Typical schedule

• 5:30 Get up. Grace, who arrived here a few days after I did and who began teaching in 1955, will have already showered, made coffee, and cleaned the bathroom.
• 7:30 Meeting in the principal's office with him and the other teachers. Pep talk and prayer. (It's a Catholic school, don't forget.)
• 7:40 Breakfast in the gym with kids and other teachers. Sometimes oatmeal, sometimes tortillas with eggs, sometimes cereal and fruit. Maria, a neighbor, is the wonderful cook. Her kids go to school here. Her husband hangs around too to help with various chores and tell jokes.
• 8:15 Assembly of all kids and teachers in the gym for prayers (it's a Catholic school, don't forget), announcements, and pledge of allegiance. Very orderly and straight-lined. (It's a Catholic school, don't forget.)
• 8:30 Teach religion to seventeen 4th and 5th-graders.
• 9:00 Teach language arts, spelling, handwriting, and reading to thirteen 4th-graders.
• 11:00 Recess and lunch. Bring broom to playground to check for rattlesnakes under playground equipment. (I haven't seen one yet, but I'm pretty sure I saw a mountain lion on the hill behind the swingset.) Lunch is Maria's fare again. Southwestern cuisine or homemade soups. Serve with her in kitchen, then eat with kids.
• 12:00 Quiet time.
• 12:15 Teach math to six 3rd-graders. Multiplication, multiplication, multiplication!
• 1:00 Teach social studies to six 3rd-graders and three 4th-graders. Continents, oceans, natural resources.
• 1:35 Teach social studies to ten 4th-graders and five 5th-graders. Map keys, the compass rose, latitude, longitude.
  
• 2:10 Health or music or art.
• 3:00 Assembly of all kids and teachers in the gym for the Prayer of St. Francis (it's a Catholic school, don't forget), announcements, and dismissal. Very orderly and straight-lined. (It's a Catholic school, don't forget.)
• 3:05 Collapse in a heap.