Food

Final Days of Term

Last week of school, and I'm feeling pretty good. I went out running again after work tonight and though I've been feeling tired and cranky today I felt better for it. Made my circut longer, now 5kms. I need a fun run to be in at some stage.

Three more teaching days at school then we are OUT FOR THE HOLIDAYS! This term has been so BIG. We are just winding up some stuff, have a concert on wednesday and parent teacher interviews on thursday night. We are lucky to be back to the original way of conducting parent teacher interviews. At the start of the year the government tried to make us conduct them after school only. It meant that we could only have them when some parents are working and we had less time available. It just makes everything more difficult to be able to fit everyone in.

I've been feeling good about my classes lately. Had a VCE session that I feel I finally cracked the analysis exam. Its been mystifying me, so it is obviously outright confusing for the students.

The more I hear about provision the less I like it. We had a meeting today and it was confirmed that I need to have an average of 16 students to be able to run a class. The last three years of classes I have had about 12 combined. Which means that the likelyhood of keeping the unit 1 subject at MSC becomes very shaky. Obviously it wont be the best idea for us to lose our senior students but when you have people making the decisions that aren't even IN schools, that have nothing to do with the reality of teaching them and being their mentor. I also will most likely mean that I will, at some stage in the next few years, have no option BUT to teach outside my subject area. Because some years music gets a lot of students, others there are less that choose it. Teachers that teach classes like chemistry, maths, english, science wont have this worry. The hardest thing is that the students are not very well informed at this point. None of them know what to choose or whats even offered. We don't know what the other schools are doing. It's all still confusing. There will be more issues before this is all settled.

Running

Looking forward to daylight savings. I've been running after school this past week. I feel so much better for having made the effort. However by the time I get out running its after 6pm and by the time I am heading back home it's dark. Got on the scales this morning and its showing a kg already. Know it's, like, water weight or whatever, but it makes me feel better to see it going down. I know I eat o.k, maybe I like the sweet stuff too much, but it's the exercise that will make the difference. And if I'm doing the exercise that will help me make some better decisions. Now that I've got the most of the work out of the way with production I feel like I have more space for doing some things at home. One more week to holidays. I have a lot of school work planning things to do - make sure I am organised to start the last term.

Post Production

In the aftermath of production everyone is sick. I was sick on camp and have managed to shake the cold, some of my colleagues have been to the doctor. Lots of the students have too. It's such a big road from the start to the end and we don't get much sleep done on the camp. It was all worth it in the end, i think that we did a great job and I have heard a lot of positive feed back this week from people who saw the show, saying that it was the best one that they've seen the school do in a long time. We have our sights set on another 'name' show next year. Not sure what yet though.

Glad there is only one more week to go.
I had my hair cut last week, very nice.
Bought a hair dryer/straightner pack. Worst straightner EVER. What was I thinking?
Bought some boots, my first real pair. Awesome. Except I keep slipping over in them.

Production and Provision

Two weeks to production. I knew I was going to be stressed and tired during this time, but there is just so much to be done! I'm so tired at the end of the day and I still have work to do.

At school they are talking about this thing called 'provision' that they want all the schools in the area to do. The rationale behind it is that schools with small class sizes have their classes combined and students go to the other school to take it. What I am worried about is my small VCE music classes being taken over to another high school and I lose my students. These students that I have in year 9 I am gearing up to take VCE classes. One of my most enthuastic students is considering doing music at uni rather than nursing or something medical. If they take him to another school then I miss out on the chance to guide him through music. It makes me sad. And it makes me think that I don't want to keep teaching if this happens to my classes. What good is a specialist teacher without their specialist class? Their is an information session that everyone is going to, that I can't make because we have production rehearsals. I'm worried.

The light at the end of the production tunnel is in sight. The band played through the whole of act 1 today, which is a huge achievement in itself. We tackle act 2 tomorrow.

Hi Mum

This post is mostly for my mum, just so she can read it. I haven't been posting on here for a long time, I needed a rest from it I guess.

I'm three weeks from production at school which means a lot of work over the next few weeks. We've been working hard at school with lots of different excursions, two bands went to Melbourne for the bands festival at Monash this week.

Dunno what else to say, it'll come to me I guess.

Hi Mum.

Ugggh.

What a bloody long week this is. Is it still Tuesday? It's like being 4 and counting the sleeps to christmas. Pleeeeeeeeeeease be here already. Just so I can stop and rethink.

