Back from the Snowmaggedon

Ooooh, I have such good stories to tell this year but can't.

Instead, I'll talk about how today, even though it was my first day of work since Feb. 5, was incredibly stressful. One student looked over at me, and I was literally running my hands against my scalp, looking like I was trying to pull out my hair. I am trying to organize the printing out of perfect versions of 84 world literature papers in the next week. The preparation time I had planned all year for this was the second week of February, which was lost to snow days. The dates for IB don't change, though, so now I'm left with a lot, lot to do in the next 8 days. That's all fighting the forces of senioritis and trying to get it done in 30-minute class periods necessitated by the 2-hour delay we have every day for the rest of the week. If we have more snow days next week, I'm in trouble.

It's good work, though, all of it, and I'm actually getting excited to do it again next year. Mostly because I'll have it organized and figured out all the much better. But this year is going pretty well. All these assignments, though, which is why I really like IB because it caters to kids' strengths, whatever they might be, make it quite a bit to organize and navigate.

As for the 9th graders, it was actually pretty great to see them again, too. Attendance was not very good, but they rarely are on delay days. At least we're back. Part of me is still surprised (I hated seeing kids walk in the streets because sidewalks aren't clear, and I hate those big mounds that make it hard to see kids) that we went in, but what are we going to do? Wait until April for all the snow to melt? It was time. I really, really hope no one got hurt.