Teacher Space

            In my classroom, there is a very strict rule - no one is allowed in the teacher space without expressed permission. That space runs from my podium, includes the space in front of my tv, and extends behind my desk. It is my space and I can't be tripping over students between classes in this very small narrow space. Plus there is absolutely no reason why they should be in this area.

            Also, I am a firm believer that if you are well-prepared and functionally organized then everything will go smoother for the entire year. It was just this week that I had a student step into my space and it wrecked havoc!! The student tripped over a wire and caught themselves on my desk making a mess of the papers that were sitting there, and in the process of tripping over the wire, knocked the attached  iPad off my podium. Praise the Lord, another student caught the iPad. But it was a great chance to remind the students as to why I had set that rule in the first place.

So this is my space and I love it. It's neat and organized. Everything has a spot and isn't a difficult to put anything in the correct spot or locate it within a moment's notice. 

Dry erase board - a really standard dry erase board from Target. I use it to post each class's homework assignments. I have five different classes and use the sixth square to highlight upcoming events or birthdays. 

Dividers - made from washi tape that I put on leftover poster paper and attached magnet dots so that I could remove or adjust the dividers as needed. 

Arrow Magnets - also from Target. 

(Story: There used to be a world map poster where the dry erase board is now, but for various reasons I had to move my other homework board and the only place I could move it to was the location of either my world or US map.)

Binders - I made all of the binder covers and sides myself, except the small Substitute Binder - a pinterest find. In each binder, I store copies of my unit plans, handouts, test and quiz keys for my most recent and upcoming lessons. The current lessons are stored in my "Master Teacher Binder" and every Friday, I just quickly swap out the binder contents. It takes me a total of ten minutes. Having the binders available has been great in case a student has a question from a previous unit or for myself as I work ahead. It's very handy. Also each binder has a file folder where I store the upcoming handouts for that class.

Storage - The stacking desk organizer, the blue drawer organizer, and the utility thing on the right are all from the Container Store. I spent a good portion of my school money this year at the Container Store. Like I said, get organized now and the rest of the year will be a piece of cake! The blue organizer has a pop-up top where I keep an extra USB cord for my iPad, a wall charger, and my AV adapter (lightning to HDMI). It has been so handy!! The stackers hold extra laminated world maps for use when needed, page protectors bound together with those rings, and file folders with documents I use regularly but not necessarily during class time.

The Flower - Is actually a tape dispenser. Every time I look at it, it makes me super-happy! It was one of those splurge items that I had to have to add some personality to my room even though I hit my budget a few weeks earlier. The boys never ask for tape for some reason though...

My Desk -  (not pictured here) Is about 2/3 of the size of my desk last year, so I decided that I wouldn't put anything on it that wasn't absolutely necessary. So usually it holds my Master Teacher Binder, a textbook or two to grade homework, and depending on what's going on that hour - my laptop. Oh, and a stapler. The students are not allowed to use my stapler.

And yes... the little label on my filing cabinet drives me crazy! That is administration issued and may not be removed or replaced. I labeled everything so people clearly know that it is mine and if it disappears, their conscience will force them to return it out of pure guilt. But no one is stealing my filing cabinet. So why is it crooked???

Fleeting Summer Memories

Over the next few days, summer is going to officially pass us by. While that means the leaves will soon be exploding with color and the air will be brisk and refreshing with hints of Thanksgiving and Christmas right around the corner, it also means that the glorious adventures of summer are over. But before they go...

Here are a few of my favorite summer memories.

(Replica of Hammurabi's Code 

at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology, 

Philadelphia, PA)

(Fonthill Castle in Doylestown, PA)

(Eastern State Penitentiary, Philadelphia, PA) 

(Niagara Falls, Canada) 

(Lake Erie, Pennsylvania)

High School History Classroom

Monday morning begins the fourth week of school! One month in! As a first year full-time teacher, it is refreshing to have made it this far. I mean, survived it this far. I am alive! In desperate need of some sleep and a time to rest my brain from school. 

For real though, the school year is going well. Lots of prayer and hard work are paying off, but I very much look forward to making it through this first year.

Before school started I totally forgot to take pictures of my classroom with something other than my phone. The pictures looked nice on a 4" screen, but not so much when I uploaded them to my laptop. 

Well, here is my high school history classroom. My goal is to make the room bright, colorful and fun with a subtle patriotic theme. But I didn't want the room to look tacky, overdone, or elementary. 

