Results

I didn't certify this year.  It's intended to be a three-year process and only 40% certify the first year.

d-day

Tomorrow is D-day.  At 9:00 Eastern time, scores for last year's entries will be released.  I'm trying to decide when I'm going to look.  I don't think I'll be able to wait all day so I may try looking before I leave for work. I really don't know.  I'll post here when I'm ready to share the scores with the world.  It will be no later than Dec. 10, when the scores are released to the public.

A new direction

I've decided that I'm going to take this blog in a new direction.  In addition to blogging about my National Boards, I'm also going to make this my school blog.  

Today was an absolutely amazing day, one that reminds me of why I'm a music teacher.  It started out  sorta scary when I was nearly merged into on my way to school but got immediately better when I walked in and was congratulated on my job as a music teacher by a man who was leading the campfire sing along with our middle schoolers at leadership camp earlier this year.  They were great singers, willing to do anything, and knew most of the songs that were being sung.  At one point, I guess, this person just stopped singing to listen to my kids.  He told me that I have done a great job with them.  (ego booster #1)

Then, towards the end of the day I had two kids in separate classes (M and E) who were incredible.  M is new to our school this year and in the first grade.  I learned her name the first day of class...and that's not a good thing.  Today, she was totally focused and participating 100%.  E has been a challenge since kindergarten (he's in 2nd grade this year).  He used to just run around the room, being totally defiant and non-responsive.  This year, he's been responsive to directions, willing to do things that I ask, and today was the model student.  It was incredible to watch.  He was also giving me 100% effort and focus.  What a change from the last two years.  I made a point of talking with his mom after school today and she was so proud of him, and he was proud of himself.  This may be the hook that E needs to help him be successful in life, as he has so many odds stacked against him.  

Done!

Well, at least until November when I find out how done I really am. My assessment center was this morning. I had to drive nearly to Canada to take it. The drive wasn't too bad, though. I always like coming home from a new place better than getting there. On the way home, I know where I'm headed and how close I'm getting. Going, not so much.

How was it, you may ask? It wasn't too bad. The section I was worried about actually went really well, I think. A section I didn't even start studying (historical perspective) was trickier than I thought it would be. I ran out of time on several sections, but was able to get many good (at least I think they were good...) ideas in before the 30 minutes were up. I found through this whole process of getting ready for the assessment center that I really liked some of the things they asked me to do (here's a concept - come up with 6 ways to teach it that, within the 6, teach to the kinesthetic, aural, and visual learners.) That sort of thing, for me at least, was pretty easy to do. The composition was also fairly easy...I wonder how it sounds! lol. I did realize on the way home that I mislabeled something, but oh, well. Aside from the label, everything else was fairly accurate in that response.

I'm so glad to be totally done and not have anything else hanging over my head now. I am finally able to enjoy myself and not feel guilty for doing other things at home. Maybe now I can get through the Steph Plum books for once.

Tonight I'm hopefully going to celebrate a little bit with a friend and our kids. I can also enjoy the nice weather guilt-free. :-)

two days to go

I go to do my Assessment Center this weekend. Tomorrow night I drive two hours north, where I'll stay the night with a friend of my mom's on Friday and then Saturday morning, I'll go do my assessment center and drive home. I'm planning on going out with friends for dinner (with the kids) to celebrate being done ont he night of. Hopefully, the three of us will go to dinner to celebrate on Sunday night. (Jeffy's working until near 10 p.m. on Saturday night).

More when I'm done.

It's in!

I checked the UPS site today and my box was signed for at 10:30 a.m. Central time. It's in! Yay!!!!

My last meeting for national boards is tomorrow. We'll be talking about the Assessment Center. Hopefully having a bit of a party, too.

Today I got my binder and dividers for the AC stuff. I'll be printing things up soon to fill up the space in the binder.

Going, Going, Gone!

The Box is out the door. We had until 5:00 tonight to get it out tonight at the UPS store. It's gone. I watched it go out the door on the hand truck. I'm not quite sure what to do with myself now. Guess I'll need to learn how to relax a little bit this week, no? Right now, though, I'm on the verge of tears with the release of getting it all finished and out the door.

We're celebrating tonight with pizza and a movie.

Getting closer!

I have what I feel are good, solid working drafts of all of my entries. Now it's time for major reflection and revision where necessary. Then I have to take out the questions (easily identified by italics), print, and pack the box! I have sent Entries 1 and 3 to a friend to be looked at. Hopefully I'll have those back by the end of the weekend. I'm very excited because I have a baby shower I was hoping to go to today as well as dinner with some friends from out of town tonight. I'll also be able to enjoy Easter tomorrow!

