This morning, a memory jumped up on Facebook: a year ago, I posted publicly that I had accepted a job at Roseville and would be leaving Forest Lake that month. It was the hardest decision I have made in my career. At that time, I believed it was the right choice and this year has generally supported my belief. Still, leaving mid-year, while continuing to coach through January at Forest Lake, felt pretty traumatic. I cried a lot. I gained weight. I doubted myself over and over. I wondered if I should even continue teaching.

In a lot of ways, I’m still healing from everything that happened over the year leading up to my departure from Forest Lake. The culture change between Forest Lake and Roseville was pretty jarring and I’m still learning a lot about my new community. I see pictures and posts from my Flake colleagues and I miss the good people I worked with, both teachers and students. As I prepared to go back to school this August, I was hit with an onslaught of vivid dreams where I was back teaching at Forest Lake, that things were really awkward, and that I felt even more isolated than when I chose to leave. The anxiety from teaching in a new school (the middle school) and traveling between them this year increased the impact of the negative dreams. The beginning of the school year was difficult.

I’ve settled into a rhythm, even though it’s hectic and crazy and I am just barely keeping everything together. I am learning so much working at both the middle school and the high school. That’s a post for another day (and I PROMISE that post is coming because I’ve been really reflecting on everything). One thing I’ve learned is I kind of like having the brief drive between buildings – it’s just a couple miles, but even when it’s raining out, I get to get a breath of fresh air, eat a quick, healthy snack (I’ve been having an apple), and clear my mind a little bit. I can run through my afternoon lesson plans in my head and look for any potential problems or I can just listen to some upbeat music for a few minutes. We’ll see how much I like it when it’s snowing, but I feel like it’s still going to be nice.

Most importantly, I feel like I’m becoming part of the community. I have repeat students from last year and it’s so nice to have that connection with kids where they are comfortable coming in (for the most part) and we can just move forward together because there is some trust built up. Other students from last year have been dropping by in between classes and after school to say hi and tell me about their summers. My middle school students, as squirrelly and challenging and different as they are, have been a bright part of my new year. They are funny and goofy and sincere and random. I don’t think I am a “great” middle school teacher yet, but I am getting better at it every day.

I think the major difference between the schools has been in the general philosophies they seem to espouse. After spending so long at Forest Lake with the drive for academic rigor centered in our educational practices, it has been a shift to move to a more holistic, more relationship-centered school like Roseville.

When I started my career in 2000, I was a holistic, student-centered teacher. My students and I did creative projects and service learning and experimented with different ways of learning. By the time I left Forest Lake, I don’t think I was using my creativity or experimenting nearly as much as could have or should have. Moving to a school that encouraged positive relationship-building and culturally relevant curriculum/pedagogy was a big change. I think I forgot how to do some of the things that came naturally to me earlier on in my career. I was suddenly a beginner again, new and wobbly and unsure of myself. I still am. But I’m in a place that more closely aligns with my values and beliefs as an educator, even as I’m still growing into how to live those values.

There’s still a lot to process. I’m working on it.