Slice of Life: Days Off

Yesterday was July 4th. An Independence day that was a bit difficult to swallow what with independence not being the main focus of our country lately. That being said, most people had the day off for this national holiday. (Sorry to those who didn't!). But instead of spending my day by the pool at my …

Slice of Life: Writing as a Teacher

Time. That's it. Just time. That's all I need. Oh, and inspiration. Maybe a snack. Wait what about that TV show I wanted to watch. Or the book I started three weeks ago and forgot about? Oh and then there's laundry. And dishes. And my god I have to cook something because I'm still hungry …

Slice of Life: I’m Baaacckkkkkkk….

Hello all... To say that it's been awhile would be a drastic understatement, so how about I be straight up and just admit that it was a busy first year of teaching and I put my teaching and my students before my personal writing desires. But now I'm back, year one under the belt I …

Slice of Life: Getting Ready to Teach

I've always been that person who asks far too many questions and tries to prepare well in advance. Well, in this past week, I've come to realize that the latter is not exactly possible in the life of a teacher. Despite all of my planning all summer and my meticulous (and often daily) questions, I …

Slice of Life: All At Once

Prepping as a first year teacher... What books to teach? What lessons to go over? What themes to focus on? What questions and skills to introduce? What essay styles to explore? What to do for each 90 minute class? How to get students engaged from the beginning of those 90 minutes? These questions never end, …

Slice of Life: Licensure & PD

I spent the previous four days in a professional development course questioning whether or not to sign up and pay for the graduate credit, or if I should just take it for the "PDPs" which, of course, no one ever explains to you what it stands for (Professional Development Points). This being said, no one …

Opinion: Trigger Warnings

It's a loaded expression ... and it has come to hold a lot more meaning over the past decade than ever before. But the struggle comes with how to handle them. Pros: Giving trigger warnings to students allows them to mentally prepare themselves for what they might read or see (depending on the medium at …

Slice of Life: Cramming

Who says cramming is only for students? New teacher here, about to take the SEI MTEL exam. Despite having done minor studying throughout the past week, there is nothing that quite compares to shoving as much information as possible through your eyes at the very last moment. I'll be uploading all of my study materials …

Slice of Life: Binge Watching

It's become a common phenomenon to spend hours upon hours in front of a screen either working, playing games, staring at social media, reading fake news, or binge watching an endless supply of television shows that are now at our fingertips. It truly makes me wonder what we did before binge watching had become the …

Opinion: Celebrities Who Comment

One of the biggest critiques of celebrities on social media is that they throw their publicity and weight behind political opinions and statements without knowing the facts and what they are actually talking about. J.K. Rowling, for example, is only one celebrity who has been known to state her opinions with heavily woven sarcasm throughout …