I can't believe this project is finally almost done! It's been such a major part of my life for the last year almost, that I might not know what to do with myself after it's done.

one week to go

Well, here we are. In the final week. I have my final release day tomorrow. I had a sub, who is a good friend of mine. She called me last night to say that she had to back out because she's very sick and was told to lay low by her doctor. She sounded awful. Poor thing! I don't have sub yet for tomorrow. That's going to make some people upset, but I've done what I needed to do. I'm sorry there's not a sub, but I'm not working tomorrow at school. I need to be at home working on my boards.

I have my videos for all of my entries now. I just have to get my last one finalized and put onto the DVD. I can do that next week. Luckily, it's a short one. It won't be any longer than 6 minutes long.

I have a good weekend for working. I need to get most of it done by Sunday night. I'm planning on taking my computer to my in-laws on Sunday so I can work before dinner time.

Down to the Wire

Two weeks until everything needs to be postmarked. I'm parked at the dining room table to write and write and write this weekend. My reward tonight for getting good work done is going to the PBR with J and O. These last two weeks are going to be made extra-tricky by the fact that I am not supposed to be sitting for more than 30 minutes at a time due to multiple sprains in my back. That's actually why I'm out in the open at the table instead of locked away in my room on the bed. There's too much bending and stooping in there.

Right now my focus is Entry 3. I'm working on getting a good draft going. After last weekend's workshop, I have a better idea of what I need to do so I think that my writing time will be more efficient now. That's good. I'm glad I went. $35 well spent. :-)

Friday will be my last release day. I'll be doing loads of writing on Entry 1, since I'm finishing up the video taping for that on Wednesday. A friend of mine is subbing for me. That makes my life easier. I can leave basic lesson plans for her and know that my kids will be in great hands and have a good day. I'll need to talk with her about covering for me in May when we go to Omaha for my sister's med school graduation.

Home Stretch

Today was Home Stretch. It went from 9:15-4:30 at one of the high schools in my district. How nice to be able to get up and get out the door at a reasonable hour! People were there from all over the western side of Washington. I saw some friends there I hadn't seen in years. One in particular whose wife and b-i-l played in my wedding. It was great to see him!

My box isn't due until the end of the month (postmarked by March 31, actually), but today was a wonderful day. Two weeks ago, when I was sick for three days in a row, I sent in my really rough draft of Entry 2 to a colleague who is already certified. She read and critiqued it as much as she could within the ethics rules of NB. Her comments gave me some excellent direction for the rest of this entry as well as my other three.

The morning session today focused on the Assessment Center. I know have some really good ideas for helping myself get prepared for that in May. We went through each of the assessments I'll be doing, including doing two retired prompts. I have a better idea now of what I need to work on and what I can only touch on during my studying. That, however, won't start until spring break, which is the first week of April. I'll have homework, but it will be good stuff to do and I'm guessing I'll enjoy doing it.

What was really nice today was being in a group of other EMC Music people. I'm the only music person in my district so far who is (or has) going through the boards process. It's cool to be the trailblazer, but tough as well because noone in the district has been where I am. Things are very different between music and the other areas. For starters, people in other areas only have to video tape two of their entries, I have to do three (Entry 1 is showcasing student work. Since music is performance-based, not pencil and paper-based, my student work is shown on video.) The good thing is that I have far fewer standards to learn than others (8 as opposed to 16 or more in some areas).

My portfolio is slowly coming together. Things will be ready to go on March 28, when I'll be putting my box in the mail. There's not a choice in that. I'll be glad when this part is done. It's been a great experience, but it's really coming down to crunch time now. I will be spending most of the weekend before the 28th working really hard. I'll have a couple of big rewards for hard work, though. I have a release day (my last one) on March 21. That night, the three of us are going to see the Wiggles here in town. The next day, there is a baby shower for one of Jeff's cousins for a couple of hours in the afternoon. I'm hoping to be able to use that as a reward for hard work. I'll need a break anyway at that point. Time to lock myself in the bedroom and start pounding out entries!

