Waiting for the Tidal Wave

First off, I know I'm supposed to called them "tsunamis" but I grew up in the 80s when all we knew were tidal waves, so that's what I'm naming this post!

I'm sitting here reflecting at the end of my first week of my new job and thought I would try to put some of my thoughts down regarding this job and how I am feeling at this point in my life. 
I wrote about the details of my job a previous blog post, but the quick description of my job is:
part time Tech TOSA / part time Broadcasting teacher at Rocklin high. 

The days leading up to this week felt like standing on a beach, watching a tidal wave come at me.  

By taking on two jobs, I would have a lot coming at me in once the school year began. So, here is what I did:

I thought a lot about over the summer; 
I spend time planning that first week
I spend quite a few summer days and nights going into my classroom
I asked for help from family, friends and my education PLN 

and I did all this because I KNEW what was in this tidal wave

• helping plan our District wide PD day
• organizing and leading workshops for our Gmail transition
• transforming the broadcasting class's curriculum
• redesigning the physical space of my new classroom
• pitching to the leadership team at RHS a new form of announcements for the morning
• trying to put into practice some ideas which inspired me over my two years out of teaching like "no homework policy", "a bottom up, gamified grading system", "and creating a project driven class based on choice"
• planning games and an auction for the football fundraiser event I had to emcee
• starting a social studies task force to look at the new framework

here I am kicking off our district's PD day called "Learning Fest"

Now, in no way am I trying to make this list to show how I'm more busy than anyone else... Because so many of us feel this way! It's kind of the nature of our roles in education. We embody the concept of wearing many hats.

What I am wanting to share though, is a bit of a realization that the wave which I was waiting for... wasn't that bad. In fact... it was somewhat manageable.

• Our district PD day was by all accounts a success
• the trainings on our gmail transition have been well received (oh, ask me how the training for our grounds crew and custodians went... fun story!)
• the RHS staff seemed receptive of my new idea of a weekly news show instead of a daily one
• our first social studies workshop to look at the frameworks went well (thanks UC Davis History project folks)
• and the students I have seemed excited and eager to be part of this class (but hey, they're teenagers so who knows what they're really thinking!)

I attribute this not getting swamped by the tidal was to a fair amount of planning and preparation as well as the natural human feeling of anxiety as a looming date nears you. 

And now, here I am on a Sunday night, writing my reflection feeling OK about it all. 

I do need to say "sorry" to my PLN. This is my community of education people on social media, like Twitter, Voxer, etc that I feel like I have had to step away from for awhile. I hope to be able to get back on that horse and be part of the community again soon. 

oh... and there's still that little voice in there saying, "uh... what are you going to do next week though!"

Crap... time to start lesson planning!