Sunday, November 12, 2006

efficiency is not a virtue

Yesterday I sat at the schoolroom table, surrounded by lessons, books, and my planning book trying to get the next 9 weeks organized. It was overwhelming thinking of all the schoolwork that the children and I will have do over the next few months. Writing exercises are the toughest because they involve one-on-one time, a rarity in our house, and there are a lot of these coming up.
Seton recommends doing lesson planning weekly, rather than a whole quarter in one session, but I thought this way was more efficient. Doing it in one session worked for K, 1st, and 2nd grades because most of the instructions for each subject are simple, "pg 35-36". However, in 3rd grade and I'm sure more so later on, the plans are more complex.
So I was getting increasingly crabby and stressed out over something that hasn't even happened yet because I want to be organized to the hilt. My bad mood put a damper on the rest of the evening and then gave me bad dreams. The whole episode helped me realize that I need to focus more on cultivating kindness and gentleness in my own self rather than to simply be efficient.

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