I knew I accomplished that when one of my students came up to me this past week to tell me how much she loves coming into my room. She said that it is exciting and colorful like an elementary classroom, but "grown up" and very educational. That part made me smile. It also made me very happy, because that is exactly what I was going for. If it inspired just one student, it was all worth it.  

The front of the room. I really wanted my students to focus on the fact that everything we do should be to the glory of God. I am really trying to put an emphasis on that each in my classes.

Although I don't teach my school's government class, I really wanted the students to be familiar with our government officials. So many times we hear about these people in the news and have absolutely no idea who they are or what they do. And... Sometimes there can be a lot of negativity in Christian circles regarding our government and it is my personal mission to change that with my students. Every Tuesday we are going to pray for these very important men and women. 

Continuing to move counter-clockwise... This is my door. I wasn't feeling as inspired as I should have with this door, but that is what I came up with. The hallways in my school are very narrow so the doors get pretty beat up as kids squeeze through with their book bags and two best friends. Basically, if you put something on the door, just know that it won't make it all year. Maybe that is why all of the high school doors have limited decorations?

My back wall. Not the most visually exciting, except for the flag, but I don't want the students staring at the back wall during class anyway. The goal was to trigger thoughts about our country and inspire patriotism every time a student walks into my room. I am still building up my collection of decor and for now those posters seemed to be the best. I would have preferred to leave the flag by itself except that it looked super lonely. 

This "Map Skills" bulletin board is one of the only bulletin board sets that I own. It worked really well with the first unit of my geography class, but it will need replaced soon as we just took our first test over the map skills unit. 

Last year I decorated my classroom/office in all owls. I had one class in there, so I just did whatever I wanted with it. Well, now the kids know me for my owls and they really are an obsession of mine, so this room just had to have a few owls in it. Maybe later in the year, I will get desperate enough to reuse the owls again so soon. 

The final corner of my room is my desk area and filing cabinets. I will save those pictures for another day. 

Disappointment

I don't even know where to start.

The last two/three years have been loaded with disappointment... crushed dreams... unmet expectations.

It's been a rough road.

And the worst part is - just when I think God is opening a door and I get a peak at what's ahead, the door completely slams in my face. I simply don't understand.

Let me give you an example. My husband and I are surrendered to be in full-time ministry. Since we were both thirteen years old, we have both believed that is what God wants for our lives. He has guided us in that direction. But our first youth ministry simply didn't work out. God clearly led us there, but He also clearly led us away. The work ethic, the dedication to ministry, and the Biblical doctrine seemed to be on a different page. But that was ok, because God was going to lead and guide us through.

So we moved and settled into being very much not-needed youth workers. That was really, really tough. I fought tears almost every single Sunday for six months. But I was co-teacher/assistant teacher to a sweet friend who got pregnant early in the youth group year (we follow the school schedule of September to May), so I had lots of opportunities to teach class.

Now we are preparing for this year and as much as I hoped that I would be wanted as a Sunday school teacher, I didn't have any expectation that I would be a teacher. It's not like teaching is a passion of mine or anything... but I know, I am very much not-needed. So I could handle it. Until I got this email saying something to the effect of "If you get the next email about the SS schedule, you are teaching this year."

And I got the email!! I will be honest. I was super-excited! I really hadn't been expected it. I had come to terms with not teaching again. Then I got to look through the awesome new curriculum and started making plans for things that I hadn't even thought of for over a year.

Then we went to the annual planning meeting and I found out that it was all lies. The email I received about "If you get the next email, you are teaching this year" was mis-worded. It was meant to be translated more along of the lines of "Yay! You are on youth staff." I don't know how what was said was supposed to translate to that, but whatever...

Can I just tell you that I suffered through a two and a half hour meeting and didn't shed a tear until I made it to the car? I felt that took a lot of strength!

Disappointment. I am no stranger to it.

So here is the question of the day... How do you deal with it?

Step #1: Cry it out. Cry until you cannot cry. Take it from me - strength is not a virtue. Being real with your emotions and not forcing them down into a hole in your heart is a necessary part of dealing with disappointment. Once you are done crying, do something or go somewhere or look at something that  makes you smile.

For me, that post-cry happiness is a trip to Charming Charlie or Home Goods, a quick shower and a nap, or a scroll through my "Pretty" board on Pinterest (loaded with bright flowers, beautiful scenes, and feminine things).

Once you calm down... relax... move your focus off of the disappointment... then you are ready to move on to Step #2.

