The Last Quarter

In a soccer game, the last quarter is when you should feel the most exhausted. It's when you smell victory, or falsely hope for it still. It's when you've given up trying and just play on auto-pilot. It's the time when you nearly always expect the ref's whistle to blow to end the game and you push yourself to finish well. It's the last chance to score, the last chance to get injured, the last chance to push an opponent whose been driving you insane.

Today was the last day of the third quarter of our school year. Which means on Monday morning, I will beginning the first day of my last quarter as a third grade teacher. The last chance for lessons, concepts, relationships, funny memories, small triumphs, and even frustrating moments. Monday morning, I will have 18 kids in my classroom at certain points throughout the day--which is a significant leap from the 12 I had today. This struck me as the students were being dismissed.

So, with 40 minutes to spare, I started rearranging my classroom. Furniture was moved out, or pushed to a new place, materials scattered or situated in some other location....I made a disaster. Since Adam was staying after school for a middle school game night, I decided to stay as well. We left school at 8pm, and I hadn't touched the grading that needed to be done nor the file cabinet that I desperately need to organize. Somehow, I spent 4.5 hours in my classroom without students and managed to be productive--yet not productive enough. That's a frustrating feeling.

I'm feeling stressed about my new set-up, about new students, and about the week that I planned out. It is intense. Five writing projects, a science test, a math test, spelling and "book" tests, 4 social studies lessons, all the other usual subjects, even a movie mixed in there....bla. It's going to hurt! But then again, this IS the last quarter.

Pictures to follow tomorrow...