A Typical Day
I thought I would tell you what a typical day is like for me...
I usually have my alarm set for about 5:30. Then the internal dialogue begins. There is a battle raging inside of me about when to get up. Do I pay attention to my alarm clock and get out of bed, or do I hit snooze until about 6:00? The debate usually goes something like this:
"Well, if I get up now, I'll have time to actually dry my hair. If I hit snooze a few more times, I'll have time to hop in the shower, get clean, and iron my clothes. But do I need time to shave my legs? And drying my hair doesn't do any good anyway because it just gets crazy anyway, so why take the time out?"
By the time 6:00 rolls around, I'm usually out of bed or deciding that I'll walk to school instead of taking the teacher van with everyone at 6:30.
Before school I'll usually do a few small things to prepare for my day. We have devotions every morning at 7:00, and a different teacher takes a different week throughout the year and does devotions. It's a good time, but it's also hard for me because I have always liked having that 20 minutes before school starts to be in my room and mentally prep for the day, and I don't have that anymore, but that's okay.
School starts at 7:30 with a ten minute homeroom. I have ninth-grade girls, and they're a great set of kids. Each of them takes one day and does a brief devotion and/or prayer. There are only seven of them total, and they'll be my apologetics classes next semester. (I currently have tenth-grade girls.) If it's a Monday, I have chapel with the middle and high schoolers. After homeroom, I have my first class of the day - physical science. Then, three days a week, I have apologetics, which is a prety cool class, but challenging in its own ways. After second period there's a brief break. Third and fourth period are probably my most challenging kids. My third period class is my first physics class, and that class has an interesting dynamic. They're mostly 11th graders, and they're quite a group this year. Fourth period is my second physical science class of the day, and they are just a bunch of talkers, but a pretty sharp class of kids in general. Lunch is after fourth period.
Lunch at the cafetin is always a surprise. They publish a calendar of what there is going to be each day, but you don't always know if 1. that will still hold true, or 2. whether there will be food left. Every Monday is pizza day, so I usually bring my own lunch. The other days I'll usually buy a plate - a small one is 15 cords, and a regular one is 20 cords. (1 dollar approximately equals 17 cordobas.) Then, most days I get a fresco, or juice, and there are GREAT, especially when they're really cold. A glass is only 3 cords, so I almost always get the juice.
I currently have a break during fifth period, which is wonderful right now, but next semester I'll have creative writing, so my days will be a little busier. Right now I usually spend at least part of fifth period in the computer lab. It's been hard so far because there are two teachers who don't have computers. The school has PAID for them, but we have loaner ones right now. It's possible that I might be able to get one as a temporary one in my classroom just for Word and the internet, which would be wonderful because right now I spend a few extra hours every week by not having a computer in my classroom. (I'm not a teacher who spends all day every day just doing notes, so there are times in the classroom where I could be working very efficiently with a computer.)
During sixth period I have my second physics class, and they are a great class to end the day with! I really enjoy that class, and it is currently my smallest science class with only eleven people in it. On Tuesday and Thursday I also have a physics lab, which always stresses me out a little bit because we don't have equipment to perform physics labs, so I never quite know what I'm going to do in lab.
I usually spend at least a little while struggling to get on the internet at school, which is usually impossibly slow. (We share a 128 connection with the entire school, so most of the time it's fairly pointless.) HOwever, Jason and I recently got internet in our apartment because otherwise, he wouldn;t be able to do school work, and I would never be able to get online to look for ideas for classes. So that has been a really good thing.
Anyway, most days I have seventh period free, which is great! I just started SPanish classes, which are on Monday and Tuesday from 6-8. On Wednesday I have a newspaper meeting after school, which has now begun to be fairly stress-free for me. We had a bit of a rocky beginning, but now the kids are pretty independent and I just see the rough copies and make some editing comments before they give me a final to copy.
And copying things is always interesting, because the machine has basically stoppped working at we only have one. It will really make you plan ahead, though, because if I want to give a test on Thursday, I need to have it prepared for the office to get copied on Tuesday. There's a guy who runs errands for us at the school. The only thing that I've had him do is get money for me at the bank, which is pretty nice because I don't ahve to deal with it.
When I get home, I'll usually relax for a while and read. Occasionally I'll go to the pool, but I haven't been doing that lately because of the rain. I know we keep talking about it, but it's becoming quite an obstacle for things like simply washing our clothes. We can't wash anything because we can't dry it because we have rarely had more than an hour at a time in a row when there hasn't been rain. (Jason and I have also decided that we're defintely going to bring febreeze back with us!)
