Mom Syndrome

When I was 13 years old, I made my way in life as a babysitter. Any day, any night, I was available for the best babysitting service the world had to offer (well, any other 13-year-old had to offer, that is).

My biggest pet peeve as a babysitter? The I-have-to-prepare-for-every-possible-scenario-since-I-won't-be-here-with-my-kids kind of mom. Don't get me wrong, they were great mothers, but I felt like their little babysitter kit accompanied by a novel of instructions was overkill.

I mean - I knew how to take care of a child for a couple hours.

So, in my preparation for my first substitute tomorrow (since I'm going to the Utah Council of Teachers of English conference in Salt Lake!), I made a monumental discovery: I have the same mom syndrome.

I wrote a letter to my substitute with a breakdown for each period. I identified students that he should watch closely and students that would be great helpers to turn to. I gave him an idea of what to expect: "This is my talkative class..." or "This class period is right after lunch so they're going to be incredibly energetic, especially since it's Friday." I even told him about some of my class procedures to help him deal with any behavior issues.

The letter . . . is 2 pages long.

And then, in addition to that, I included my lesson plan.

And I might have also highlighted things I wanted to make sure he didn't miss. And I might have had a degree of importance with my highlighting: really BOLDED highlighting for things that really CAN'T be ignored, slight underlining highlight for things that are good to know, etc.

And then I might have added a few sticky notes with messages about what happened today so he knew some students would just be reading.

And then I put together a complete "SUB" binder full of my class seating charts, lists of emergency procedures, and the bell schedule, all in sheet protectors in case the sub would like to mark up the charts with a wet erase marker.

Yeah. I am a control freak. When did this happen exactly?

After I finished highlighting, I realized that this substitute, this stranger, is probably fully capable of reading a letter and following directions. Yeah - I might be going through some separation anxiety with my own classes. Wow.

Is that even normal?

At least I can say that if things go to pieces tomorrow, it's not because I didn't prepare enough! (Though it might be because I overwhelmed the sub with so many directions that he keels over!) :D Now I understand why teachers like to have the same substitute in their class - it's a pain to do this kind of preparation every time you have to leave!

Well - here's to an adventurous day away and the inevitable adventure of the Sub notes I'll read on Monday!