Light at the End of the Tunnel

I finally saw the light at the end of the tunnel this past week for my National Boards. I successfully finished and shipped my portfolio on Wednesday (it was ready to ship Tuesday), and now all I have to do is take the assessment portion. It was quite a relief to finally mail the portfolio. It had to be post marked by March 31st. I managed to ship mine a week early and right on time according to my schedule. It was a grueling process, but not many things worth doing are easy.

It did seem like a long week and there are two reasons for that really. The first was that we had student led conferences on Monday and Tuesday. I was at school both days by 7:30, which isn't unusual for me. Monday I was on my way home close to five. Tuesday, however, was a late night, and I didn't head home until after six. Nevertheless, I felt the conferences went really well. I felt better prepared, the parents seemed better prepared, and as a rule the students were better prepared.

The second reason this has been a long week has everything to do with me being a control freak with a need to be busy. I regularly over plan for the time I have because I want to know what we'll be doing every minute of class. When I'm out, I tend to leave very detailed plans complete with a time line. But this past week has been out of my hands more or less.

We began the first part of the week with a journal about the CECHS Book Club. I wanted them to tell me about their book, as well as, how they felt collaborating online and with the juniors. (On a side note, I've added video tutorials to help groups with their wiki.) So far about half of the groups have created their wikis. Of those, several have been very active and have a great start on the project.

After the journal, it was time to work. The second part of the week, I made some announcements, and it was right back to work. The light at the end of our animation tunnel is growing brighter. Most groups have their audio recorded; I'll try to post them this week on the podcast page of my website. I did post pictures from one group that is a little ahead. The sets and characters are coming together, and I'm excited to film this week.

Of course, my wife is convinced that the our baby will be arriving this week. I doubt it only because I am completely prepared for him to show up this week. I've prerecorded lessons for this week, just in case we do have the baby, and I'm out when it's time to put our movies together. That way someone will only have to push play and pause and we can still finish our short story animations this week.

Time will tell, but the house is filling with baby stuff, and he'll be arriving soon that's for sure!! And we will be finishing our short story animations this week, so I'm looking forward to a fun and exciting week either way!