1. Snow. I'm grateful for snow! I know a crazy intense Chicago winter is upon me, but I still get excited when I see the little white flakes falling outside my classroom windows. Our first snowfall this year came mid October! I pulled out my camera and got a couple of shots of the boys' soccer team practicing in the snow - in shorts, of course.2. Scaring children. Well, that's not entirely true, but I did have an entertaining Halloween this year.
The evening started with trick-or-treating, where I accompanied a cat, Spongebob Squarepants, a leopard, some sort of angel, a vampire, and George Bush trick-or-treating (and later met up with a road, Princess Leah, and Sharpay from "High School Musical"). Then I had the pleasure of chaperoning the middle school dance, which actually turned out to be one of the less awkward middle school dances I have been to. The kids actually danced! A refreshing change from the wallflower dances typical to this age group.The best part, though, was probably the scary night hike that I participated in; the dorm students went on a hike in the school woods, and another teacher and I hid in the woods to spice things up a little. I started following them halfway through the walk, making small noises to set them on edge, while the other teacher waited in a tree and swung down on a rope as the group approached. Ah, the thrill of hearing kids scream. Wait, that doesn't sound good... These students love being scared, though, and have been begging to watch "The Blair Witch Project" ever since. Nope.
3. Real-time learning. It was quite an experience to study the election with the middle school
students this year! We watched the debates - and some SNL clips, learned about the important issues, tracked the major candidates, and tried to sort out the electoral college.After weaving election topics throughout social studies for the month of October, we wrapped it all together with an evening event on Election Day. The students stayed after school for an election "convention" that included pizza, cow tag, presentations, and live election results. Each grade focused on a different area - sixth grade studied local elections and candidates, seventh grade studied swing states, and eighth grade suffered through the electoral college - for which they created informational posters and explained their material to the other grades. Because of school the next day, we couldn't keep the students all night, but they got to watch results come in from the East Coast and some Midwest states.
We also did a mock election, which Barack won by 68%. McCain got 30% of the vote, and Nadar earned an impressive 3% (one vote). Being from Illinois, it was an easy win for Barack! I was glad to see, though, that the students were able to speak intelligently abou both candidates, the VP hopefuls, and the major issues. My goal was that the students would internatlize enough to look back in 20 years and remember that they learned about Barack and McCain in middle school, and I think that goal was achieved!All in all, my classes are going well; we have finished To Kill a Mockingbird in seventh grade and did a quick poetry unit before moving on to Avi's Nothing But the Truth. Having watched Romeo and Juliet kick their buckets, we will be moving on to Gulliver's Travels in eighth grade. We took a quick hiatus from literature to write short stories, though, and I was impressed with the creativity and variety of subjects that the students have explored. In social studies, we are in the midst of studying World War I (much to the students' dark delight) in seventh grade, and in eighth grade we are learning about Charles I - learning about the British politics that would later prompt the colonies to search out a more democratic form of government.
4. Playing with the dorm. Up until recently, I have been working one weekend a month in the dorm.
Just a week ago, however, the dorm director left, so from now on I will be working every other week. Yes, more work, but the kids make it worthwhile! I worked a couple of weekends ago, and other dorm parent I was working with (Mike) and I decided to get the kids cooking. We made pizza and Jessica's Marshmallow Clouds - some of you should know those cookies, the chocolate ones with marshmallows baked inside. Flour, sugar, and pepperoni ended up everywhere, but it was definitely worth it. Korean boys and girls typically keep to themselves, and it can be a struggle to get them to interact. But they all got into the mixing, the kneading, the stuffing, and the baking (not to mention the eating). Although I would enjoy having my evenings and weekends free, I have found working in
the dorm to be really rewarding. There are eleven students total, eight of which stay on the weekend. These eight are all Korean students, sent across land and sea to learn English well enough to be accepted to a good American high school (so that after that, they can get into a good American university). These students are all bright, hard working, and ambitious. And crazy, good-natured kids. By seeing them both in the classroom and in the dorm, I have the opportunity to see them write impressive short stories and ask intelligent questions about the execution of Charles I during the day, and then chase each other around the living room with pillows and giggle in unnaturally high pitches after drinking helium out of a balloon at night.5. Mango. This past month has been characterized by a few other random events,
including buying a new gas tank (mice somehow ate through some element of my original one) and almost losing my cat. As you all probably know, Mango is a stray cat that found her way to me last November. She was found on Principia's campus. After posting a flier and asking around without receiving any response, I kept her. I took her to the vet, had her all checked out, and assumed things were fine - although I did always wonder where she had appeared from. Well, a few weeks ago, I had occasion to take her to a vet in Elgin, and when the vet found out she was a stray, she offered to look for a microchip (a tiny chip that is implanted to be able to track lost animals). She found one! The short version of the story is that they discovered Mango's original owner, who does live at Principia. This owner was contacted and told what happened. She was actually happy to hear that Mango (Annie, as she knows the cat) is alive an in a good home; she thought the cat had been eaten by a coyote, but she is thinking the cat may have run away because she didn't get along well with the family's other animals. So now Mango (no longer Annie) is now officially officially mine! I am very grateful.6. Unexpected entertainment. As a final note, I thought I would mention that I went to a body-building competition last weekend. James King (friend from Prin and fellow Admissions Counselor last year) was in the area for a wedding, and his brother just happened to be in a body-building competition nearby, so we stopped in to watch.
For clarification's sake, the picture here is not James' brother. This guy was one of the most memorable contestants; he was frighteningly chipper, and his hair was, oddly, the same tone as the fake tan he probably sprayed on that morning. James and I dubbed him Rocket Man because in some of his stances, he looked like he might take off for the moon at any moment. It was a very weird experience to sit there and watch men and women flex in skimpy swimsuits, and I was grateful to see that, while James' brother is impressively built, he still looks (well, except for the obligatory sprayed tan) fairly normal.Well, that's my update for now! Thanks to a newly-updated firewall at school, I can't access my blog on campus, which makes updating it difficult to do spontaneously. So, to my short list of gratitude, I should also add the library's free internet. I'm also grateful for my co-workers at FRCDS, who keep life entertaining and bright through "The Office," Carcassonne, coffee breaks, prairies, and meaningful conversations.
