This past, exhausting week

Normally, I don't blog about what I'm actually teaching anymore, just because it's probably not terribly exciting for you and it's one less thing for me to worry about. Butt his past week was particularly interesting, in an exhaustive way, so I thought I'd share the gory details.

MONDAY: The most normal day of the week. I taught science at the local (within walking distance) high school. This teacher has sixth period prep, and it looked for a while like she had second lunch, which would have been five periods straight before lunch. Fortunately, she had first lunch, so I had that breather, then my final period, and they let me go home early once I was done with everything else. (I almost had to cover another class sixth period, but they managed to fill that job pretty quickly. Good thing, too, as you'll see how the week progressed.)

TUESDAY: My longest day of the week. I was back up at the local high school again, teaching Spanish this time. This was a short day, and the classes had a student teacher, so all I had to do was take roll and run the DVD player. But the moment I was done, I had to head out the door to the local elementary school (just a few blocks from my house, but not so close to the high school) and teach a fifth grade class there. Nice bunch of kids, I might add, even though the teacher warned me that she had some tough ones. No real prep period, a long walk between jobs, and my day ran from 6:30 to 3:30. On the plus side, I think I'm going to get paid for a day and a half.

WEDNESDAY: Science at another local-but-not-within-walking-distance high school. They have a block schedule, so they get a longer prep every other day. Guess what? That wasn't the day I was there. Again, teaching all the way through without a prep period.

THURSDAY: Elementary PE in the morning, then the moment I was done there down the road to a junior high school for math. I knew the timing would be close, but I thought I could make it in time — which I did. I even had a lunch period, which I hadn't quite expected. Again, no prep period.

FRIDAY: This was a teacher professional day in my usual district, so I grabbed a junior high science job in the other district I work in, thinking I'd finally get a break. Wouldn't you know, this guy was a 1.2 FTE, and had six classes and no prep.

By my reckoning, I should be paid for 5.9 days this week. Fortunately, next week is already shaping up to be a lot more normal, so I doubt I'll have a repeat of this past week.