Nov. 18, 2016
10:30 pm
Beijing, China
So what does a teacher at EF do when they don’t have any classes for the day? Here’s what we do. We sit on our phones and play Tetris. We are free to leave work at whatever time we like to do whatever it is we want. But, most importantly, we organize marshmallow gun wars with the students and parents.
Okay, did anyone actually believe that? I certainly hope not. If so, I want you to know that gullible is written on your ceiling. Actually, having no classes all day is kind of a blessing and a curse. It’s awesome because you get to lesson plan for all of the other classes you have without worrying about teaching for the day. But it also stinks because you don’t get done nearly as much as you think you will. An hour goes by so much quicker than you would ever expect, especially when you’re concentrating on something. Also, I was only kinda joking about the marshmallow war thing. I mean, obviously we don’t play that with the parents, but it’s not unusual for an object to go flying across the teacher’s office.
I love the atmosphere in which I work. You could imagine that a teacher’s office would be very quiet with everyone working on their lesson plans and focusing on what they’re going to be teaching next. In fact, our office is the exact opposite. It’s usually exceedingly loud and incredibly chaotic. There are teachers yelling across the office to ask others question. There are TAs coming out of no where to do tasks for who knows why. There’s usually someone goofing off (*cough cough* Adam *cough cough*) and someone telling that person off (*cough cough* Susan *cough cough*). In fact, the other day I actually played “baseball” with two of the teachers in the hallway. It’s crazy in our office, so you can understand that it’s often extremely hard to concentrate. Even when most of the teachers are in classes, there’s still a ton of work to do and it never seems to get done quickly.
That’s what today looked like for me. My Fridays so far have nothing. I really shouldn’t say that because I know I’m going to jinx it, but it’s true. Aside from a teacher meeting at 1:00 and a short training, I have nothing but planning time for the day. It was super helpful today because I have 6 classes this weekend. I’m feeling a little bit overwhelmed trying to plan for them. Again, I’m trying not to stress and remember that it doesn’t have to be perfect, but I want to be prepared. Today I finished most of my planning for tomorrow’s classes, but the result was me staying until the mall closed today. I need to be better about my time management in the future. To make up for it, though, I’m going to stay up a little longer and finish my last lesson for tomorrow. Then it’s off to bed so that I’m not exhausted for the long weekend ahead. Man, this schedule is taking some time to get used to.
As a quick note, remember how I said we were getting a new teacher today? I lied. We didn’t get a new teacher today. We got two! Again, where they think we’re going to put these people, I don’t know. Luckily we’ve got 2 weeks to try to figure it out.
Words to Remember: Hebrews 2:6-10
Challenge: Think of Abba’s glory. What does the passage say about J—s? “For a little while [He] was made lower than the angels… crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death” (ESV v. 9) Because of the suffering of death! Think of what this means. You know when you’re going through a tough time and people tell you something like, “Just look for the silver lining.” Most of the time they’re encouraging you to look for something positive in that moment. But I believe this passage is saying something different. Because of His suffering, He was crowned with glory and honor. Granted, He is J—s, so He already had those qualities. But instead of looking for the positive in that moment of suffering, think to the future. Think about what you will receive by going through this suffering. What can you gain? What can you learn? How will this make you stronger? Believe that Abba is there with you. While I don’t believe that everything happens for a reason, because we live in a broken world where Evil holds too much power, I do believe that Abba can use any situation for His will. Believe that no matter what you’re going through right now Abba has something greater in store for you. All you have to do is trust that He will see you through.
Bless,
Kristen
PS. I’ll take some pictures of the office tomorrow and post them so you can all see what our office looks like.