Relief

I'm feeling a small sense of relief right now. Entry 2 is currently on hold as far as my work on it goes. I've sent it to three people to read and comment on. I'll be working on Entry 3 for the next couple of weeks while I am taping Entry 1 and finalizing things for Entry 4. My deadline for being postmarked is five weeks from today. That's a lot of work to be done in just five weeks, but I know I can do it. After that I'll be taking spring break off and then studying my butt off until May 17 when I do my assessment center. Hopefully that will be in the Seattle area. If not, I'll be driving to Portland on the 16th to stay the night with my aunt and uncle and then assess in Vancouver, WA on the 17th. I'll know if about 3 weeks or so where I'll be doing my assessment.

Assessment Center - step 1

I registered for my assessment center today. The kicker, however, is I don't know where exactly I will be doing my assessment. The nearest assessment center to where I live is 140 miles away. There is a place on the registration site to mark that there are no centers with a 125 mile radius from where I live. I marked that, but know that if I have to go the 140 (it's all interstate, luckily) I can make it work. I have family in a neighboring city that I'm pretty sure I can stay with for a night. I'd drive there the day before my assessment center appointment and then just drive straight home after I was done. I hope that they can find a center for me closer to home. We might also have to change some plans we have for the end of March to have a night away, but I'm doubtful that that will happen as the registration for the March test date has passed, but I'm way early for the May date. Luckily that date won't coincide with my sister's med school graduation half-way across the country.

I'll keep you all posted as I hear back. I should find out within the next 4 weeks. I'm planning on calling the hotline tomorrow, actually. I just have to do it before 4 p.m. here.

An Extra Week!

I just found out today that I have an extra week to complete my boards. I thought things had to be received in San Antonio by March 31. The e-mail I just read from a day or two ago said that my box must be postmarked (and that was underlined) by March 31. Yahoo!!!!! My goal is to get it in the mail on the 28th or 29th. That will depend on if the UPS Store is open on Saturdays or not. Hooray for extra time!

Release Day #2

And it's a good one. I have had the chance to look at the two videos I've done so far (you remember those two I didn't have with me in December?) They are both good videos. I have to pick a maximum of 15 minutes (consecutive minutes) from each to focus on. For my Entry 2 video (filmed with PreK-K students in November), that will be easy. For my Entry 3 video (filmed in December with 4th and 5th graders) that will be a bit more difficult. There are lots of things throughout the segment that I would really like to use but due to the time restrictions, I can't use the whole thing. I've asked a couple of NBCTs if they have any advice on picking the best 15 minutes. I guess another question I should ask them is if my statement to the students of the day's objective needs to be on the video or if it's ok to just have that written in my written commentary that gets evaluated. If having it in the written commentary is sufficient, the decision might be made easier.



So today, my goals are:

1. Determine whether or not my videos will work (they will)

2. Get started on the written commentary for each (both are sort of in process)

3. Get to school and get my grades entered for my middle school class (not NB related, but they are due today and I wasn't able to do it from home so I'll go into school around 3 today and get that done.)

4. Study my entry requirements and standards more.

5. Get final preparations done for my Entry 1 so that I can get started on that in the next couple of weeks. For this, I need to figure out what parts of the unit I should film. I'll need to bounce ideas off of colleagues for this, I think.



My portfolio is due two months from tomorrow. Can we say crunch time?

In the Mail

I got copies of the two forms that my district filled out in my box at school yesterday. They were dated on Wednesday, so I'm assuming that means that they are on their way to San Antonio. Yay! All is well. :-)

Wednesday is a release day (number 2 of 3). I'll spend the day watching the videos I've done (they will physically be here, not at school...) and get started on my reflections.

There is a workshop at the beginning of March somewhere in my area called "Home Stretch". I've signed up for it. Being a member of the state teacher's union gives be a $120 discount on the cost. I'll only have to pay $30. At least one other teacher from my building is going and she and I are going to carpool if it's out of our city. Heck, we may carpool anyway. Of course if it is in our downtown area, I'll just park elsewhere and take the light rail into where I suspect it may be. I'll be able to have one of my entries reviewed and be able to get live feedback. I also need to get things sent off to some friends who are already nationally certified.

last step

...toward candidacy. I got my last bit of paperwork into my school district yesterday afternoon. They need to fill out a couple of forms and then send the entire envelope to San Antonio so that it arrives by the end of the month.

I have a three-day weekend so I'm hoping to get my videos viewed so I can determine whether or not I can use them for my entries.

As an aside, I thought my state teaching certificate was expiring this school year. Nope. I found out when I looked at the copy I got from the central offices (my original is somewhere really safe at home...) that I actually have until June 1 of next year to either get my boards (I'll find out in November if I certify nationally) or to otherwise complete all of my clock hours (150 total) by next year. What a relief!