The Calm.
Tomorrow begins parent conferences. People say that the parents are just as scared as the teachers. We'll see. I don't have too many anxieties about it. At this point, grades (quarter grades) have gone home, and comments that I wrote have gone home. C'est fait. This will just be the aftermath, so there's nothing to do but live through it. :)
Today was an interesting day. Being a White Week, I had 3 long periods today, and 2 long breaks. I had a moment, about 12:52, just after lunch, where I wasn't sure what to do. It blew me away. After 2 months of not enough seconds in the day, I finally had several to spare and I hadn't any idea what to do with them!
Meet the Parents (Part I).
Last night was "Back to School" Night, where parents come and sit through a mock "day at school," going to each of their son or daughter's classes for 10 minutes and listen to the teacher talk about the class. This had the potential for a number of tragedies, all of which I envisoned in my head before the thing started.
1) I show up to class late, forget my syllabus, and accidentally insult each parent in an unintentional yet grave manner.
2) The computer with my presentation crashes just before class.
3) The demos I'd planned go all wrong and something explodes.
4) I spill ketchup on my tie at dinner, and coffee on my slacks after it.
5) The parents ask me why the class failed my quiz.
6) Someone asks, "... and what did you teach before you were here?"
7) Someone presses me for qualifications.
8) Embedded in my chemistry audience is a real-life chemist, and embedded in my physics audience is a Doctorate in Physics.
Thankfully, aside from #5 (which actually went off OK), the thing went well. One student told me today that his Mom couldn't stop talking about how cool I was when she got home last night. Yes! (err, wait, was 'cool' what I was supposed to be going for???)
