How Did I Survive Summer School?

HA. Well that's a good question. Your guess is as good as mine.

Walking into my classroom the first time this summer I thought two things: oh my gosh it's hot, and this isn't so bad. Well I was in for it. My first day of actual teaching was a whirlwind. I arrived 30 minutes too early and couldn't figure out how to open my door. Within 10 minutes of the kids arriving I had one student in tears because he thought he was going to be in fourth grade and another two arguing over the computer. Luckily my aide was super helpful and pretty much took over the class the first day so I could see what it was all about.

I was in shock. I felt so overwhelmed and clueless. My first day of summer school was so bad I allowed myself to eat a Wendy's kids meal and an ice cream sundae while watching The Bachelorette. After a few more days I found my grounds until a kid smacked another kid in the head, then continued to smack his head into the computer. Chaos was an understatement.

At times our classroom reached 98 degrees. No not the boy band, but Fahrenheit degrees. There were days where I said, "Friends, it's hot, we're all cranky. I'm going to pass out ice cubes and we're going to watch a movie." What else was I going to do? Granted I did accomplish academic work before letting them watch the movie. I sought advice from my principal, my aide, other classroom teachers in the building, my teacher friends, my former undergrad professor, and teacher's that were on maternity leave at the school. One of the reasons I love the education field is the sense of community teachers build around each other :)

There were many times where I didn't know what to do so I'd burst into my neighbor's classroom to seek advice. Those are the people I owe a round of Starbucks to. But really. During this summer I was working upwards of 65 hours a week between this teaching gig, my hostess job, and my babysitting job. I'm yawning just thinking about my overwhelming summer as I type this post!

Almost every day I'd print out a new article to bring home as evening reading material. I hoped I'd find the absolute answers to all my questions and issues I was facing. Naturally they were extremely helpful but didn't include the end-all-be-all answers I was looking for. 

My first summer school experience was filled with popsicles, class on the grass, playground visits, iced coffee, and breaks in the air-conditioned teacher's lounge. I also had the help of my teaching angels, Stephanie and Kelly of Double Dose of Learning, but I'll explain that another time :) 

By the end of summer I was realizing I was going to miss some of my kiddos. Lucky for me I have three of them for the school year in fourth grade!