Balancing Out Stress From Work

I know that I've been less than faithful with my posting schedule, but everything is a little hectic at the moment.

School work is picking up, I'm starting to have more homework to do and more things to memorize; and on top of that I have my job and report cards to write.

Many people are confused when I say that I have report cards to write, but I do them for the swimming lesson classes I teach.

For the term I'm working, there's a total of 10 weeks, therefore 10 classes. By around the 7th or 8th week, we start to write report cards for the kids in the classes, hand them in to the looked over for week 9 and then hand them out on week 10.

I thought that it would be a breeze, but I was very wrong.

I have many classes with little kids and I can't say that many of them are passing.

They all have the same main problem which is they can't float.

While writing report cards, I can't wright the same thing in them because of they're friends within classes and parents compare report cards, that doesn't reflect too well on myself.

There's only oh so many ways you can word "Remember to squeeze your bum and to look up at the ceiling to help you float!"

Personalizing every single report cards wasn't the issue, it was the phrasing.

However I have managed to get almost all of them done, I believe that I have completed around 65 report cards and only have 10 more.

I didn't realize that I taught so many kids.

As you could imaging, 65 report cards with 10 more to go, schoolwork and general life events have made it difficult for me to write.

My Sunday evening was spent at the dining room table, report cards and worksheets all around me.

I love blogging, it's something that I want to do seriously when I'm older, but at the moment other things such as work and school will have to come first.

Admittedly, I've been feeling stressed because of the report cards.

I honestly wondered if teaching and writing a total of 75 report cards was worth it when I could make sandwiches or pour coffee into a cup for the same amount of money.

Then I realized that it was.

It's such a great feeling when a kid gets something right after weeks of working on it and you can pass them to the next level.

Writing so many report cards is worst is because you get to know these kids over the span of 10 weeks and you get to know their personalities and some of them you grow to like.

One father asked if I would have his daughter next term and I honestly hope so because even though she didn't cover all of the skills, she was always smiling and having fun and that's what makes my job great.

There's always going to be a stressful factor whether it's report cards, the environment you work in, the location, the people, the coworkers; but if there's something to balance out that stress, then you know it's worth it.

One More Girl, no longer online

Having Too Much On Your Plate

Yes, it is Thursday and not my usual Wednesday post, but here's my reason as to why my bi-weekly post is late:

I was tired.

I haven't had the greatest sleep pattern since school as started, I've been going to bed very late with headaches, waking up early with headaches and it's not the greatest cycle for me.

I spend the majority of my day with headaches and I shouldn't be.

With all of this going on, I also work all day Saturday and then Sunday morning.

By the time Sunday afternoon comes around, I'm tired and I don't want to do all that much.

My plate is already full. My weeks have been pretty eventful.

Yesterday, I was in class when I received an email notification.

I'm in a Facebook group for work, and every time someone posts, I get an email notification.

It was a co-worker of mine looking for a teaching substitute to cover his 4:15-8:15 shift.

Four hours is a long time to be working as a teacher. It's a long time in the pool and you're bound to get cold within the first hour and a half.

I didn't know whether or not I wanted cover his shift, but after talking with my mom, I decided to take the shift because I could get more experience, get as many favours as possible, and I do need to earn money.

I ended up really enjoying the shift. I did get very cold about halfway through, but I made it to the end.

My last class was suppose to end at 8:15, but it went over until 8:20-8:25. There's absolutely no problem with that, it's just that I was so tired.

I got home at maybe 9:15, had supper, lied on my bed with full intention of writing a post, but I kept drifting off to sleep.

When I took that extra shift, I thought that I was doing it for me, I thought that I was doing it to earn money to put towards a trip, but I realized that I was wrong.

I also took that shift because I didn't want my coworker to worry. I didn't ask why, but I didn't want him to worry the whole day over if he would get a substitute for the shift or not.

It's not my responsibility. We are a facility with 30+ employees, I'm not the only one who would've been able to take the shift, I was the first to offer.

I shouldn't feel stressed or anxious about my evening if I'm taking someone else's shift. I'm doing it because I can, but sometimes I do it because I think I have to.

It is not my responsibility to make sure that someone else's shift is cover when I'm not working. Of course I can take the shift if I don't have any homework and I'm feeling okay, but there are supervisors that could have also covered his shift.

I should feel stressed over someone else's shift, that's not what I signed up for.

I'm going to plan my day and make sure that I have everything under control before I take on any extra shifts.


One More Girl, no longer online

My First Ever Work Shift

Oh my goodness.

Today, I had my first ever proper job shift.

As some of you know, I'm a certified swim teacher and as I was lounging around my house this afternoon, I had a family friend text me to say that he was sick and he needed a sub tonight to cover his classes and he asked me if I could.

I figured that this would be a good way to ease myself into teaching on my own  rather than to have my own classes for a first time experience.

I was pretty nervous before I started. Me being me, my mind automatically raced to all the possibilities of things going wrong. Easy enough to say, I psyched myself out.

However, a pool supervisor told me that he would be in the pool with all of the classes today, so if I needed a hand I could call him over to help. That helped me relaxed a bit.

My first class was with an older level, but there was only one girl out of two who showed up.

Honestly, only having one girl to teach boosted my confidence.

I didn't have to jump into a class with six, three years old, kids where half of them didn't listen. I had to teach one girl who was ready to learn, liked to swim and I slowly gained confidence during that first class.

I had a total of five classes in the three hours of my shift, and that's not bad at all.

I was worried that I wouldn't have enough things to do with all the students, but I ended up having plenty to do with almost all of the classes.

When it came to my last lesson, it was a private lesson for a little boy in one, I started to run out of things to do, but he was pretty interested in the bottom of the pool, so for the last two minutes a let him see the bottom of the pool in between two last floats.

I was impressed by most of the kids attention. Of course, it's harder with the younger kids, but all of the older kids were great!

I had a younger group with a little boy and a little girl in the group, but the little boy's aunt and grandmother were also at the pool. Usually that's no problem, but his aunt came over to talk to him during the lesson and that completely derailed and distracted him and he wouldn't listen to me anymore.

I couldn't tell the aunt that I need her to leave in fear of seeming rude, so I said "Hey, hop back in, bud! The lesson isn't over yet!" and the aunt understood that she had to step back for a little while longer and she understood that.

My only other troubled time was when I had six students from the ages of three to five. One of them was not listening to me at all, he didn't want to participate in the class and do what everyone else was doing and the supervisor saw me struggling a little bit, so he came over to help me out with him.

I taught the other five kids while he dealt with that one student.

Overall, I think I had a pretty good first shift.

I was nervous about so many things, but I got over those as more lessons went by and there was other staff around if I needed any help.

Your first shift is always the one you get the most worked up about whether it's with nerves or anxiety, but as soon as you get it over and done with, you realize that it isn't nearly as bad as you thought it could be.

I'm really happy that I took this shift, I feel more comfortable teaching in the water (granted I haven't made any of my own lesson plans) and I feel as though this is a job that I can do well.


One More Girl, no longer online