Updates and Portfolio preparation

Well, so.... I'm a slacker. 

I know it. As much as I wanted to keep up with my blog all year, it didn't happen. But I hope to be much better at it next year! I just got busy! What can I say! I also think that it doesn't help that sometime shortly after I finished my master's degree in December, my laptop gave out on me. The computer itself was fine, but the screen didn't work, and it was too much of a pain to hook it up to the TV with the HDMI cable. A new computer was not in the budget and any minimal computing that I did need to do could be done on Dan's computer. So I never got the flexibility to sit around and blog much. However, I got a new laptop for my birthday on Friday, so I hope to be much better this summer!

SO today marks my 3rd Monday since the move, so I consider it to be my 3rd Monday of summer vacation. Where has time gone? So quick recap: After Dan got a job transfer to the Atlanta corporate office within his company, we decided this would be the perfect time to make our transition back home. After all, I grew up in Alpharetta, spent 5 years in Statesboro, and 2 in Augusta. It was about time we headed home to be closer to family. It was a HUGE decision because of the wedding coming up in July, so we knew it was going to be a crazy summer. But we also knew that everything would eventually work out, and so far it has!

On Monday #1, I found an email from a principal in an amazing elementary school at a top-notch school system in the metro-Atlanta area, wanting to interview! Luckily, I was able to set up an interview for the next day, so I hustled to get my portfolio updated. I will say that I'm very proud of the final product and hope to post pictures later. I probably spent too much time on it, but I had a goal in mind, and that goal was to make my first interview of the summer also my last (I was just really dreading having to interview all summer and not know what I would be teaching in the fall).

Well, all the hardwork on my portfolio definitely paid off. I had the best interview of my life, probably due to the principal's awesome personality. After she called my first reference (the principal at my school from this previous year), she called me (probably 10 minutes after I left) to OFFER ME A JOB!! I was so so so excited. I thought I was dreaming. It was absolutely definitely positively 100% HANDS DOWN the most excited I had been in a lonnnnnnnnnnnnnng time. The thrill of knowing that I got a job on the 2nd day of my summer vacation, and knowing that the search was over was just HUGE! So from there, I decided to relax.

It took an entire week to get my new routine figured out. Walking the dogs 10 billion times a day has been a huge adjustment for me, considering we had the luxury of a fenced in back yard at our Augusta house. I never walked them, because I could just let them out before and after meals, and whenever in between. It was great because they could stay outside and lounge in the sun ALL DAY on the weekends, and they just LOVED it. Now that we're temporarily staying with my mom, and due to the fact that she has no fenced-in backyard, we have no choice but to leash them. This is super annoying, because my dogs STRONGLY DISLIKE leashes, but if we take them off, they like to run away :( . So as I have been settling into my new routine, I've also been doing a lot of lounging and relaxing. Who wouldn't?! I worked hard for the past few years, and this is my first summer of not working (purposely so that I could find a job-which I already did- and find a new house and focus on the last of the wedding preparations). So that brings us up-to-date. :)

Okay, so after I did all this preparation for my interview, I realized that it might be helpful to share it with some of my new teacher friends who just graduated this past year. So, my treat to you is a template for what I used. It is in a word document, complete with comments to help you make it your own. You need to delete the comments as you go, so that it will not print funny. If your school system uses the TKES evaluation system, this would be a perfect portfolio template for you! Each section addresses each of the 10 standards. As an added bonus, I included a self-assessment at the bottom for you to complete to help yourself identify your strengths and weaknesses to create professional goals from. As a trial school, we were required to do this self-assessment at the beginning of last year, and I printed out all of my evaluation results from throughout the year to add to my portfolio. It was never looked at it, but as a new teacher, you can never be TOO prepared, and it may help you get your thoughts together for your big day. I hope it helps!

Click here to get the portfolio template!

When you click on the link, it will bring you to the Google Drive document. You need to DOWNLOAD it and save it to your computer so you can edit it and make the changes yourself. Please email me if you have any questions!