Awkward Ann: Under Pressure

Hello friends, family, and strangers (I flatter myself)! I am a recently-graduated girl finding my way in the "real world" (apparently, I've been floating around the fake world for the past two decades). Many of my friends' "real world"s consist of cubicles, nine-to-fives, marriage, babies, and other such grown-up things. My real world looks a little different. Yes, I still get up and go to work every morning, same as they do. But instead of battling fax machines, computer programs, disgruntled spouses and dirty diapers, I arm myself against a legion of 14-year-old boys. Well, 83 of them to be exact. You see, I teach 8th-grade boys' Science in an inner-city, high-poverty school. What it is not: glamorous, prestigious, boring. What it is: humorous, heartbreaking, and the most challenging thing I will ever do.

The stories I tell and the people I describe are real; you can't make this stuff up. If you are new to my blog, I hope you'll start at the beginning and fall in love with its characters, just as I have.

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Under Pressure

It is the night before my first day. Well, my second first day. Which is infinitely better than the first first day, but still a little scary. I've made my copies, finalized my lesson, set up my room and said my prayers.

I know you're ready for entertaining stories where someone jumps out my window or tries to date me or imitates my mannerisms, but honestly I'm not. It might make for a boring blog, but I'd actually like to come home and write:

"Today in first block I taught the difference between relative and absolute age. I didn't get interrupted. Everyone stayed in their desks and did all of their work. Dante called Anthony "fat," but I got on to him and he apologized. Then I did the same thing three more times and called it a day. The end."

I feel the tremendous pressure to set things up perfectly tomorrow to ensure that that vision is more of a reality. Here we go...

Laters.