A Day In My Life

Someone asked me earlier this week what I do all day since teaching just means I hang out with kids all day. I thought I would enlighten the world with what a teacher really does. So here is a day in my life...


6:30 I awake to my cell phone buzzing...aka welcoming a new day.
I'm out the door by 7:30.
7:45 I greet the janitor at my school with a smile and most days ask for some sort of favor: more chairs for my classroom, the key to the supply closet, to fix something that broke... you get the idea.
For the next 7 1/2 hours I do not rest. I am not exaggerating! I am photocopying papers for lessons, grading papers, passing things out, emailing/calling parents, teaching, talking to students, stopping arguments, investigating something that happened, monitoring student progress, dealing with parents and oh sooo much more.
At 9 the 1st bell rings and the madness begins. We do morning work, class meeting, spelling sorts, reading groups, fluency, word work, writing lessons, journal writing, grammar review, and read aloud all before 11:25.
At exactly 11:25 we head to lunch. Where before I can eat I make sure every student had gotten their lunch and is ok. Then I rush off the the teacher's lounge (which isn't really a lounge as much as a few chairs and tables where I scarf down food.)
The conversation at lunch typically consists of discussing what we are teaching, funny things kids say, BYU Football, the one student or parent who is driving you crazy, and whatever reality TV is going on (at the moment its The Biggest Loser.)
After about 20 mins. I exit to once again run around like a chicken with my head cut off preparing for the afternoon (photocopying, getting out math manipulatives, checking my email, replying to parents, etc.)
At exactly noon the hallway fills with the sound of pounding hooves, war cries, groans, and "Teacher, Teacher..." as 30 fifth graders pour through the classroom door. They grab their math book, spiral, journal, and pencil and we do math until 12:50 at which time they grab their 1 minute timed test along with an daily out of 100 paper. Both of which have to be completed before the go to recess at 1.
My recess is not really a recess. Every other week I supervise outside. On my off weeks I spend the time helping students find that paper their desk ate so they don't get a zero, or watching students in recess detention.
1:15 after a quick drink/bathroom break we do one of two things either "mix it up" with the 5th grade classes and reteach/enrich on a topic or do social studies.
1:45 My entire class rotates to a different 5th grade teacher who teaches a specific subject. Mine is US Government. On Mondays my class learns the recorder. Tuesday they do DARE with Officer Adams followed by government with me. Wednesdays they do reading lessons. Thursday are Health class, while Friday is Singing Time with the entire 5th grade.
From 2:15 to 2:30 we do announcements, read a poem, practice state capitals, and go over homework.
At 2:30 my students go to specialty classes so I have prep time. Mondays are art, Tuesday Library, Wednesday is early out day for teacher collaboration, Thursday is computers, and Friday is PE.
3:10 We pack up and clean up the room.
As one of my students put so poetically during writing last week (our writer's tool was personification) "The school up chucks students at exactly 3:15."
I then hang around til around 4:30 or 5 grading papers, cleaning the room, going to meetings, and preparing for the next day.
I then go home exhausted but my day is not done. NO NO I try to be social, go for a quick jog, play on my flag football team, read about 200 pages a night in reading group books for the next day, plan/research a trip I want to take, do my church calling, and continue to grade papers. If I'm lucky I also get to watch a little TV before falling into a blissful slumber around midnight that is too short and rudely interrupted the next morning to do it all over again.