Classroom Pics

 Milk Crate Book Benches

 Reading Bulletin Board (Dr. Seuss quote)

 Expect to be accepted bulletin board

 View of the room from the door

Kidney table Promethean board & teachers' corner

Gettin' down to the nitty gritty!

Worked some more today in the classroom (with the teacher I'll be sharing with). We got some sorting and rearranging accomplished. I feel like we're getting down to the finer details now. I still have a few hours of work to do just sitting down and sorting through the piles of paperwork that have been left for me! DH and I made some adorable milk crate book storage benches last night and I sorted books by grade level and filled them up today. (I'll take pics and post next time along with my cute bulletin boards) I am hoping to take the weekend off and spend some quality time with the boys since school starts back Tuesday. I don't know if I'll be able to stay away for two whole days, but I'll try.
I actually can't wait to get started! I know it will be challenging but also tremendously rewarding!
Stay tuned as the real adventure begins!

Progress!

 BEFORE:

AFTER
I wish I had a true 'before' picture. As in: the way the previous teacher had it set up with the ugly blue carpet!
Well, after several days of working on the room, it is finally starting to feel like my own. I have a few more days to work on it so hopefully I will feel somewhat settled by the first day of school! The classroom is shared with another special ed teacher and we, along with our assistants, will be doing a lot of small group work so there are four areas set up all with a whiteboard available to use for small group activities. The way the room is divided, each teacher and assistant could be working with their own group and not cause too much disruption to the others. Ask me in a few weeks if this actually works or not! But I am not so set in my ways that I can't change it! :)
Anyway, I'm heading back up there now to work on bulletin boards. Wish me luck!

Move in day!

So...I will be moving all of my stuff back into my classroom today. Hopefully I'll be able to get it all rearranged the way I want it and start decorating and sorting through all the crap the previous teacher left behind. I am excited! It's odd though because when I graduated I thought I would be getting my classroom ready over the summer to begin teaching at the beginning of the year. Not that it matters really, but I also thought I would be a regular ed teacher with a self-contained or departmentalized class. But...everything works out for a reason so I am going to just go with it. When I first decided to get my degree in education, my inclination was to go into special ed, so I guess I just went around it an odd way to end up in the place I had initially intended to be. I think having had an exceptional child of my own gives me an advantage when interacting with my students' parents. I hope to be able to do all I can for each one of my students as well as address the concerns of their parents.
Anyway, it is going to be a long day, but hopefully by the end of it I'll have a sense of accomplishment and hopefully be at least a little more prepared for school to start back next week!

Ramblings of a first year teacher

So, besides getting a job in the middle of the school year, my classroom is getting a makeover over winter break. So instead of being able to work in my room the whole time, I have to wait until the flooring is finished and all the furniture is moved back in. There is an upside and a downside to this. Upside: I actually get to take a break over winter break. (and I get to set the room up how I want it.) Downside: I'm freaking out worrying about being settled in in time for school to start back.
The whole special-ed staff is new basically so I guess we're going to be learning the ropes together. I'm not sure how the evaluations will go since you're supposed to have 6 in a year. Will I have 3 since I'm only working half a year? If I have to have the full 6 still, someone will be evaluating me every other week!
There is so much to do and so little time to do it! I would really like to be able to go through everything in the room and get rid of stuff and rearrange, but under the current time crunch I'm facing I think I'll be doing good to get my stuff moved in and the room set up the way I want it. I guess I'll be spending time after school and on weekends wading through the rest of it.
That's all for now!

Preparations are underway!

Ok, a little about me to start off: I just graduated with my teaching degree this year (I am 34 years old), I live and work in the same little town I grew up in, I have been married for 9 years, my sons are 10 years apart, and my daughter who was profoundly disabled passed away at 2 years old (6 years ago)
I will be starting my first teaching job in January (in the middle of the school year) and hope to record my adventures (good and bad) via this blog.
My initial degree is in elementary ed and I was licensed to teach Kindergarten through 6th grade. Over the summer I added on my middle school endorsement which then licensed me through 8th grade. I then proceeded to add on the endorsement for special ed K-12 this fall.
I am very excited to have gotten a job at the school closest to my home and which my 5 year old attends pre-k. I am slightly nervous about teaching special ed especially being assigned the 7th and 8th graders. However, I am confident that I can do it and look forward to the challenges in store for me.
Not only are special ed and middle school challenging, but coming in in the middle of the school year adds its own new set of challenges.
I know I'm going to laugh and cry and be frustrated and rewarded throughout this experience, and hopefully I will entertain some of you and give myself an outlet for my frustrations along the way.