A Day in the Life of a Teacher Family

I'm writing this post on behalf of my family. My husband and I are both teachers and we have two amazing sons, Jack and Ben. They live our busy lives right along with us. I know that our professions affect our boys because I, too, was a child of 2 educators, as was my husband. Since an educator's job doesn't end when you leave the building, our 3 year old and 5 month old are definitely entrenched in what we do. 

I remember many a night of traveling with my dad's varsity basketball team to games and doing homework in the stands. I remember staying after school with my mom and cutting out her laminated things. I remember weekends of helping to grade the easy stuff. I remember helping to crank the old carbon copy duplicator and erasing endless transparencies. I remember watching my dad fall asleep while grading AP English papers. And here I am, doing it all again (thankfully, with much better technology). 

My husband teaches 3rd grade about 35 minutes to our west and I teach 7th and 8th grade math about 25 minutes to our east. We teach in COMPLETELY different worlds! (But that's for another post)

Our day starts early. I am generally up with the baby a couple of times a night nursing, so I generally cobble together 6 hours of sleep. When I'm up at night, I spend that time diving into the MTBoS on my iphone in the dark. I get a shocking amount done at 2:30am! I shower the night before, so my morning is spent nursing Ben. This is from about 6 to 7. I grab breakfast, that my hubby prepares for me, brush my hair, get Jack up, get dressed, and fly out the door by 7:20. Jason's morning starts about 5, sometimes earlier if report cards are due soon or something. He gets up, works on school stuff for about an hour, gets everybody's lunches ready, gets my pumping paraphernalia packed up, and makes breakfast. After I leave, he is left to balance both boys, get Jack fed, get their bags packed, and get out the door no later than 8. I haven't witnessed this, but I'm certain it's impressive! 

He brings the boys to his school for daycare. He somehow manages to get in the door with bags and lunch boxes for all 3 of them and with Ben in his carseat. Again, I haven't witnessed this, but, wow! He gets the boys settled into the infant room and then the preschool, and then it's off to his classroom just in time for the kids to come in. 

I don't know exactly how an elementary teacher's day goes, but I know it's busy! Some days he doesn't fit in a lunch break. This is because any spare moment not with the students teaching all subjects, needs to be spent prepping for the next day. Pretty much as soon as school is out, he goes to pick up the boys so they can be home by 5ish. Because of this, he has no time in his classroom before or after school...I won't even pretend to know how difficult his job is. 

On the other side of town, I get to work just in time as well. My first three classes are back to back 7th grade math. Class sizes range from 25 to 30 this year, big improvement from my 39 last year! After 3rd hour I eat lunch in the lounge unless there's something going on, like having to sub on my prep. After lunch is my prep time, which I start with 30-40 minutes of pumping depending on how quickly I can setup and clean up. I spend the remainder of prep getting lessons ready for the next day, grading/recording 150 papers, contacting parents, making copies, filling out endless forms, organizing evidence for my binder, and/or  creating activities and assessments to match our newest school improvement initiative. (I used to be the SI chair, but I needed a year off with the new baby...best decision ever. I'd be drowning by now if I still had that responsibility!) After prep I have one more 7th grade math and then advanced 7th graders taking 8th grade math to finish the day. After school, I finish getting ready for the next day's lessons. I'm creating everything new this year because of the common core, my first attempt at ISN's, and my general attempt to do things better after reading so much from the MTBoS. It's been really hard and really rewarding work, but that's a different post, too. 

If I'm going to be working for more than a half hour at school then I need another pump session. Otherwise, I pump again as soon as I get home.  Then the clown car gets home. I take Ben and play with him until he's ready to nurse again, usually within the next hour. At the same time, I talk to Jack about his day. If needed, Jason and Jack run to the market. We buy a lot of fresh produce for meals, so trips to the market are about 3 times a week. I continue nursing Ben throughout the evening (this is his hungry period) while trying to interact with Jack. This usually means reading books since I'm sort of stuck to the couch nursing. Jason works on dinner (making yummy food from scratch, no cans or boxes) and gets all the lunch containers and pumping paraphernalia washed. (If he doesn't have time now then he does it later in the evening, usually around midnight.) We eat dinner together, Ben's usually nursing still, so it's a bit of juggling. I grab a quick shower while Jason plays with the boys. We work together to get the boys ready for bed around 7:30. I spend the next hour and a half or more nursing Ben and getting him down for the night. Jason plays with Jack for another hour or so while I do that and then gets him to bed. He lays down on Jack's floor for a bit and usually falls asleep too until I go in and kick him. :) Then he cleans up the kitchen, if that hasn't happened yet. Most nights he does school work at this point, some nights he works out in the basement afterwards, and at some point he comes to bed (I think). Sometimes he's coming to bed just as Ben is getting up for a 2am feeding. And we're back to the start!

Hmm... Things I forgot...there's usually a load of laundry in there somewhere and while I pump at home I'm usually trying to pay bills, make phone calls before businesses close, or dealing with school stuff for the boys. If I have time before the boys get home, I fold and put away laundry that we're behind on. When did I have time to write this, you ask?  While nursing, of course!

I keep telling myself that things will be easier when Ben is older, but I know that in reality things will be just as hard in all new ways!