Forty minutes in the morning and an hour and forty-five minutes in the afternoon and pretty soon you’re talking about real work time here. Suicide prevention took about half an hour. Charlotte Danielson and our new evaluation system took a little over half an hour. I love endless Danielson, as readers know. Soon I should qualify for three college credits in Danielson’s Rubric 101. We even sat around reading Danielson’s book, the world according to Charlotte.

I shouldn’t be too snippy. It’s not Charlotte’s fault we are doing a CAT scan’s worth of in-depth investigation into how we will be evaluated. If most of our professional development time in the last year has gone to learning about the new system of teacher evaluations, that’s the district’s choice. Many districts have been dedicating time to Danielson, of course, and with good reason. I had to laugh at a Facebook cartoon recently; On top, the cartoon listed the old system of teacher evaluation with the words, “You are a dedicated teacher!” On the bottom, the new system of evaluations said, “You suck. Prove me wrong.” The cartoon was funny because it’s getting closer and closer to true. I handed my Assistant Principal about four pounds worth of data and ancillary supportive materials before my evaluation, proof essentially that I did not suck. My final evaluation ran about 22 pages, I think. I’m not sure. I haven’t read it. I signed off on it anyway. One of the charms of deciding to leave your place of employment has to be stuffing your evaluation in a cubby and losing it immediately. Frankly, I’m too busy to read the damn thing.

One of the academic coaches has come up with a list of words I am supposed to read with all of my classes every day. Another coach has come up with a list of math problems I am supposed to do with my classes a couple of day a week. We were supposed to be doing choral reading a few days a week during all our classes. I rather think that choral reading may have lapsed. I’m afraid to ask for fear I will find out I am wrong. We were supposed to be doing multiplication chanting a couple of days a week. I still sometimes do this. They like chanting. They also like shouting out their new sight words. In the meantime, I have lesson plans and actual instruction to fit into these classes as well, with quizzes in math that I am giving weekly. I am supposed to analyze the data from those quizzes to share with my team during one of the daily meetings once each week. The Dean has a new 100% form I am supposed to fill out, some form of self-analysis. Mine got all wet. I have to borrow another one. I am helping a math teacher by making keys for some quizzes. I have to find my protractors. I have to call parents and fill out various papers for any disciplinary issues I encounter. The coaches want an analysis of the new software for the new software company. I think I may be caught up on the various required surveys in my in-box except for the one from the four-hour training last night after school. I am supposed to read another chapter and a half of Danielson’s book for an upcoming professional development day focused on “utilizing the Danielson Framework to dig deeply into student intellectual engagement.” Somewhere in this mess I have to find time to tutor some students. I am also going to continue this post later since I have more details to stick in this litany but I also have grading to do.

Eduhonesty: My mail is such an adventure. What will it be today? A message telling me we are having a science fair in two weeks? A new software program to create openers to supplant the openers that supplanted the last set of openers? Perhaps a poetry contest? A spreadsheet to record students who can multiply all numbers up to 12? A new PARCC practice program? A list of the teachers who were more than five minutes late putting in yesterday’s attendance? The possible surprises are endless.

First, I need to go look for those protractors, though.