A Checklist for End of Year Sanity

"The three o'clock sun shone full upon him, and the strange enervating conviction that her seducer confronted her, which had been gaining ground in Tess ever since she had heard his words distinctly, was at last established as a fact indeed."    -Tess of the D'Urbervilles


As the school year winds towards its end, I find myself in the midst of a jumble of thoughts and emotions.  Certainly, relief and happiness at the successful completion of the year stands foremost in my mind.  Excitement about next year's schedule begins to build.  Most of all, however, I am struck by the need to not let the usual end of year issues paralyze me as an educator.  Summer lurks like the seducer Alec, beckoning with its beaches and cookouts.

All of the usual problems of the end of the school year are present.  Senioritis and its cousin summeritis?  Check.  A pile of papers (both real and virtual) that seems to still be growing rather than reducing?  Check.  The neurotic need to "finish" the curriculum that was planned, despite changing schedules which this year even include shortened days for heat?  Check.  How easy to become paralyzed in the face of such troubles.  Indeed, I sometimes feel like Tess hearing Alec preaching in the barn - the end of the year an old wolf, now dressed in sheep's clothing.

While no expert, the following checklist has brought me some sanity.

1) Let go of the curriculum you planned.  Finish what you can, but accept that plans are only plans.  Your students will survive without that last poem or assignment.  Focus on what you did accomplish rather than what you failed to accomplish.  I find much success with being reflective and supportive in the closing weeks while introducing only a small ammount of new material.  Students appreciate taking the foot off the gas and looking back at what they have accomplished: not mere exam review; rather a celebration of the learning that occurred.  You will all feel much better.

2) Look through curriculum documents, professional goals documents, or anything else that you made at the beginning of the year.  Congratulate yourself for all of the things on those documents you were able to do this year.  Make a quick list of your greatest success stories for the year, a kind of "Greatest Hits" - students reached, crazy ideas that worked, moments of briliance.

3) Get a cup of coffee, or beverage of your choice.  You have earned it, and will need it.  This might be the most important item on the list.

4) Ask some hard questions.  Why didn't you get to everything?  Did you decide that some things were more valuable?  Did you make the decisions, or were decisions made for you by external factors (i.e. scheduling changes).  What crazy ideas crashed and burned? 

5) Make notes NOW about your goals and curricula for NEXT year.  There are many wonderful and professional tools to aid in this process, such as Jim Burke's excellent English Companion, but any list of ideas will be better than none when the Fall rolls around.  What is fresh in your mind now will be gone when the shiny new year is being unpackaged.  Particularly, make notes about what not to do next year that "seemed like a good idea at the time".  It will seem like a good idea again in August if you don't pay attention now.

As another year comes to a close, these are the steps I find myself taking.  What sanity-saving steps have I left out?