Dear Jonas {Weekly Blog}

Dear Jonas,

As you rapidly conquered Pennsylvania this past week, you gave me sore muscles, cabin fever, and had me eat a lot of PB&J sandwiches. Even though I was not thrilled about any of this, you gave me the chance to get ahead in work, think through activities, create materials, and catch up on sleep. Little did you know that you would cancel school for two days, followed by 2 days of 2-hour delays. As great as that sounds reading, remember I am the teacher now and not the student, and it is not all that great.

Let me tell you what was great about your passing. First, winter feels like it is really here now. Second, I was able to get ahead so I was not at school until 9pm all week. With 2-hour delays, the day goes by so quickly you can't believe you were even in school. 2-hour delays were also great because I did not lose a day off later in the semester.

Now lets discuss the inconveniences of your passing. I lost two days off later in the semester I was looking forward too. My students were more wired because of the extra rest. I had great lessons plan, but did not get to teach them at all or had to shorten them. I was not able to have club meetings or flex time to work with students. I still cannot get the bell schedule down because I had two bell schedules to look off of this week.

Even through all of this Jonas, I should thank you. You provided multiple learning opportunities for me this week. One of the biggest lessons I learned was to not rush through lessons just to make them fit the timeframe of the day or week. There will be days given back to accomplish what I had planned. If I know the students are coming off a long weekend or a snow day, be ready for energy and channel that into something productive. That is when that word adaptability fits into student teaching. Thanks to you Jonas, next week I am going to adjust better to my lessons to meet the needs of the students of that class on each day. Parallel with this, I am going to stop myself with 3-4 minutes left and remind students of the assignments coming up and to complete the ticket out.

Jonas, thanks for letting me be apart of history, but next time lets keep it under 10 inches.

Sincerely,
Ms. Andrews