Month: July 2017

A reason to be compelled to complete a task. Sometimes I have it, sometimes I don’t. I wish I could buy it and take it like a pill. But even if that could happen, who’s to say I would do what specific task I was after?

When lesson plans are due, my motivation is that I want to know what I am doing that week, day or month, and I don’t want to get in trouble for not doing them! I don’t want to be in trouble, I want to do everything right.

Exercise. I want to be healthy and look good. I don’t know why but I don’t want to go to the gym. When we are done, I can’t understand why I didn’t want to go in the first place! I feel so much better when we are done! Maybe it’s just the time I get to spend talking with my good friend, Kathy. I like her. She motivates me and hopefully I motivate her too.

When I was younger, I remember having so much drive I could barely stop for a second. I held down three jobs, went to night school and still kept my head above water, no problem. Now, as I am growing older, my motivation is to be able to relax. Finish what I HAVE to do, then relax. Even when I lived in Hawaii, my down time was tearing up the town of Waikiki.

Clean the house. Organize the home office. This is what I am constantly searching for motivation to complete. Maybe I need to find a better reason than “it will be done and I won’t have to do it” or “it looks great and I can find everything!”

When I was a single mom, my motivation was my beautiful daughter Ashley. I wanted her to have everything and lack nothing. Now, she is a grown woman and I still have trouble letting her go. She has moved out and if it wasn’t for my mom downstairs, my nest would be completely empty!

Well, now that I have remembered everything I should be doing, I must close because for some silly reason, I feel motivated to clean up and organize this office!

Motivation. I need more. My tank is slowing leaking…

As with any definition, we can apply what parts we choose to define ourselves. I don’t consider myself a hoarder, although someone else might! I see my act of preserving something for future use is thinking ahead. After all, no one is tripping over boxes of files all over the floor, piled to the ceiling, right?

Summertime is usually the time I could be quoted as saying “I promise honey, I will put it all away!” “Right after we finish this movie, I promise!” Yet, the pile of worksheets, children’s books, and administrative papers still sits in it’s little corner of the home office. It seems I always have something more important to do, (like writing this blog!).

I am changing grades this year again, from second to third, AND I am most familiar with first grade after I taught it for 8 years! I am expected to teach with “differentiated instruction” which means many different levels of difficulty for the same objective, for each lesson. So, in essence, I should keep all that super helpful paper for it’s intended use, right? The problem is actually getting it filed under the correct heading so I can find it if I actually use it in my classroom this year. Do any of my teacher friends do the same thing? Most of my teacher friends are over achievers and have probably already done this task because they always seem to have something I would like to borrow! I must be on the lower end of that differentiated instruction scale because even though I know I have it “somewhere” I can’t readily find it when that lesson is coming up (unless I go through that pile sitting in the corner of the home office…)

Cheers to all my over achieving friends who have completed this task and please send me motivational thoughts so I can join you!

Ahhhh, the dog days of summer. Time to relax. Time to break away from the hustle and bustle of the daily life of a busy classroom. It is well enjoyed but I actually get bored quickly! I find myself wondering what my kids are doing and wishing I could take them to the beach with me! I’ll never forget Peanut when I took her… “Miss Joyce, how did you make this pool so big?!” She was referring to the ocean, like I made it myself! I always had a little pool on our front porch of our row home in Northeast Philadelphia that we all played in.

Try to imagine babysitting 25 eight year olds, then showing them how to love reading, writing and math, enough so they want to try it all on their own. That, is my philosophy on teaching. In a nutshell. Oh yeah, now imagine someone watching you and taking notes on what you’re doing wrong, or how to improve.

It is hard, since every child has already formed their own impression of it all. If they can’t do it and get frustrated, they hate it and don’t feel like failing again. It’s my job to get around that and find the one thing that they can do and take it from there. That is what I do. It’s my passion, it’s my job. That is the one reason I keep going. I need to find that switch in each little human in the making.

What people don’t understand about teaching is the mental anguish. It’s literally like you are on stage, being watched, so you better get it right! How about that one kid that just doesn’t want to hear you, he/she doesn’t like you because you are always telling them what to do! Jeez! Can’t she just leave me alone? I have to work past that and keep searching for that switch… where is it? I know I saw it somewhere… While you are still trying to keep their interest on what point and standard you are trying to communicate!

Anyway, just missing my kids. I’ll make centers or read a book to share with them, or maybe even do some lesson plans for the first week of school.

Thank you to my wonderful husband who gave me this idea today, who puts up with my ups and downs…

 

My husband says I over analyze everything. I think of it as planning, or being well prepared. This can be a blessing, (as my principals and administrators think) but my family or people close to me may consider it a curse.

It’s definitely a blessing in my profession as a teacher. All I do is plan! Lesson plan, center plan, schedule plan, floor plan, behavior plan, homework plan, driving plan… My mind is swimming right now with the planning I’d like to get started on NOW for September!

In my personal/family life, it’s mostly a curse! What if the hotel didn’t get my reservation? What if my credit card doesn’t go thru? What if something happens to my elderly mother? What if my daughter messes up? What if something happens to my stepdaughter? What if my husband gets laid off? What if the renters don’t pay the rent? Questions are definitely a curse in my mind, especially late at night.

The trick to feeling peace (well, to me anyway) is to imagine what to do if my plans don’t turn out the way I planned it. What would I do if the credit card didn’t go through? (I’d use another one, or I’d cancel the trip! Make a staycation instead).  If it happens, it happens. I am sure I will figure out what to do. I think this is the way we build character. But just getting there, to that point seems to be the issue. I need to practice letting worry go! So many adages come to mind… Help me change what I can, forget what I can’t change, and try my best. My only hope is other people know what I am talking about. I am going to try better to make sure this planning thing is a blessing and not a curse! I am sure I will have a better summer if I do!

God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.                                                           – Reinhold Niebuhr (1892-1971)

Okay, I am just starting! I am going to have to start somewhere, so here it goes. I’ve always dreamed of being a writer, so I better start!

I was born to be a teacher. I love being a teacher, even through the tough times of overwhelming stress. I love the management of a classroom, hopefully, I do it well. I am also a perfectionist so I always think I should have done better, but that’s a good thing, right? I am always trying to do a better job without feeling defeated.

Follow me through the back part of my teaching career (retirement is actually in sight!) and the beginning of a blogging/writing career. I hope I don’t let you down. I’ve been told I am quite a humorous person and like to think of myself as a joyful person, so I am hoping to include funny stories to keep my readers interested and keep my pieces light hearted!

Fingers crossed…