Yet Another First Day

Day 5 of 31 at TWT

Today was (once again) the first day of the trimester.  Another weekend of moving out and moving in.  Another night and morning with a pit in my stomach and thoughts spinning through my head:  What would the kids be like?  What would the "personality" of each class be like?  Could I make the rooms work?  Would the technology work?  Could I still function from a cart after being spoiled by having a room for 2/3 of the year?

Another day in a blur of new faces and new names.  More getting to know each other, establishing expectations, and practicing procedures.

Last night, when I was supposed to be falling asleep, I started thinking about first days and how I vehemently dislike them.  (Really, I vehemently dislike the hours leading up to them!)  I realized that I've had a ridiculous number of first days in my short teaching career.  How many? I started counting.

In my first job, I taught Spanish to over a thousand 3rd-5th graders once a week for twelve weeks, changing schools every trimester like I do now.  (Except I also traveled during the day, for a grand total of 6 -- that's right, 6 -- schools per year.)   So really, I had 5 first days every trimester, since I saw the kids once a week and had completely different classes every day.

(5 first days x 3 trimesters) x 2 years = 30 first days in my first two years of teaching.

Then I got my current position, where thankfully I get to see the kids every day (for a trimester)!  So, only 1 first day each trimester.

(1 first day x 3 trimesters) x 3 years = 9 first days in the past 3 years of teaching

Of course, I also taught summer school several summers.  A couple of the years, I had 2 separate multi-week "sessions", and one year I had 2 classes simultaneously.

(1 first day x 2 sessions) + (1 first day) + (1 first day x 2 sessions) = 5 first days in 3 years of summer school


Wow!  30 + 9 + 5 = 44 first days in 5 years of teaching (counting today).  


Astonished, I tell Husband.  He says "Some people don't have that many first days in their whole teaching careers!"

You'd think after 44 first days, I wouldn't get nervous anymore.  You'd think I'd know that the day will go fine, the kids will be sweet and fun, and we'll have a great trimester together.  But I still had to take a deep breath before I shoved my cart into the first room.

And you know what?  It was great.  The rooms are fine, the technology worked, my expert traveling cart skills (a topic for another day!) came back like riding a bike.  Best of all, the kids were sweet little balls of pent-up excitement for Spanish, each class seems to have a good balance of diverse kids, and we had lots of fun getting to know each other.

I'm pretty sure I deserve a nap now!