Jason and I will usually eat dinner by about six. We eat a lot of chicken curry, and fajitas, and spaghetti, and sometimes grilled cheese sandwiches if I've found real cheese at the grocery store. There's cheese, and then there's Nica cheese. I am a cheese snob, so I never even liked processed cheese. Nica cheese is so much worse than processed cheese, so we usually don't keep a lot of cheese in the house. However, Nicaragua does have things like grapefruit soda, which I love! (DO any of you remember Citra?) On Monday nights I usally go grocery shopping. Occoasionally I'll run other errands during the week. There's this place called Megaboutique that sells a ton of used clothing from places like Gap and Banana Republic and Express. It was kind of funny to discover that only a few kilometers from the apartment. They also have a section that has household stuff, and it's been a good place to pick up things like measuring cups and cofee mugs. There's also a Swiss bakery down the road where I've been buying wheat flour to make banana bread. (I've never used wheat flour before, and it's a great combo with banana bread! I found a really good, basic recipe, and the first thing you do is cream butter and sugar together, which is always a GREAT combo! If you've never eaten butter and sugar together, go and give it a try.) Jason and I also play tennis occasioanlly, although of course we haven't with the rain.
At night we usally read, or watch a movie, or work. We live on the first floor, and people end up coming and hanging out at our windows and talking a lot, or coming in and hanging out, or other things. We usually get into bed around nine and read for a little but, after possibly having a little bit of ice cream! The Eskimo coffee ice cream here is AWESOME!!! I usually try to start actually falling asleep aroudn 930, but sometimes that is prolonged if I'm really into what I'm reading. And throughout the week there are teh various household chores, like sweeping the floor almost every day, and washing dishes, and clothes, etc. (Jason almost always washes the dishes, which is great!)
Anyway, that's a normal day!
I usually have my alarm set for about 5:30. Then the internal dialogue begins. There is a battle raging inside of me about when to get up. Do I pay attention to my alarm clock and get out of bed, or do I hit snooze until about 6:00? The debate usually goes something like this:
"Well, if I get up now, I'll have time to actually dry my hair. If I hit snooze a few more times, I'll have time to hop in the shower, get clean, and iron my clothes. But do I need time to shave my legs? And drying my hair doesn't do any good anyway because it just gets crazy anyway, so why take the time out?"
By the time 6:00 rolls around, I'm usually out of bed or deciding that I'll walk to school instead of taking the teacher van with everyone at 6:30.
Before school I'll usually do a few small things to prepare for my day. We have devotions every morning at 7:00, and a different teacher takes a different week throughout the year and does devotions. It's a good time, but it's also hard for me because I have always liked having that 20 minutes before school starts to be in my room and mentally prep for the day, and I don't have that anymore, but that's okay.
School starts at 7:30 with a ten minute homeroom. I have ninth-grade girls, and they're a great set of kids. Each of them takes one day and does a brief devotion and/or prayer. There are only seven of them total, and they'll be my apologetics classes next semester. (I currently have tenth-grade girls.) If it's a Monday, I have chapel with the middle and high schoolers. After homeroom, I have my first class of the day - physical science. Then, three days a week, I have apologetics, which is a prety cool class, but challenging in its own ways. After second period there's a brief break. Third and fourth period are probably my most challenging kids. My third period class is my first physics class, and that class has an interesting dynamic. They're mostly 11th graders, and they're quite a group this year. Fourth period is my second physical science class of the day, and they are just a bunch of talkers, but a pretty sharp class of kids in general. Lunch is after fourth period.
Lunch at the cafetin is always a surprise. They publish a calendar of what there is going to be each day, but you don't always know if 1. that will still hold true, or 2. whether there will be food left. Every Monday is pizza day, so I usually bring my own lunch. The other days I'll usually buy a plate - a small one is 15 cords, and a regular one is 20 cords. (1 dollar approximately equals 17 cordobas.) Then, most days I get a fresco, or juice, and there are GREAT, especially when they're really cold. A glass is only 3 cords, so I almost always get the juice.
I currently have a break during fifth period, which is wonderful right now, but next semester I'll have creative writing, so my days will be a little busier. Right now I usually spend at least part of fifth period in the computer lab. It's been hard so far because there are two teachers who don't have computers. The school has PAID for them, but we have loaner ones right now. It's possible that I might be able to get one as a temporary one in my classroom just for Word and the internet, which would be wonderful because right now I spend a few extra hours every week by not having a computer in my classroom. (I'm not a teacher who spends all day every day just doing notes, so there are times in the classroom where I could be working very efficiently with a computer.)
