No more pencils, no more books, no more teacher's dirty looks...

...at least for another week and a half.

Anyway, the point of this entry is that I am done with classes for winter term! I am really happy about that, even if next term is going to kill me...

Even though I'm done with my finals week, I do still have a test coming up. The Illinois Certification Testing System's Elementary/Middle Grades Content test. I have to take that mouthful next Saturday. Fortunately, unlike when I took the Basic Skills test, I don't have to wake up and be there to take the test at 7:30am. I was fortunate enough to be signed up for the 1:30pm session, something I am eternally grateful for! Still, I'm going to have to look up the map because for me the hardest part of the basic skills test was actually finding the building. So, I have one week to study all of this and for the first time in a long time I am actually studying something on time instead of last minute cramming which leads to basically winging the test.

So, I think I have decided that I need to go find someplace that is sunnier year round to settle down. This is because I really noticed my lack of productivity during the winter this year. I also had a huge slump in my mood. For example, before winter break clinicals seemed to be going well (granted I didn't want to wake up for them, but still). However, when we got back from break, the kids seemed to go crazy and I felt extremely incompetent. I was honestly strongly second guessing my decision to become a teacher. And then Valentine's day came and the kids seemed amazing again. At first I thought it was just their renewed appreciation of me :) but now I think it was also the fact that it is getting sunnier out and I am getting happier. The kids seemed to be getting happier as well, which made things easier. I'm going to miss them a lot, but I'm alright with moving on as well.

So, I started this by discussing how on task I'm being lately. However, writing a blog doesn't really qualify as being on task, so I think I'm going to be getting going and back to my studying! TTYL -Kristi :)

Feeling more productive/ambitious...

So, I never got back to that last post. Story of my life. Anyway, I think I have come up with a solution (or at least a plan) to keep me from having as much crazy stuff to do next term. I'm going to see if I can get some of the big things out of the way before classes start. My friend Crystal suggested that I start getting ideas for my science unit that I will have to complete by myself before the end of the term. So, I'm going to actually take it a bit further. I'm planning on (attempting) to start to plan--maybe even make a rough draft--of my science lesson durring spring break. I also just emailed my Lit Professor about my books for next term. As soon as she emails me back, I'm going to buy the books that are assigned for class and I'm going to try to read those during break as well. That way, I won't have as much to do over next term. Let's hope that this will work so that I can manage throughout the term.

While it's snowing out right now, you can see by my new surge of motivation that it's getting to be spring... or at least we're getting more sun. I didn't want to do anything all winter and now I'm making plans and getting creative all over again. I wonder when the weather will begin to reflect my mood...

Much less time to waste...

If you're reading this, you are most likely a friend of mine and know the type of schedule I take for my classes. If not, first of all, I wonder why you are reading my blog (I don't think my life is that interesting) and second of all I'll tell you the reason why I have to take such a huge class load. I am an Elementary Education major who is working on her Middle School Language Arts Endorsement. So, to figure out my whole schedule visually, I put it up on my google calendar. This is what I came up with (The blue is possible work times and the yellow is for my possible clinical timeframes):

Looking at that image, I was already a bit overwhelmed. Then I counted the classes and realized that I had forgotten one. Well, I'll finish this later... work is over!
(Edited for grammer issues)