Day in Life: First Week of School

I’m done with my first week of school! I’m teaching 8th, 9th and 10th grade. I can’t believe I have students who were born in the 2000s; where is the time going?

My schedule is keeping me on my toes. The workweek is Sunday through Thursday, which is hard to get used to. I keep saying “This is due on Friday… I mean Thursday,” and students laugh. Students are also correcting my pronunciation of names. Hana, Malak and Jana are popular girl’s names, and Mohamed, Omar and Youssef for the boys.

I thought I would do a very simple “Day in the Life” post. I will probably do a more detailed one once I get more into a routine.

6:00 a.m. Wake up, make breakfast and get ready for school.

6:30 a.m. The first week, I left home at this time to walk about 2 km to the bus stop. I love Cairo in the mornings. It’s cool, breezy and quiet. My new schedule, I will catch a bus at 6:50 a.m. in my neighborhood. The bus leaves around 7:00/7:10 a.m.

7:30ish a.m. Arrive at school. I go straight to my classroom, turn on the air conditioning and start the day.

7:55 a.m. School starts. We either have an assembly where students line up outside by homeroom or students come to homeroom right away. I have a 9th grade homeroom class.

8:15 a.m.–3:05 p.m. The school day. My schedule changes every day, but I usually teach three or four classes a day. Lunch is about 45 minutes long. I have lunch supervisory duty once a week. It is so hot midday that most students eat their lunch in the shade. Though the boys play soccer (“football”) and come to class drenched in sweat.

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3:15 p.m. Bus leaves for home. The bus ride home is an interesting time to peer out the window at the traffic and things going by.

3:45/4 p.m. I’m home! Thankful to have a relatively short commute there and back.

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4:00 p.m. to…? I make dinner and pass out on the couch. The first week I was in bed by 7:00 or 8:00 p.m. I haven’t had a lot of papers to grade at home yet. That will probably change once we get into the swing of things.