other choices that put me there.
With all that said, being purposefully chosen for a position like this is a very nice thought indeed.
