My First Day Teaching in Alaska:

So in-service started today. For those who are unfamiliar with in-service, it is basically the week teachers have to get the classroom ready for the students' arrival and to receive thousands of handouts on information about the school year.

Today started with a great breakfast provided my the PE (physical education) department and the kitchen staff. During breakfast, we went around the room and introduced ourselves and went over a few procedures for the year. After that, I was set loose to do my thing. For the first two hours in my classroom, I felt like a blind man playing baseball...no clue what's going on. I had no knowledge of what the previous teacher had done the year before, I had no idea where things where, and I had no idea what student played what instrument. I figured I should be doing SOMETHING...so I went through the music library. On first inspection, I noticed the literature in the library is mostly crappy pop "Crowd Pleasers" and mid '90's Disney tripe. The jazz band literature is actually pretty solid and the orchestra stuff is not bad, but I have a lot of searching to do if I am to find something decent for my choir and varsity/concert bands to play. At around 1pm, I left to grab lunch and to pick up some computer speakers from my hotel room...I was having a very difficult time functioning without music to listen to. When I returned to the school, I popped in a CD of Yair Dalal (if you like world music, go out right now and buy everything he has ever written!!!!) and got to work. The previous music teacher showed up around 3:30 and we went over some information that was VERY helpful. I finished up the day around 5.

After day 1, I feel surprisingly calm and confident; however, I am sure that will fade as August 20th gets closer day by day (the 20th is when the students show up.) Tomorrow is a lot of workshops with the whole district, so I will have the opportunity to meet many new people who's names I fill forget several seconds later!

Rock on
~Bobb