The sun'll come out tomorrow!

The weather is getting nicer and nicer and I can tell. I took a VERY quick stroll around the neighborhood tonight and it was just nice to be outside again. I need that...

So let's do some positive sandwiches:

Positive: I am the "German Goddess" according to one of our assistant principals (since my numbers have grown enough to have another partial position at Park... how's that for alliteration!)

Negative: I am overwhelmed. I wanted to get a bunch of the tournament stuff done today during my prep, but I was surprised by a student (who failed to show up to my class today just the hour prior) who was obviously just over a crying spell... came in with Kleenex... and we had about an hour discussion about her broken relationship. I reminded myself right away that she is the reason I am at school and in my profession... and that was a great reminder... but it just delayed (and increased) the stress for the tournament.

Positive: Our principal stopped me the other day and said that she had spoken with my cousin about me... saying that I was "top notch" and that my "umbilical cord was planted at Park High School", then she tapped my arm and said, "right?". I said, "Yes." and smiled. She asked if I knew what she was asking. Again, I said, "Yes," and smiled.


Positive: I told my department chair about the conversation with the principal and she said that she had also had a conversation with the principal about me and the principal had said that if my numbers were growing like that and things were so wonderful that perhaps they should train me for IB! My department chair said, "I was like, yeah, that's what I've been saying the whole time!"

Negative: I'm the only one stressing about the number of entries for our tournament... it seems so small. I'm worried. (But to what end? I don't know.) So I entered everything into the computer today and I had like 8-10 judges that were standby for the whole day! I don't know what is going on. I e-mailed "the guru" so that I can have that conversation tomorrow.

Positive: I'm blogging (off and on) again. It's nice to start to get into the swing of things.


(This one might end up a bit more speech focused and... dare I say... cynical?)
Positive: After our tournament, we will have almost two weeks before the next tournament. Breathing room.

Negative: I'm in the doldrums of the season (both meteorologically and speech-wise), and it's affecting everything.

Positive: The coaches we have are amazing. Everyone has really pulled together and is doing such amazing things in getting ready for this. I know that they are probably feeling overworked... I wish that weren't how it was... but I definitely appreciate it. They all rock... especially my rockstar, Liesl!! Thank you so much for everything you do!

So there it is. Me in a nutshell (or in sandwich form... I guess...)

Planning for the multi-level class has been nice enough. I could do better... and i would like to implement another larger project (like the soccer project we did a couple years ago). It's beneficial when it's planned and scheduled... I would like to do and see more.

Formative assessment is going okay. When I do it, it gives me an amazing quick look at who is and isn't getting things and the notes are super beneficial for planning. I find myself thinking about it in all of my classes. It's kind of exciting!

Stress... Time to vent...

Like a pendulum swing, but without the timely notice, stressful days seem to swing in and out of my life in very grand fashion.

This afternoon became one of those grand stressful ones.

I was keeping things under control, had a few pots simmering in my mind, but my mental stovetop wasn't boiling over with too many pots. I had figured out the checks, I had written notes about tomorrow morning, I sat with Steve and took fastidious notes about the computer program, and I had set up (what I could of) my classes.
Then I began to help clean/sort out a bit of the speech closet... and Laura reminded me of so many things that I am now totally stressed. They were all important things and good things to collaborate about this weekend. However... now I'm stressed.
So now I'm thinking about those things and then I fear that I've forgotten about the things I had simmering prior. And all of that is stressing me out. Even (perhaps especially) the little things stress me out right now as I feel that my mind has surpassed that critical mass.

I'm going crazy.

Shawn is stressing out about his job, his resume, his income, and everything that follows along. So that's stressful, too. Ah well.

I've lost my train of thought... I need to go get supper made. And the house cleaned. And the guest bedroom prepared. Family is coming.

I'm Ba-ack!

Whew. It's surprising what a difference it makes when you spend four days of break in a different state... I have a feeling that this entire break is not going to feel like much of a break. I think I'll have two days that actually feel like break... one was yesterday. During that time, I spent much of my time realizing that perhaps break time can be bad for me, because my brain begins to stress about all of the things that should be completed and/or worked on. I'm stressing about speech, Master's, research, my classes and next semester.

So I'm going to create a new entry to deal with my class for next semester...
And start pulling together my plans for the 3/4/5 class.

As far as speech stress goes, I think it's just because this year it's unknown. It's unknown how we'll do and it's unknown how things are actually going because things aren't the same as before...