Last Week of School

Christmas is coming! Here are a couple of my helpers, decorating the tree that was donated to our class.

I made it through Grade 7 report cards!!! It was kinda tough to learn the process for the new curriculum, a new computer system, a new Principal... but I made it! I had a lot of help from Nikki, my teaching partner. We kept avoiding talking about the fact that my contract would be up at the end of December and that we wouldn't be working together anymore. So, we kept busy with a bowling field trip:

Here's Devin trying to get a strike, with a little help from his CEA, "Mrs. A"!

A lovely group of girls taking a break to check their scores:
Here's "Evan" (yes, that's the secretary's son that you heard so much about!) posing in front of some of his keen, polite and helpful classmates.

We followed up the field trip with a movie in the afternoon and Craft Night in the evening. (We were in charge of cookie decorating. Hello chaos!!! Thank goodness Jeff came to help us!)

One morning while going through the inbox on my desk, I came across a letter one of the kids had handed in. I opened it, saw "Dear Parents... Mrs. Dumas'... surprise party..." and quickly closed it. I handed it back to the student and said "I don't think you're supposed to hand this in to me!" He was quite embarrassed and I had to let Nikki know. So, I was pleasantly "surprised" with a "going-away party" on the morning of December 18! The kids were so sweet and I received some lovely cards and gifts. Nikki's sister even baked and decorated these gorgeous and delicious cupcakes! Purple! The kids had a dance that morning and another movie that afternoon. This gave me some time to clean up the classroom so it would be ready for the teacher returning from her mat leave in January.

I felt bad about all the work Nikki had done to organize the surprise party because I found out in the second last week of school that there was another position opening up for me! While I am sad to say goodbye to (most of) the kids in my Grade 7 class, I am looking forward to staying at the same school and taking on a new age group! I am so fortunate that my Principal put my name in to cover Charmaine, the French Immersion Kindergarten teacher, while she is on leave for about six weeks! 11 students, no behaviour issues, no IEPs... her best class in 19 years!

The only con in the list is that it is a half-time position. I was quite worried about having to wait for substitute calls for the afternoons, getting Jeff to drive me there over the lunch hour... Fortunately, my Principal decided to create a position for me! "We'll find the funds somewhere!" she said. Excellent! So, I will be doing Learning Assistance in the afternoons. I've got two Grade 1 English reading groups and then Grade 2 French Immersion support! With almost no marking (just tracking progress), no supervision and prep time once a week, I should be able to leave school at a reasonable hour! Jeff is happy about that!

Depending on whether Charmaine is ready to come back after six weeks (she copied enough day plan pages for eight!), I will have three weeks as a substitute before March Break (which is TWO WEEKS here, by the way!). Depending on when Robyn, the Grade 1/2 French Immersion teacher, is ready to have her baby, I will hopefully get that contract for at least April to June. Things are looking up! Especially now that I am officially on PAID Christmas Break!