During sixth period I have my second physics class, and they are a great class to end the day with! I really enjoy that class, and it is currently my smallest science class with only eleven people in it. On Tuesday and Thursday I also have a physics lab, which always stresses me out a little bit because we don't have equipment to perform physics labs, so I never quite know what I'm going to do in lab.
I usually spend at least a little while struggling to get on the internet at school, which is usually impossibly slow. (We share a 128 connection with the entire school, so most of the time it's fairly pointless.) HOwever, Jason and I recently got internet in our apartment because otherwise, he wouldn;t be able to do school work, and I would never be able to get online to look for ideas for classes. So that has been a really good thing.
Anyway, most days I have seventh period free, which is great! I just started SPanish classes, which are on Monday and Tuesday from 6-8. On Wednesday I have a newspaper meeting after school, which has now begun to be fairly stress-free for me. We had a bit of a rocky beginning, but now the kids are pretty independent and I just see the rough copies and make some editing comments before they give me a final to copy.
And copying things is always interesting, because the machine has basically stoppped working at we only have one. It will really make you plan ahead, though, because if I want to give a test on Thursday, I need to have it prepared for the office to get copied on Tuesday. There's a guy who runs errands for us at the school. The only thing that I've had him do is get money for me at the bank, which is pretty nice because I don't ahve to deal with it.
When I get home, I'll usually relax for a while and read. Occasionally I'll go to the pool, but I haven't been doing that lately because of the rain. I know we keep talking about it, but it's becoming quite an obstacle for things like simply washing our clothes. We can't wash anything because we can't dry it because we have rarely had more than an hour at a time in a row when there hasn't been rain. (Jason and I have also decided that we're defintely going to bring febreeze back with us!)
Jason and I will usually eat dinner by about six. We eat a lot of chicken curry, and fajitas, and spaghetti, and sometimes grilled cheese sandwiches if I've found real cheese at the grocery store. There's cheese, and then there's Nica cheese. I am a cheese snob, so I never even liked processed cheese. Nica cheese is so much worse than processed cheese, so we usually don't keep a lot of cheese in the house. However, Nicaragua does have things like grapefruit soda, which I love! (DO any of you remember Citra?) On Monday nights I usally go grocery shopping. Occoasionally I'll run other errands during the week. There's this place called Megaboutique that sells a ton of used clothing from places like Gap and Banana Republic and Express. It was kind of funny to discover that only a few kilometers from the apartment. They also have a section that has household stuff, and it's been a good place to pick up things like measuring cups and cofee mugs. There's also a Swiss bakery down the road where I've been buying wheat flour to make banana bread. (I've never used wheat flour before, and it's a great combo with banana bread! I found a really good, basic recipe, and the first thing you do is cream butter and sugar together, which is always a GREAT combo! If you've never eaten butter and sugar together, go and give it a try.) Jason and I also play tennis occasioanlly, although of course we haven't with the rain.
At night we usally read, or watch a movie, or work. We live on the first floor, and people end up coming and hanging out at our windows and talking a lot, or coming in and hanging out, or other things. We usually get into bed around nine and read for a little but, after possibly having a little bit of ice cream! The Eskimo coffee ice cream here is AWESOME!!! I usually try to start actually falling asleep aroudn 930, but sometimes that is prolonged if I'm really into what I'm reading. And throughout the week there are teh various household chores, like sweeping the floor almost every day, and washing dishes, and clothes, etc. (Jason almost always washes the dishes, which is great!)
Anyway, that's a normal day!
posted by Jess Edgerton at
2:34 pm
2 Comments:
ok, just tell my why jesus was not a poached egg...and i have been trying to figure this out for a month...:) hope you are well. school is going fine here. am teaching OF MICE AND MEN, which i didn't teach last year (elaine noonan did when i was out on med leave in november.) am going to see anne lamott in january along with fr. richard rohr - both at a conference on spirituality in d.c.
lol... it's an allusion to a gk chesterton comment in a book called orthodoxy. (if you've never read a book called the man who was thursday, i bet you would really like it :) cs lewis also "borrowed" the idea in mere christianity. it's about the idea that jesus was either exactly who He said He was or a lunatic on the level of a man who claims that he's a poached egg. but He could never have been just a "good" man.
do you enjoy mice and men? it was never one of my favorites!!!
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