My new school schedule + Backpack tips and tricks🎒

Hi guys! Today I'm going to be doing a few things, first I'd like to give you a brief birthday update: Saturday was my Dad's birthday, we got him a bass guitar and made him a card where we all said what we loved about him. We had a vanilla cake which had like candy ontop making the shapes of hearts and stuff. Then we went to a local restaurant for dinner, I had chicken tenders, french fries and a diet coke, and on our way out we saw my new English teacher! Woohoo!! 

Now, I'm just gonna give you a overview of how schedules work at my school, using mine as an example and then share some tips about packing, because I've learned plenty of those the hard way. 

So, how schedules work at my school. 

There's this four-day cycle: A, B, C, and D days, and each block (Minus Aspire) has a color: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, pink. That's the order in which are classes are on A days, then it shifts, so on B days it goes orange yellow green red, C days are yellow green red orange, and so on. Aspire is like break period: ten minutes where you can have a snack or chat or do whatever. It's after second period. 

There are four different lunches (First, second, third, or fourth) and they have the potential to alternate as well. That's basically it, so I'm just gonna share my schedule, and then give you the backpack tips! 

Red: math (I've gotten math in red, every year) 

Orange: French 

Yellow: Civics (Which is basically like government studies) 

Green: PE (A and C days) or Academic Support (On B and D days) 

Blue: English 

Purple: Elective (Right now I have Facs / Family and consumer sciences, I'm not gonna go explaining what that is right now) 

Pink: Science 

And lastly, some tips for what to put in your backpack / packing.

Bring a water bottle if possible 

This is a huge thing at my school because if you don't have a water bottle, you can go down to the office to get plastic cups and fill them, but then they run out, and then we have a problem, Oh and you might wanna know they don't have water fountains at my school because y'know germs.  and there are times when there are several days in a row during announcements, when they say to bring a water bottle because the office people run out of disposable cups. Oh and also, drinking out of disposable cups is just kinda gross. That's my oppinion I do tend to think of a lot of disposable things (Paper napkins, plastic cups, etc) as gross. Oh, and guys, remember to fill your water bottles. School water fountains / water bottle fillers vary in quality (The ones at my school are actually mostly ok which is surprising considering my school is 102 years old and like everything else about it is defective) and also it may be hard to be constantly running out of class to fill up your water bottle, or, for that matter, get a drink from the office  

Remember to close your water bottle before you go to school AND make sure you close it after you use it in the day

Oh my gosh, this has happened to me SOOOO many times! I forget to close my water bottle, I'm running around because there's only two mins between classes and (At least last year) I had to go like 8 flights of stairs between my core classes and my electives classes, my backpack bounces, and then guess what happens??? I have a big ol' puddle to deal with! This is not fun! Also last year I had like a flip-style water bottle and had a tendency for the tab to catch on things in my backpack (particularly folders) and open, and usually I don't notice and then guess what happens????? So if you have that kind of watter bottle, just be careful if your backpack has a lot of stuff in it and just check the water bottle once it's in to make sure it's still closed.  

Don't put your electronics (Phone etc) and your water / food in the same pocket!

This has thankfully never happened to me, because I have known all along (And my dad told me) to do this, but if you don't, there is the potential you'll spill your water on your electronics. And if you don't have a choice (Like me and my big, bulky ipad pro and braille display sometimes) just make sure to be extra careful to close your water bottle, again, if you have the kind with the tab that you can just pop open, make sure it doesn't get caught on anything when you put it in, and make sure your electronics are in their cases if possible. Also, don't leave ¥r electronics open with the cases out there and plapping, they will get caught. I promise you. 

Make sure your school device (If you have one) is charged!!! 

Please, guys, this is a big one! Not necessarily for me (I keep my school device at school and plug it in in my academic support classroom every afternoon—It's part of my routine!) but I know it is for a lot of my classmates. And for me, when I used my school ipad for school and brought it home, then it was an issue for me too. So yea, guys, just make sure you charge 'em, so you don't have to go through the hassle of charging them during the school day. 

Remember to bring your school device if you have to 

This happens at my school all the time: Someone forgets their chromebook, they have to borrow one, they lose the borrowed chromebook, and that's how we start to have problems. so yeah it's just way better for everyone if you just remember it. 

Have some way to check the time. 

Guys, I don't know about you, but the clocks at my school are sooo defective. So it might be good to have a watch or be able to check the time on your device your using. 

If you have an apple watch, make sure it doesn't make noise 

Because that's how you get it confiscated. That includes  your local minnie mouse. I have the minnie mouse watch face but last year I didn't know how to shut it off, so at random ol' Minnie'd get excited and announce the time and start vibing at me. Now I just turn it on theater mode and that really helps. 

The same goes with phones. Turn 'em off. Like, all the way off. If you can't do that turn on Do Not Disturb. And keep it in your backpack, not your pocket. If it falls out of your pocket it could a) crack the screen in certain situations, b) get you in trouble / get confiscated, or c) both. 

Bring something to read on test days. 

I've fallen into this trap before. It was standardized testing and they don't allow you to use devices and I didn't bring my book because I thought I could just grab something from English class. But guess what? That didn't work: they were testing in there too. So guess who was bored out of their mind for their leftover testing time? 

 

Lastly, don't overpack.  Sorry I can't think of examples, but basically stuff you don't need. If your backpack is going to be heavy might as well make it be with stuff you'll actually use. Because guess what, people? Your backpacks are probably heavy enough, so you don't need a bunch more stuff in it. especially all the junk that's probably accumulated in the bottom of your backpack, you may not think so now, but it can and will add up. 

So yeah, that's me for today! I hope you enjoyed and I'll see you again next time!