My adventures in life

Life. (sigh......)

Wed, 13 Jan 2010 08:03:50 -0500

The question of the day is this: Why is it so easy to put weight on and so hard to take it off? I swear my almost 41 year old metabolism moves at the pace of molasses in January. (That’s pretty slow.) I’ve been faithfully working out everyday for 2 weeks and the scale is hardly moving. I guess after 6 years of sitting at work and sitting at school my body has become comfortable where it is. Well, my brain isn’t comfortable where my body is. I wish they’d get together and make some sort of compromise.

Speaking of 6 yrs, life is dramatically different now than it has been. For all these years, I hardly ever had time to relax. I ran to work, ran to school, ran home, went to bed, did it again the next day. Then I went to teacher’s college and worked myself into a stupor, then did my teaching practicums where to taught all day and then planned and marked all night. Now I’m done, waiting to be certified to teach, and I have nothing to do all day and all night. I like this! I’ve finally got time to do nothing!!

The cruel twist of fate is this: I’ve got all the time in the world to do anything I want, and not 2 cents to rub together to do it with. HA! I could be relaxing and enjoying somewhere beautiful, like Mexico, but I can’t afford to go. Ugh. I could almost laugh at the irony. Almost.

Instead, I’m sanding my kitchen cupboards so I can paint them white. They’ve been there since the 60’s and look like it too. So, I figure it’s time for an update in the kitchen. Now I just need to save my pennies so I can buy paint! Not working is nice, but the money aspect sucks.

An update

Wed, 4 Nov 2009 06:16:49 -0500

I’m into my 2nd practice teaching placement, or praticum as they are sometimes called. This time I’m in a high school and loving it so far, even though today is only my 3rd day. The differences between secondary school and elementary school are vast and each has its own set of pros and cons. So far so good though!

I’ve been talking a lot to my friend who is living and teaching in a more industrial part of Mexico. It seems that there could quite possibly be a job there for me. We’ve been doing a lot of research and reading. There isn’t a whole lot of information on Carmen on the internet, so I’ve had to ask a lot of questions and put my inspector hat on.

What we’ve come to so far is this: Even though we want to spend a couple of years in Mexico, we’re both doubting that Carmen is the place for us. We have an informal ‘wish list’ of things we’d like to have where we move to, and Carmen isn’t fitting the bill at all. My friend and her family are really enjoying their time there, and I’m not at all saying that Carmen isn’t a good place to be. It may just not be a good place for us to be. So, we’re kind of in limbo. I think more research is going to be needed!

Another idea we’re toying with is Provence, France. This would fit really well for us on a number of fronts, and face it - Who wouldn’t want to live in Provence???

Anyway, that’s it for now. I really should try to update this more often...

Another great book!

Thu, 15 Oct 2009 17:53:39 -0400

If there’s one thing about being in the midst of my teaching practicum, it’s that I can find a few minutes here and there to get into a really good book. I’m still looking forward to the days when I can curl up for the afternoon with a good read, but for now the precious few stolen moments I’m able to get are priceless and cherished.

I just finished a fabulous read and I highly recommend it! The Poet of Baghdad is a book that I picked up off the shelf at the library but wasn’t really committed to reading. I was hooked by about page 5. It isn’t one of those quick easy reads, but something you spend time with and think about. The writing is fantastic even if the story itself is sometimes hard to fathom, especially because it’s the truth. I think you’ll enjoy it!

Teaching and celebrations

Sun, 11 Oct 2009 08:02:52 -0400

I keep meaning to sit down and blog about something, and then something else always seems to get in the way. It happens everyday - I find something funny, or interesting and think I should remember it and blog about it, and then I forget or never get time to do it. Such is life, I guess, eh? (How Canadian of me to add the “eh”, eh?)

So. Student teaching. I’m having a ball! The kids are great, even the hormone ridden grade 7’s. On the first day of school, my associate teacher and I spent time covering in other teacher’s classes because the actual French program wasn’t going to start until the second day. We found ourselves in a Kindergarten room first thing in the morning. If you’ve got, had or know of kids in this age group, you also know that they have yet to develop that verbal filter that stops them from blurting out inappropriate things. This little boy walks over to Wendy, my associate teacher, looks up at her (she’s quite tall) and states ever so matter of factly: “You’re huge.” We looked at teach other and laughed, What else are you supposed to do?

Getting control of the kids in the classes I’m teaching was a little difficult. First of all, they know I’m not a teacher. I’m not their real teacher, I’m inexperienced, and lack the tools to be effective in classroom management, even though I know the material. What they didn’t plan on was the fact that I’m a mother, and I’ve lived through the various behaviours of kids their age. The question for me was, could I put my parental experience into use in a classroom of 30 kids.

