The Right Thing to Do

I have both a sense of loss and a sense of accomplishment. School is over. Technically it was over on Friday, but since I am moving to second grade next year, I had to pack my old room and move to a new room on the other wing of the building. I am sure moving to second grade will end up being a good change. It will challenge me to learn and grow as a teacher and hopefully, I will be able to get these young children excited about reading and help them learn and develop. But I have loved teaching third grade. I like the age...old enough to be fairly independent, but young enough to still be (mostly) sweet and innocent. I like the curriculum...force and motion, sun and moon, heat and light, South America compared to North America. But mostly, I love who I work with. Brenda has become one of my closest friends and we collaborate on almost everything we do. This has helped us both tremendously, cutting our work load and helping us both to grow and learn from each others' strengths. So as I said at first, there is a sense of loss to not be working with her and to leave a classroom filled with memories. But I've spent the past two days packing and moving into the new classroom, going through everything I own as a teacher to decide what to keep and what to toss or give away. And I basically finished moving in. So that feels great!

So, many people have asked why I'm moving to second grade and if I'm excited. The answer is more complicated than I usually share. I have very mixed feelings. But moving to second grade was the right thing to do. We have a bilingual program at my school. It is usually K-3, although it used to go to 5th grade. This year we had such a small 3rd grade group that there were only enough students to have 2 classes, so there was no bilingual third grade. But the plan was to have bilingual in third next year. When we began looking at staffing for next year, we found that there were too many teachers in the upper grades. So the plan was to move one of them into third grade and then we wouldn't have bilingual in third grade. Stopping a bilingual program at second grade is not what is best for kids, though, and our bilingual program is working and helping a lot of kids. I truly believe it is what is best for our students...and I wasn't always convinced of that. But at first, it appeared that we would be losing our bilingual program...or at least shortening it to K-2. But as we looked at various options, I realized there was another possibility. I honestly hated to mention it, but since one of our second grade teachers was retiring, I could move to second grade, one of the 4th or 5th grade teachers could take my spot and then we could still hire a bilingual teacher for third grade. And so that is what was decided. I said up front that if another solution could be found, I would prefer another solution. But I was willing to move if we felt it was what would be best for kids. And so after looking at various options, that is what the school decided to do. So a 5th grade teacher moved to fourth, a fourth grade teacher moved to 3rd and I'm moving to second (although I'm the only one that actually has to move physically since 3rd-5th are in the same wing). So when I say it isn't really by choice, that is true, but I wasn't forced to go either. I am happy and comfortable in third grade and we are/were a good, strong team. But this is the right thing to do...and so I will do it. (I'm groaning now...I hope this didn't come off sounding all self-sacrificing or anything... just trying to explain my feelings and why I am moving.)