I'm having to reassess everything I'm doing. I want to be able to do lots of interesting things like performances and things but my evenings are too short to fit many things in. I know I'm getting stressed again because it gets harder to sleep. Getting to sleep is not so much the problem, I'm out the minute I hit the pillow. It's when I wake up at 5.30 - without fail - and need to go to the loo. If I get up then my brain turns on and I don't get much more sleep. But its hard to fall alseep again when you need to go. Problem.

Anyway, I have to stop the German course because I just don't have the time in the evenings to study and get the school work done and have a life and rehearse. These extra curricular things like Orchestra and Brass Band keep taking up my weekends which I need to recharge. And see Mark a little. I had to stop playing at church on sundays because its often the only morning that we both don't have to go anywhere. If I was like a normal teacher who went home at 3:20 then I would be able to fit these things in as well as house work and practise. But I'm a music teacher. And I don't get home till after 6. And I have a concert tomorrow night so I'll be back at school from 7pm to 10pm setting up and packing up. I didn't get lunch today because I was rehearsing with singers. I wont get lunch tomorrow for the same reason. I'm tired, Lindy is tired. It's time for the holidays. Please.

Update

A quick update cause I should be in bed.
One week to holidays!
We've dug big holes in the yard to pour concrete for the pagola.
The auditions are finally over for the production. The suspense these kids went though was intense! There was mass celebrations when the cast list was finally announced. We're doing the Wizard of Oz. Just hope that the parts arrive ASAP.
Concert prepared for the first of april. The juniors are ready for their first ever concert on the 1st of April. They've had three rehearsals.
Had a girl come to band tonight said she was interested in learning. She said probably trumpet so I sat her with the section and put an instrument in her hand. I think she'll be a gun!

Week 7

The long awaited arts performance on the weekend went really well. I am always a bit baffled by some kinds of art works, it sounds nice as an idea but I'm not really sure if the concept is going to work in reality. Or it just seems like a strange idea and I don't know what they were thinking at the time.

At the end of last year the orchestra was approached to participate in an artistic show symbolising the drought and hope for rain and renewal. The idea was to have the orchestra play a sound scape and little bits of sculpture would join to make a big 'drought monster' that would look scary, and then it would die and become a windmill. It sounded like a strange idea to me from the start. However the night went really well I thought, there were heaps of people there and food stalls and other artists playing, and the performance went off with very little problems and the audience really like it. And there were fireworks, maybe that helped...

Other than that things at school are going great. I am feeling really good about the work that I am doing at the moment and whats happening in my classes. I have been conducting the band rehearsals and have been really happy with the progress, tomorrow we are picking some new pieces for the students to start learning for the Melbourne School Bands Festival.

I donated blood again today. Each time I go the experience gets easier, I know what to expect and it is over really quickly. I'm in the 'frequent donors club', she tells me that I get a diary. I was maybe thinking something a little different for a reward - something to entice people to continue donating or even start donating. But that's not what you do it for.

Week 6

Hard to believe that its week 6 already! Its been pretty busy, but so far I feel I'm handling work better than this time last year. I'm starting to get a handle on the job and all the things that I need to take care of. The last few weeks I've been conducting band when Lindy has been absent, and it has gone very well. From watching Lindy conduct I have learnt so much about taking a rehearsal and comunicating things about the piece. Loving it.

The year 7s are having their first lessons this week. Its amazing knowing that from this point I get to watch them learn music and its all up to me what they learn. I have five trumpets, four trombones, euphonium and tuba starting this year, what an awesome brass section!

Term 1

Life is ticking along well for me at the moment. I have been working hard at work, getting my classes organised and making sure that everyone is on track, getting the band students working including the new year 7 students who will be starting instruments next week.

I've been learning German after school with distance education. So far I've completed two weeks of lessons, doing well at this stage. Sprechen Sie Deutsch?

Into the holidays

Its been a much more relaxing week this week. I've had time to relax, catch up on sleep and get some things at home organised. I got some of the weeding done in the front yard, and I'm hoping to get the first trailer load of mulch maybe thursday. Actually cleaned out the fridge today. I was reading in a magazine about vinegar and baking soda to clean out your fridge. It all looks and smells clean and shiny now.

Mark and I took a trip to Frankston to get his car serviced. It was really nice to go down sunday night rather than run down there monday morning. We went to a resturant on the pier and I had some seafood. What came out was a bucket load of fried squid rings and prawns. More than enough to feed three people. I was a bit upset to send so much back to the kitchen. No one needs to eat that much. Marks meal was the same. They served so many chips and a double serve of steak and veggies on the side. Huge meals.

Very exciting news this week, I lost a kilo this week at Jenny Craig!