Here are some facts about Lake Air:
- this is the first year it has been Intermediate (5th and 6th only!)
- there will be approx. 540 students
- there are 35 classrooms and 44 teachers
- the demographics are 39.26% black 41.11% Hispanic 19.26% white 0.37% Asian
- it is an IB-MYP candidate school
Since this is the first year that the school has been an Intermediate school, it means that 98% of the teachers are new to the campus AND it means all 100% of our students are new!!! This is exciting for me because I do not even feel like an outsider coming in, everyone is getting to know everyone and it has allowed me to just slip right in! I'm also the only Baylor Intern at the school and so it makes me feel even more like I'm a real teacher! My mentor teacher seems amazing and has even lived in Carrollton for a short time! She had Jessica Russell last year as an intern who is also from Carrollton and grew up in FBCC! This made us have a connection right off the bat and conversation just started flowing! I have a desk at the back of the room and have my own little set-up which I love. I will be bringing my laptop every day which isn't something I was counting on, but not a big deal! I am very interested to see how an intermediate school works because the 5th and 6th grade are verrry different! The 5th graders are on team teach and do not follow a bell schedule, while the 6th graders are on the bell schedule and the teachers are split into core departments. The 5th graders will have assigned lunch tables and recess, while the 6th grade can eat wherever and have PE 3 days a week and Health 2 days a week. There is a new curriculum that Waco ISD is implementing that is going to be very rigorous, but we don't even have to write lesson plans anymore. I have the first 17 days of the curriculum and its 130 pages front and back. The difficult part will be that the curriculum has not left any days for "reteach" or if you get behind we aren't sure how to catch up yet!
This is also the first year we are an IB candidate school. This stands for International Baccalaureate Middle Years Program. We will be doing certain things with the community and have 10 focus words that we spend a lot of time on during the year. If the students graduate highschool with their IB certificate, it is a world known accomplishment. All the boarding schools and international schools have been obtaining this IB certification, so if we become an IB school it will be a huge deal!!! Because of this we have 2 conference periods this year. So my schedule goes like this:
1st, 2nd, 3rd, conference period, 5th, 6th, 7th, IB planning period
Overall, I'm very excited and have been looking over my rosters all weekend!! I've already been cutting fraction strips (over 600 of them!) for the year and what I'm sure will be my wonderful 123 students!!! I'm pretty sure it will take lots of prayer and patience to get through the year, but I'm ready for it!!
I found that quote I was looking for:
"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond imagination. It is our light more than our darkness which scares us. We ask ourselves – who are we to be brilliant, beautiful, talented, and fabulous. But honestly, who are you to not be so?
You are a child of God, small games do not work in this world. For those around us to feel peace, it is not example to make ourselves small. We were born to express the glory of god that lives in us. It is not in some of us, it is in all of us. While we allow our light to shine, we unconsciously give permission for others to do the same. When we liberate ourselves from our own fears, simply our presence may liberate others."