Hurry up, hurry up. Don't waste time! Don't waste time!

Time on task. That was drilled into my head by my principal my first year. 1 minute a day you are off-task adds up REALLY fast over the school year. Like to a few extra days. Needless to say, I learned a lot about time on task my first year. I kept to a tight schedule, trying to squeeze both social studies and language arts into a 40 minute block for 3 periods. I definitely think it helped shape the kind of teacher I am today.


After teaching 4 years in the states, with constant reminders of time on task, state-standardized testing, and my evaluation being based 50% on my student test scores, coming to teach internationally has been a HUGE change. Though, I hesitate to call it a bad change, it's just different. VERY different from how I'm used to things. Some of them are hard to wrap my heard around. The biggest one is the schedule.

My schedule of the last two years was:

8-9:55-Math
10:00-10:30 Special Area
10:30-11:15 Science
11:15-11:45 Lunch
11:50-12:00/12:15-In-Class PE
12:00/12:15-1:30-Reading
1:30-2:00 RTI
2:00-2:30 Language Arts
2:30-3:00 Special Area
3:00-3:30 Read Aloud/Pack Up

90 minutes of Math (which, my teammate and I really think benefited out kids in the long run for state testing) and, per the State, 90-120 minutes of uninterrupted Reading block). Since I was at a fine arts charter school, we had 2 periods of special areas. Most school have 1 special. In all, teachers had a break for an hour without kids. We also had lunch, where we didn't have students so I had total of an hour and an half of planning. The other 6ish hours I was teaching

The scheule here is crazy. But, I do understand why it is. There are only so many specials teacher for K-12. I know how hard the woman at IH worked, trying to figure out schedules for K-8. I can only imagine how hard it is for Pre-school all the way to 12th grade.

Amy (2D)	Mon. A	Tue. A	Wed. A	Thu. A	Fri. A
8:10-8:50	Spelling	Literacy	Literacy	PE	Spelling
8:55-9:35	Literacy	Literacy	Literacy	Literacy	Literacy
9:40-10:20	Recess	Recess	Recess	Recess	Recess
10:25-11:05	Mandarin	Mandarin	Mandarin	Mandarin	Mandarin
11:10-11:50	SS	SS	SS	SS	Library
11:55-12:35	Lunch	Lunch	Lunch	Lunch	Lunch
12:40-1:20	Math	PE	Math	Art	Math
1:25-2:05	Art	Math	Math	Grammar	Math
2:10-2:50	Grammar	Math	Music	Math	Music

Amy (2D) Mon. B Tue. B Wed. B Thu. B Fri. B 8:10-8:50  Spelling Grammar  PE  Grammar Spelling  8:55-9:35  Literacy  Literacy  Literacy  Literacy  Literacy 9:40-10:20  Recess Recess Recess Recess Recess 10:25-11:05 Mandarin Mandarin Mandarin Mandarin Mandarin 11:10-11:50 SS   SS SS SS Library 11:55-12:35  Lunch Lunch Lunch Lunch Lunch 12:40-1:20 PE  Math Art  Math  SS 1:25-2:05 Art  Math  Math  Math  Math 2:10-2:50 Math  Music  Math Music  Math

It's done on a Week A and Week B schedule. My Literacy block varies from 40 mins to 80 minutes, as does my Math blocks. Coming from 90-120 minutes, it's a HUGE change!! Social Studies and Science and combined to Social Sciences. We vary every six week. As you can clearly see, I have around 160-200 minutes (3 to 2 and a half hours) a DAY with my kids to teach I also have around the same amount of planning time. Crazy huh?!?! It blows my mind how little I actually see my kids a day. The classrooms open at 7:30 and kids start wandering in. I do Daily 5 so most of them sit right down and start reading. I try to get as much Literacy and Math in a possible. Goodness know, my babies need it. I'm just having a hard time wrapping my heard around how little I see them. I do like how much time I have to plan. It doesn't mean I'm not working late into the night. But, as Angela knows, we worked hard that first year at IH to get everything done for the 2nd year. I know Year 2 will be so much easier. Different isn't bad. It's just takes a while to get used to. It's.... different. :)