Day 1-2

Today was the first day for freshmen, which for most seemed to drag on forever. We started off the day w/ an assembly where about 97% of the kids showed up on time (with the other 3% getting ripped up by and in trouble with the principal - he's big on attendance this year). They seemed like a pretty calm bunch - nothing like last year's freshmen class. After a 45 min assembly, we went into an hour and a half of homeroom where I had to explain the various weird schedules our school has (no two days at our school is the same - rotating daily schedule, late-entry or early-release Mondays, assembly schedules, etc.) along with lunch protocol (again complicated as there are three lunch schedules), school policies, building orientation, lockers, etc. It was a whole lot to go through, and we finished pretty much with only about 5 mins left before we went to lunch. I had to lead them to the cafeteria, then I was able to go back to my room and prepare for the classes I would have for the day. Our network is still kinda screwed up, so I had no idea how many kids in my classes are freshmen. Thankfully someone showed me a trick to get into the system and find the grade levels. In my five classes, I had one freshman in the first (two actually, but the second was a repeater and won't be in school until tomorrow), no freshmen in the second, 14 freshmen in the third, 16 freshmen in the fourth, and 1 freshman in the fifth. I always find it pointless to do anything on my second first day because my classes are mixed grades so I don't want to tell the freshmen everything that I will have to tell the whole class again tomorrow. Basically, I just told them who I am and what I expect from them and not to be intimidated by the upperclassmen (the one freshman from the first class actually asked if she could switch to a class w/ less upperclassmen. The answer, of course, is no.). I hope the year goes well though. I'm not very well planned thus far (all the stuff I planned earlier this month I've completely thrown out the window, so either I'm going to have to do some heavy-duty planning this weekend (doubtful), or I'm going to get back into my late-night/early-morning planning. I've always been the kind of person who works best without a plan (bad, I know), but hopefully I can work on that.

Tomorrow begins Day 1-3. Hopefully it will go as smoothly as today.