A Day in the Life of a Teacher and Mom

I’m a nosy person.  But not about things that matter.  I just really like seeing how people’s days go.  What they do, where they go, what they wear, what they eat, who they meet, what they cook, what they watch…

I’m starting to sound a little stalkerish, actually.  Let’s move on.

Today, I thought I’d bring you along on my daily routine, as boring as it is.  I tried to take pictures at times throughout the day when I’m doing mundane, normal things that aren’t usually picture worthy (though, honestly, in this age of Instagram, everything seems picture worthy sometimes…).  So, here we go…

Every morning, I have to set up my common board in my classroom. It’s what tells students and anyone else who might pop in what I’m teaching that day. It’s called a common board because schools generally have one common board configuration that all their teachers are required to post. This is mine.

I had a meeting this morning before school, so other than my common board, I didn’t really get much done. When I got back to my classroom, it was almost time for students to come in, so I popped my presentation up on the board and opened my door to greet my first period class. I gave a quiz today at the beginning of each class period, so I gave them a few minutes to look over our review before we started. Should have given them longer. Scores were awful.

Because I gave this quiz on paper instead of on the laptops, I had to grade it by hand. So, throughout the day, I kept a stack of quizzes on my desk for me to grade whenever I found any downtime.

I have a planning period after 2nd period, and all my pencils were already gone. Thieves! The end of the year is brutal for teacher supplies, let me tell you! So, I marked a few with tape before continuing to grade quizzes.

I also spent some time on my planning period looking ahead at the LAST MONTH OF SCHOOL! Yay! I was so excited to flip my planning calendar over to the last month! How exciting! As you can see, my advanced students are reading “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” Shakespeare always seems like a good idea at the end of the year when I am burned out and the students are bouncing off the effing walls, right???? *eye roll* Shoot me next year if I decide to do this again…

After planning, I teach one more class period before I have 20 minutes for lunch. I have about 10 girls who eat lunch in my room together. They used to eat outside in our courtyard, but since the Stoneman Douglas school shooting, our school won’t let them eat outside anymore. They are really sweet girls, so when they asked if they could eat in my room instead, I agreed. It’s kind of a pain because I lose my lunch break peace and quiet, but it’s not terrible. I put in my headphones and listen to music while I eat and do whatever I have to be doing. It drowns them out and gives them some privacy, too. Not too terrible.

By early afternoon, student laptops begin to lose their battery power and my room becomes a landmine of cords everywhere! This is just one little area that I could get a stealthy picture of, but cords like this are across my entire room. Classrooms today definitely look different than when I was growing up!

Also in the late afternoon, I have my regular classes. I teach advanced kids in the morning and regular and low-level kids in the afternoons. I wish it were flipped because those lower level kids need the most from me and, honestly, I’m drained by the time they get into my room. I wish I had them earlier in the day when I was fresher, but it is what it is. My regular kids are reading “A Wrinkle in Time” right now. I snacked on a snack while we read in 6th period today.

After 7th period, my day is done. The school day ends at 3:50, and I usually head out by 4:30 because my own kids have activities and things to do. Before I leave for the day, I clean and straighten my classroom and desk. I can’t stand coming in the next morning to a messy classroom. And even before I was a teacher, I couldn’t handle walking in to a messy desk in the mornings when I had an office job, either. I spend about 10 minutes organizing from the day and putting my room and desk area back together before I lock up and head out.

On Tuesdays, the kids have tennis, so I went by and picked them up from aftercare. Normally, I leave them there while I run any errands I need to do or take care of anything at home. Living so close to where I work means I can pop home right after school and do a quick load of laundry, prep dinner, or work on ClassMax for an hour or two before I have to go pick up my kids. I love that! In fact, the kids get kind of irritated when I pick them up too early! Today, though, we had to get going because of tennis, so I got them by 4:15.

Once I had them, we headed home to change into tennis clothes and grab the kids water bottles and tennis racquets. And, of course, there was the complaining by Gracie about having to change into tennis clothes. She hates doing it because she doesn’t like having to take her shoes off to get on her little tennis skirts. #firstworldproblems

After tennis lessons, we went home and the kids jumped right in the pool. It was so hot at tennis and the pool was cool and clean!

While they swam, I was just about to start dinner, but I got a text from Chris that he was running late and I figured that was as good of an excuse as I was going to get to put off cooking. Anyone else really hate cooking? Ugh. It’s my least favorite responsibility. So, instead of starting dinner, I started a load of laundry and folded my one from this morning. I’m trying to get back in the saddle with doing a load of laundry a day. It is SO HARD to start that cycle! You have to get yourself synced up and your rotation going before it is any help at all. I’m on day three of getting back in the groove and just now it is becoming manageable. Thank goodness because laundry is my least favorite responsibility.

Basically, I hate all responsibility.

I had also been meaning to clean up the counter in my bathroom for, like, a week now. I have so much jewelry (check out this post for information about my jewelry party tomorrow night at 8pm! You’re invited!) and it was taking over our bathroom. So, I spent half an hour this afternoon getting it all put away.

By the time I finished with that, Chris still wasn’t home and the kids had just gotten out of their showers after the pool. Somehow, we all ended up in the hammock together just hanging around. Gracie read to us from her new book (“Mr. Popper’s Penguins”) and Bean had me time him on his Rubick’s cube (did I tell you he can solve that now? He’s getting fast, too!. We laid out there for a while until Chris got home from work.

When he got home, I made tacos for dinner. Everyone’s favorite at my house. Even Gus. (Please don’t judge the hamster on the kitchen table… He ate our leftover lettuce and I promise I cleaned the table with cleaner afterwards!)

After dinner, Chris took the kids upstairs to get them all tucked in. We try to have them in bed by 8ish and they can stay up and read as long as they want. Gracie usually only lasts about five minutes before she turns her light out, but Bean stays up until about 9:00 reading before he turns his light off. While Chris tucked them in, I came downstairs to write this blog post. After this, I have a few ClassMax emails to answer and then I’m going to curl up on the couch with Chris and finish watching the NHL hockey playoffs.

Usually, Chris and I head to bed around 11:00. And we’re up at 7:30 in the morning to do it all again!

Thanks for spending my day with me!