It has been one month since I left my previous position, and I can feel the difference. I was not sure if I would regret that decision, but it has been an eye-opening one. I have my self-confidence, inspiration, and energy back. My mental health is significantly improved, and my memory issues have all disappeared. I had no idea how much stress was sucking years off of my life and putting me into defensive, fight-or-flight mode. It was not a good way to live.

My stress levels still feel high – but the stress is not from my emotional well-being, feeling unsafe, unappreciated, and excluded. Instead, I stress about now includes what to make for dinner — both my husband and I have lost over 50-pounds each over the last six months – and we’re eating “normal” food instead of shakes, bars, and soups. My stress also comes from my two adult kids — motherhood worries about their success, independence, and safety. My mother is still in hospice and memory care, but she’s happy doing activities daily at her new care facility. These feel almost like “normal” stress – things everyone feels at some point in their lives, especially being in what I call the sandwich era of my life (being parents to young adults while also taking care of my mom).

My new job in an independent, private school feels like I have come home. The school allows me to teach every single day while also managing the technology infrastructure and devices. My heart is full when I get to see students engaging with technology in healthy and academic ways. Just yesterday, I had a student run to give me a hug – in front of the high school students in my classroom. What an awesome feeling that is! I can walk through the yard or in the halls, and kids know my name – but even better, I know theirs! Relationships are truly the heart of respect and students’ investment in their learning.

This week, my middle schoolers creatively learned about analogies, and they completed a slide deck that made school into a video game. They had to identify different levels, explain what power-ups could be, and of course, they had to describe the big bosses they’d have to battle at the end of each level. For their final slide, they got to go into Canva and design their avatars for the game. One student made a beautiful rainbow unicorn – and I, of course, was so excited about it.

In less than a month, my high schoolers have all created portfolios for their courses, and they have built websites to house their artifacts from each subject. They have built plant cells in Minecraft, and they screencasted the walkthroughs of the different parts of the cell. They learned how and when to cite research for their Genius Hour topics – and they finished creating presentations and websites about the topics they chose. And many of them have increased their typing scores by 10% in the few days they have started documenting their stats daily. They have the choice of typing in realia (i.e., letters to a relative/friend) or go to typing.com. Once they complete 5 minutes of warm-up, they take a one-minute typing test. I am so impressed with their progress and growth, and secretly, I think they are proud of themselves too.

This is what work should feel like… It is a warm hug (literally!) and helping kids figuring out how to make academics fun and engaging.