The first few days were a breeze. All I had to do was sit there, observe, and write about what I had watched. What could be easier? Then Wendy said “Oh, by way, I won’t be here on Friday, but there will be a supply teacher with you. Can you handle the French and she can do the math?”

The first feeling I experienced was confusion. Was I hearing her right? She was leaving me alone with these children???? The next feeling was terror. Long lines of strung together expletives ran through my head, my knees began to shake, my heart raced, my eyes blinked rapidly and I managed to squeak out, “Sure. No problem.”

I can do this.

Friday morning dawns, I’m up, dressed and on my way to school, smoking one cigarette after the other, trying to figure out what in the world I’d gotten myself into. The options were limited. I could a) turn around and go back home telling everyone I’d made a horrible mistake and teaching was definitely not for me, or b) face the kids and turn myself into a teacher.

Thankfully I chose option b.

Now that I’ve been at this for a month or so, I can honestly say that the most difficult and challenging thing to get right is classroom management, and establishing yourself as the person in charge. Once you get a handle on those 2 things, everything else seems to fall into place. I’ve also figured out that things need to be fun and varied. You can’t do the same thing everyday, and kids like to play games while they are learning. Divide the kids into 3 teams, have one student from each team go to the board, give them a question to answer on the board, and voila! You have a game that the kids enjoy, and they’re learning. Provide some candy at the end for the winning team and you’ve got a great activity.

My next placement is at a high school, which I’m sure will provide me with new challenges. The kids will be older and different but I’m looking forward to them.

On another note, Ger and I celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary in September. 2009 was a year full of ‘big’ things. I turned 40, finished my BA and started teacher’s college, my son started university, and of course, our anniversary. We had hoped we’d be able to do something fun. Take a vacation or something. Unfortunately, our money is pretty much gone with only him working and earning an income, so our options were, to say the least, really limited. What could we do to celebrate our 10th?

Ger came home and said he’s taking me to a restaurant. He’s got a 2 for 1 type certificate that he won from a radio station and he’s taking me out. “Do I need to change?” I asked, looking at my jeans and t-shirt. This might not be the most appropriate dress for our celebrations after all! “No, you’re good” he tells me.

This should have been my first clue.

We arrive at the restaurant, which turns out to be a fairly grubby neighbourhood sports bar. The nieghbourhood itself is a little below standards, and we can’t find any parking because the place doesn’t have a lot. So we park 2 blocks away and walk over.

As soon as walked in I started giggling. There’s a bunch of men standing around the bar, some with teeth, some without. Interspersed between them are a few women, some suffering from the same dental conditions as the men. There were 5 or 6 televisions on the walls showing baseball and football games. Of course, we sat in a booth which apparently gave the waitress the idea that we wouldn’t be the greatest tippers as we weren’t at the bar ready to guzzle bottles of beers and tip her copiously. We were apparently not worth much of her time.

Regardless, we ate, sipped on glasses of water, and ended up leaving with leftovers after having paid about $1.10 after the value of the coupon. It was without a doubt, one anniversary we’ll remember. It was far from the celebration we’d imagined. I’d hoped to be sitting on a sandy beach watching the sun set, sipping on some fruity drink in Mexico, but this is what we had instead. The beach will have to wait until we can afford it.

Just around the corner

Thu, 3 Sep 2009 19:47:08 -0400

It’s been a busy 2 days. I’ve met my associate teacher, or the teacher who’s class I’ll be teaching in until late October. She very nice, and we seem to have quite a few things in common. Television shows, music, kids, sports, etc.

I’ll be teaching grades 5, 6 and 7 French as well as grade 5 math, starting Tuesday. I can’t believe it’s almost time to start! I’ve got a long list of things I need to accomplish in the next 2 months and I need to get started sooner rather than later.

I spent the last 2 days stumbling around the classroom and school trying to figure out what is what and what to tackle first. I met the staff and the principal, attended staff meetings and now I’m generally overwhelmed with information!

I also found out that we will be coaching the boys softball team and going to a tournament later in September. This is great news, because one of the requirements for teacher’s college is that we get involved in extracurricular activities, so this is perfect! Besides the fact that I played softball for a few years, it also means that we get the day off to attend the tournament. Another of the things I have to do is plan a field trip, so I’m hoping that this may count for that too. Two birds with one stone, and all that.

So, so far, student teaching is going pretty well. A grade 8 French teaching is leaving on a mat leave in November, and the staff was trying to figure out a way that I could take her mat leave, but the timing is off. I won’t actually be certified until late January or early February so as far as I know, I can’t do it. Boo hiss. That would have been ideal!

So, now it’s time to connect with my buds from teacher’s college and see how their placements are going. Stay tuned!