A Week Full of Firsts

This week brought with it many new and exciting things for me. As I've mentioned before, Tuesday was my first day of work as a paraprofessional in a LBLD (language based learning disablilty) classroom, working with grades 1-4. On top of that, I attended my first class towards my masters degree at Bridgewater State University. I have a feeling this year is going to be life changing for me and I can't wait to see what's in store! Anyways, here's what my first week of work and school looked like.

Tuesday: 

Am I too old for a first day of school pic?? 

Weymouth public schools hosted a breakfast for all staff at the high school at 8 a.m. I got there, grabbed a small bite to eat, and got a seat for the annual colloquium from 8:30-10:30. The speeches given were pretty motivating and I left feeling excited for the school year! One of the highlights for me took place towards the end of the colloquium. During the key note speech, the speaker talked about ways to rise above the negativity that may be present in your school and armed everyone with a comeback for anyone being negative. Needless to say, "thanks for sharing" will probably be used multiple times this year. (I heard it at least 8 times alone on my first day!)

My new place of work, ya'll! 

After the colloquium, I headed to the elementary school for the second staff meeting of the day and a staff luncheon, where I got to meet most of my new coworkers and learn more about my responsibilities this year! When we finished lunch, everyone was dismissed to their classrooms to finish things up before the kids show up Wednesday. I got to know the teacher I'm working with, Jill, a little better and helped her finish some tasks around the classroom before calling it a day! All in all, I'd say it was a very successful first day on the job!

Wednesday: 

I got to school around 8:50 Wednesday morning and finished up a few last-minute things before walking to meet the students at the bus outside. The first part of the day was spent familiarizing the students with classroom procedures and getting everyone settled. The LBLD class is split up into two groups- each spending half a day in ELA (reading and writing) and half a day in math. Since Wednesday was only a half day total, each group spent an hour and a half or so in each classroom, just enough time to do a couple first day projects! The kids colored cupcakes to put up on the birthday wall and decorated a September calendar before going home for the day! It was a super short day and I'm excited to get to work more with these kids! We finished our day with a couple classroom projects and a staff meeting. After a long but exciting day, I came home to some BEAUTIFUL sunflowers from my amazing husband. He spoils me, ya'll!

Thursday:

Thursday morning was pretty interesting for me. When I walked into the classroom, I noticed Jill wasn't at school. The principal came in a little bit later to tell me that Jill had to go home because she was sick and that I was in charge for the day. I'm all about being in charge and getting more experience leading a classroom- but since it was the 2nd day of school, I was a little nervous with what I was going to do with the kids! Luckily it was only a half day again, so the amount of time I was required to fill was much shorter than normal! It all worked out well and the kids had a good time creating dream boards and finishing their "About Me" posters! After school got out, all of the Special Ed staff had to head over to the high school for a SPED meeting that lasted until about 3.

Around 3:15, I got in my car to head to my FIRST day of class for my Master's! Class didn't start until 4:45, so in an effort to kill time, I stopped at Marylou's for a little pick-me-up! As soon as class started, the Prof split everyone up into groups of 4, called cooperative learning groups. I ended up in a group with 3 other girls roughly the same age as me and I'm looking forward to getting to know them better and possibly going through this Master's program with them! (We're all starting at the same time!) We discussed a lot of interesting topics on the first day, but we also went over the syllabus which contained information on ALL of the projects and papers we are required to complete! It's going to be A LOT, but I'm exciting just thinking about all I'm going to learn! Homework and papers aren't my favorite thing, but when it's all on a topic you're passionate about- it doesn't seem so bad!

Student lounge at BSU! 

Anyways... that's pretty much it for my first week of my new life! It all flew by, and while I'm exciting to continue on... I'm also pretty pumped to do NOTHING this weekend!