Year #4 and another long hiatus

As per usual, the time seems to disappear without notice. In a mere two days, October will be over. Just last week it was summer, but yesterday we got our first taste of the cool north wind funneling down from the hinterlands of Siberia. And somehow, barely after being able to remember the names of my new students, I'm hopping on a plane for my first holiday of the year.

My new job as Department Head has been, well, full. I'm the head of English 11, which has about 12 teachers between Intro to Lit and English 11 classes. I've got a full load of English courses myself that are keeping me plenty busy, and since we've already sent home our first round of report cards, the month of September was anything but quiet. Multiple meetings per week with my department, the admin, and our new English coordinator... regular and ongoing emails with department colleagues, coordinating teaching strategies with the other grade levels, and trying to keep up on my marking/planning. It's hard for me to believe that in just my fourth year here, I'm considered one of the "olds"... full of wisdom, knowledge and guidance. What is the school/world coming to?? 

My new assignment also brought me a change of venue over to the Girls' Campus. This has been a weird but fun adjustment. I find myself much more calm in the classroom and the constant spitting in the hallways and lack of interest in the classroom aren't nearly as evident. Whether it's because of the DH job or that my classes (including my homeroom) are all taught in the same classroom and I don't have to share with anyone else, I'm not exactly sure what the reason is, but I know that things feel much better this year. I even have a couple of my old middle school students from 3 years ago in my English class. My decorating talents pale in comparison to my Zhou Enlai homeroom (top students in the grade), but the girls just take care of everything and make it awesome. The girls can be loud and boisterous and they like to laugh. I'd come to assume that it'd be like pulling teeth to get them talking. Nope... definitely not the case. I even feel like I'm finally starting to figure out this teaching thing. Who knows? Maybe I'll make a run at being a decent teacher after all.

But enough about work. It's vacation time! The wonderful MM and I are leavin' on a jet plane for Kuala Lumpur and Singapore for the next week. It wasn't exactly a financially frugal trip, but the hope is that we'll come back with more potential for jobs for next year in much more tropical, much more beautiful locales. Your duty (for those few readers who read this nonsense), is to cross fingers, say prayers, or burn some incense to inspire some good luck to float our way.

I have a post from the summer that I'll post soon about my travels, and another one about an an unexpected incident of a mystery animal in the nighttime. Those will come soon (quite possibly during layovers en route to the tropics). Until then...

T