The Last Day of School

I haven't been this excited about the last day of school since I was a student in high school, at least. Now, as a teacher, it's even more exciting than it was before. It's not just days off that I'm looking forward to, but one hell of a vacation. Have I mentioned that I'm already basically on vacation all the time because I live abroad and get to experience something new at every corner? Oh, well I guess I have then. The last day of school today was a real treat, and let me tell you why.

I showed up as usual right at 8:30am. The homeroom teachers were all in a really good mood, and the air conditioner was already on in the office. These are usually signs that it's going to be a really good day! My coteacher came in and I asked if the schedule would be any different today, after all, it IS the last day of school. She replied "Oh yes. You do nothing today! I'm envious!" and I smiled. Then she explained that because of the municipal office of education's policies about paying native teachers for documents, I could earn some extra cash by having extensive lesson plans and powerpoint presentations ready for summer camp on Monday. Then she said that the native teachers should leave at noon because they wanted to lock the school up. And then, as if it couldn't get any better, she said that the native teachers were not to come to work tomorrow.

I managed to finish up one lesson plan, worksheet, and powerpoint combination before I left school, and I have all day on my much-faster-than-work laptop to get the other two done. Monday we have summer English camp from 1-4 at school, and we're meeting our coteacher downtown to buy some prizes at the English bookstore for the kids. We do camp 3 days and then we're keeping our desks warm on Thursday and Friday. Oh yeah, when we come in to warm the desks, we only have to stay until noon. Gotta love the fact that the school has concerns over using too much power and would rather just lock the building down!

So the semester has come to a close, my first semester as a "real" teacher (in all senses except for having to do all the admin work a real teacher does) has been pretty successful, and I'm excited about the summer. What's not to love?