I had my first day of professional development at the new school today. It was crazy intense. Everyone seemed pretty focused--taking notes, not playing on their cell phones, etc. I'm not saying that people didn't talk, because they did, but it was unobtrusive. It was a long time to sit on a folding chair though! I was glad to switch to my desk chair after lunch.
Another thing that is very different from any other school I've been at is the amount of appreciation the school shows its teachers. I'm pretty sure I've gotten more gifts and nice emails or notes in the past four weeks than I have in the previous twelve years combined! Today's gift was personalized mousepads with an inspirational quotation...mine was from Einstein. I put it by MY computer so the kids will know it's all mine! Even the folders that the handouts were in were beautiful. I have never seen such nice file folders. In fact, I think they could inspire a new facet of my office supply obsession. And they gave us nice pens, not crappy ballpoints. Very important.
I'm still freaking out about my unit plans and getting all the procedural stuff figured out, but I got a lot of questions answered today. I have a lot more freedom than you would expect, which is nice. It seems to be a good balance between clear educational objectives and creative expression. Thankfully I now have Office 2007 on the new laptop; previously I had to screw around with making sure it was saved in a lower version, blah blah blah. Now I can work at home and not worry about it.
Tomorrow is meetings in the morning and first aid/CPR class in the afternoon. Big fun!
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