Saturday, August 22, 2009

Wake, Eat, Learn, Eat, Learn, Earn, Eat, Sleep & Repeat...

The last 2 days have been comprised of CRISS training, a great strategy that, for me at least, reminds teachers of the best strategies to use in the classroom to pre-teach, post-teach and use during instruction. There were a lot of great reminders. And I got to bond a bunch more with my fellow new high school teachers. 

I get the feeling were are seen as the "noisier" group of all the teachers at the training. We all felt it was geared a bit more towards the younger grades, despite originally being created for the high school level. Yet the biggest obstacle for us was that none of us teach traditional subjects that use all of these strategies on a regular basis. Between Health, Coop, Special Ed and Math, most of these strategies were a bit too elementary. I'm not saying I wasn't glad to have participated, but I wish sometimes that such training programs are split a bit further between grade levels to provide more applicable examples to model.

Yesterday, I had the great opportunity to dog sit for my all time favorite pooch, a little Shitzu named Bacon. She is adorable, very soft and has the biggest personality of any animal I've ever been around, except Chico, a bird I had for a while in high school. Taking care of Bacon for about 7 hours on my own prepared me for a lot of things for when I get a dog eventually. First off, I can now reasonably guess where the dog will lay down. Both my dog growing up and Bacon liked to lay on the top of couches and in the window to better watch the world outside. Second, they love to explore. Bacon wandered the house a few times before settling down in her perches. She also loved to play with her little bumble bee chew toy and I've learned that my long hallway is great for a little dog to run and fetch things in, once they've learned not to slip on the tile near the door! 

It was also nice to take a walk around my community with a purpose, other than getting out of the house. I even met and had a conversation with my first friendly neighbor, a woman in her 20's who moved here from Pakistan. We are both somewhat lonely and I'm excited to get to know her better. We walked for about 30 minutes and it wouldn't have happened had I not had Bacon for those few hours.

I've spent most of my afternoon today going back through paperwork for classes which start next week. I'm really excited to begin and just hope I do a great job and see the impact I make on my students. There is nothing better than that. Heck, I have plenty of things to offer them besides having knowledge about business and the real world. I'm a great writer, know a TON about history and I'm sure can be a great recommendation for some of them someday. I'd probably offer to be available in my room for questions, but since I'm in 4 different classrooms and my office is located INSIDE a classroom, that doesn't seem as likely as I'd imagined. Time will tell.

Have a great night everyone. Thanks for reading. I'm gonna go take another little walk in this October-like fall weather. Global warming? Nope, not in the midwest.

Buonasera,
KB

1 comment:

  1. Chico may have had a personality, but I never got close enough to him to find out. That bird HATED males.

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