I really want to focus on that last point in this post, hopefully I can also post pictures of our D.C. trip at some point in the near future. As for the race, I couldn't run it, I had to walk it because my knees are still bothering me...
So I got a job teaching Spanish III and IV at a private school. As many of you know I wasn't planning on applying for teaching jobs. It's amazing how things can change and how quickly those things can change. Someone I know also works there and when one of their Spanish teachers resigned in July so came to me to ask me to apply, but I didn't want to. So she came to me again to ask me to apply. The more I got thinking about it the more encouraged I was to apply. Here are two reasons of my I decided to apply after all:
- The school is a much smaller school than where I student taught. I think I felt lost there because I come from an extremely small school background (in fact both schools I attended growing up were K-12 and both have been consolidated with other schools, due to how small they were, after I was there). My schools always had 100-200 students in the entire K-12 facility and I student taught in a school that has more like 1400 students in the high school alone... The school I am currently teaching at is a K-12 building (though much larger than any that I attended growing up) with less than 1000 students in the entire building. Still many times the size I ever attended, but not nearly so large either!
- I also applied because I knew there would be another Spanish teacher there. I wouldn't be left on my own at the school trying to figure out all 4 levels of Spanish out by myself. I teach levels III and IV and our Spanish I and II teacher actually used to teach III and IV and she seems to be a wonderful teacher. I am excited to be able to work with her!
Yes, there were other reasons I decided to apply, but here are two of the bigger ones. Needless to say I applied and then got the job (exactly 3 weeks before kids would start school). About a week after getting the job we left for D.C for a week and a half, then I came home and went straight into teacher in-service (that was almost 2 weeks ago now).
The first two weeks there have been extremely busy, but good. Now we all could have appreciated having air conditioning several of those days, but we all made it through that. Just pray for cooler weather so I don't feel like I'm melting! :-) The kids overall seem to be responding well to me and I do enjoy my students. You probably won't find me writing in too much detail about my job here, but I wanted to at least let you know I have it and that I am enjoying it. Though it is definitely not what I saw myself doing at this point, it is proving to be a good adventure (as all of life is an adventure).
Pray for me that I can teach these high school students to the best of my ability with keeping their needs in mind!