Three's a charm

Okey dokey, here I am again for the third day in a row. Woot woot!

I slept again until after two p.m. and then napped again after that. I'm not bothered by that but I could see where some other people would think I am being rather slothful. This is what I get for not taking my Provigil for two days. The fatigue and sleepiness just overtake me and I am out like a light. Even at night I am so tired that I don't make it to where I can turn out the light and put my CPAP mask on before I literally pass out into sleep. I wake up an hour or two later to use the bathroom and find myself zonked out once more with the lights on. It happens every night now...

School is over and I am glad for the break. I need to get myself prepared for a new year in a new grade. Some of you know the story already but some of you do not.

In the simplest version I have been teaching fifth-grade for the past several years. We were not departmentalized and our principal was considering a switch so we would be. There were five teachers at the grade level, with one retiring and one having to leave the grade level to work in another building due to circumstances beyond her control. That left three of us.

We all emailed our boss the subject we preferred to teach in the event of departmentalization. He said the three of us all wanted something different so that wasn't a problem. The original five of us were against departmentalizing and we had explained our reasons. Our boss said he would tell us his decision by the end of the next week.

We were somewhat certain that he would departmentalize us but I had a special surprise coming my way. Thankfully, one of my friends had gotten wind of a rumor that one of the remaining three would be leaving the grade level and she passed that on only to me. So it was not much of a surprise when my boss told me that I was being moved to another grade right before the meeting on departmentalization. I was hurt by being moved and hurt by the fact that I was told about the switch in my room only one minute before the meeting.

We don't always get what we want though. So now I am a sixth-grade teacher who will be departmentalized and teaching a combination of ELA and Math enrichment. I am getting a huge air-conditioned room for the majority of the next year, while my area is under construction. I also get to create my own curriculum that uses skills that reinforce what is being taught in Math and ELA.

It isn't all bad and change is good but I am sad in some ways and mourning the loss of being a fifth-grade teacher with a great team.