Step #2: Remember that God is in control of absolutely everything. I don't say that to sound cliche. I mean it. God is in control of everything. He designed the universe and spoke it into existence. He named and knows the name of the stars. He cares about the disappointments and the trials, the joys and the happiness of my life, just like he cares about a sparrow that falls out a tree and a stunning lily in the middle of an isolated field. (I take that to mean, He has a great capacity for love and is concerned for the smallest, seemingly unimportant details.) If He cares for the tiniest details, He really cares for the things that cause my heart to ache and turn me into a soggy mess.

Step #3: Remember the big picture. You and I do not know the future. We cannot actually see the big picture - as hard as we try. It is 100% possible. In fact, 100% fact that God is at work and this huge disappointment, whatever it may be, is God doing something great that we absolutely cannot see right now.

Example: I graduated from college four years ago and desperately wanted a full-time teaching job right out of college. What I got was a job teaching two classes and helping in the administration. There have been a ton of disappointments with that, but also a lot of joys. I built a really strong relationship with my direct supervisor and even though she has since moved far away, she is a great mentor, a spiritual encourager, and a close friend. Also I had a chance to work through some of the difficulties that first year teachers experience rapidly in the first weeks of school and have to cope with quickly. I on the other had a chance to sit back and digest and fix those problems. Now that I have my own full-time classroom, I have already worked through most of those first year teacher mistakes. Yes, I am still making mistakes and have lots of room to grow, but God knew that I was going to need to really kill it right out of the gate this year and He gave me that chance to practice over the last three years. Also I was able to build a relationship with the students and the staff that few others can say they experience, and I was able to get my choice of classes. That was God working through major disappointment in my life four years ago. Let me say that again... It took FOUR YEARS for me to see the bigger picture.

Every step of the way, God knew.

God knows. Disappointment - it's a nasty thing, but don't let it get you down for too long!


PS (#1) - Like I said, I am no stranger to disappointment. So if you are thinking my examples are nothing compared to what you are going through, please know that these are just the examples I felt comfortable sharing with the world. You pick an area of possible disappointment and I think it is safe to say, been there, done that, still struggling through that one.

PS (#2) - Remember that dealing with disappointment today, doesn't mean that you won't have to deal with it tomorrow. It's surrender. And surrender is a daily commitment to God. Remember... Everyday surrender.

Fall Has Arrived

This weekend I really wanted to get you up to date on all that is going on with school and my very own super-cute classroom, but I realized I never took final pictures of my room. And blogs get really boring without at least one great picture.

But my day off was not wasted. I decorated for fall. If I didn't do it now before fall actually arrives, I will not get it done until Thanksgiving. Plus the turquoise, pale pink, and sunny yellows didn't feel like the end of summer, beginning of school anymore.

Well, my 750 sq. foot apartment is more function than decoration out of necessity. We have been living in this one bedroom for about a year and it is spacious for two. There is a lot of leg room, but there is a distinct lack of great wall space. Some of that is I refuse to spend money on larger pieces for an apartment that I didn't want to stay in for a second year. Some of that is I have some great wall art that I bought for a large spacious loft condo that we had, and it simply doesn't work. I don't have fourteen feet of wall to work with anymore. But I do have a decent fireplace and mantel. It is the focal point of the entire living space of the apartment.

The bike canvas print is my absolute favorite piece. It has great colors and blends well with all seasons, so it stays up year round. I found it for $25 at a Marshalls two years ago. 

The the gold glittery wheat with the cute ribbon were also found at a Marshalls (last year though). I know that it is a huge designer no-no to have such noticeably different heights on display, but the wall is actually angled back so the taller arrangements aren't awkward. It actually kinda works. 

Everything else is from a hodgepodge of affordable or discount stores like Kirklands, Hobby Lobby, Target, and Home Goods. Every item ran $15 or less and I repurpose a lot of those items throughout the rest of the year. 

So now at least one portion of my home looks like fall! 

Here are a few of my other favorite fall things:

This candle is the best Yankee Candle ever!! It is my favorite and super-hard to track down. I usually find it at Home Goods of all places. It's limited edition and only comes out every couple of years. When I first found this candle, I literally burned through the medium candle in a month. But the flavor had totally disappeared. My sweet husband tracked down two jars for me from Amazon and surprised me with them for our first anniversary. (How sweet is that!) 

This white ceramic owl was another Home Goods find - from this year. He is hanging out in my kitchen right now, because he doesn't match or fit on the mantle. The little dude who says "Enjoy Fall" was a Hallmark store clearance find. I am not a major clutter person and this guy falls under the "clutter" category, but he does remind me to smile, so I figured he is a necessity.

So that is what fall looks like in my apartment.