DEMO

It's Update time! This shall hereafter be called THEN/NOW

1-2. Front Room. THEN/NOW

3-6. Kitchen/Dining Room. THEN/NOW

A special thank you to my volunteers. Check your email for the new address (although I won't be living there quite yet, I can get mail) and send some love. Early call now for drywall volunteers (starting next week). :) Here are some working pics...

I may have forgotten...

...both to breathe and believe.

It has been a crazy, crazy two months, a crazy time, during which much has happened. Where to start?

Off the beaten path...
I am closing on a condo on May 30th (assuming nothing goes wrong)... It's a two bedroom, ~1100 square feet, and it needs a lot of work (and by a lot, I mean a lot). It is everything i want though, and I am so excited about working side by side with my daddy to renovate and rejuvenate it!

Speaking of my daddy...
HAPPY BIRTHDAY! I wouldn't be half the person I am now if I hadn't had your hands holding mine, your love surrounding me, and your infinite wisdom enriching mine. I love you more than you know!

A special thanks...
To Bryan. THanks for being absent. They tried to put ten of your best friends in my room today, but I declined and was stuck with five. Charmers that they are, they filled my (our) lives with incessant talking, impressive slacker-esque behavior, and excessive profanity. a REAL JOY, I promise.

Insofar as dreams go...
I agreed to come back for a second year (provided nothing falls in my lap before then), but I don't think I can do more than that. I'm not sure that I'm walking out of this year a better teacher than I went in, and that scares me. I still feel frustrated on an almost daily basis, but my ability to DEAL has greatly increased. I want a second year though, want to feel doing it for the second year, having at least a clue about what will come next.

At the same time...
I also want to be appreciated for the teacher that I am. I want to use the skills, talents, and abilities I have. I want to love what I'm doing, not just love the theory of what I do. Is it me? I have been challenged in more ways than I felt possible this year, and I think I have risen to every challenge with impeccable grace and fortitude, but I don't always feel that I can stop that voice in the back of my head, the one that says "maybe this is because you aren't cut out to do this". I haven't made the progress I would like to have made-- we have made progress, and I know my standards are high, but I so want my students to be able to engage in the type of meaningful learning that I think will be most beneficial to them, but I haven't managed it and they haven't managed to find any self control. Will I be able to accomplish more next year? How?

And also...
I want to teach science and social studies. And reading to more that the ISAT and area tests. Are all of my district's schools like this?

And finally...
If you (all of you) could keep me in your thoughts-- there is so much coming up- a three week trip to europe, a closing on a condo, renovations, and still one full month of school to go.

Sometimes the days are so long, and the nights so short.

In Other News...

Congratulations to RARI (How's that for stupid remembrances, my salsa stirrer?)! In High School we were inseparable, and we've fallen apart since then, but in that way where it is not painful or permanent. We're in different cities, different places in our lives, and have different demands and expectations (or as we say in testing lingo, different demands and distractions), but we manage to maintain a decent line of communication. She just had her second baby, and while I am by no means jealous of this (having 23 of my own is just fine by me) I am very happy to see her happy. She is a fine lady, full of passion, spitfire, joy, and love. Congrats!

Also, I'm going this evening to make an offer on a condo. I'm terrified. And excited. And terrified. And excited. You get the picture, I'm sure.

Let's rock this.

where do we go from here?

I know that jealousy is not a good trait, nor is it normally my cup of tea, but I admit to feeling it lately-- There are so many blogs (of friends, friends of friends, etc.) that highlight excellent teachers doing Things I Want to Do that often I just want to scream.

I am trying to look at it as storing up my wonders. I have lists and lists of things I will do differently (even if I am in the same school) next year. I am building my knowledge and my skills sets-- taking courses, getting training on writers' workshop, learning from the people I consider to be mentors... I'm just building up my skills so that when I am in an environment that encourages the use of those things I can shine like the superstar I am.

Sometimes I feel like crying when I think about the fact that the environment I'm in isn't one where I feel like I'm encouraged to be the best I can be. There is a strange mix of causes creating these feelings: first and foremost the interpretation of NCLB and the Teach To The Test Mentality, next the concept of Progressive Education as embraced by the administration, and finally the needs and mentalities of my students, their families, and the community as a whole. The resulting tension of these things brought together is (to me) Suffocating.

Teaching solely to the test kills education. The goal of education should not be to have students who can fill in the correct bubble on a scantron sheet, but to create thinking individuals who can be an active and productive part of the future that we envision for ourselves. As teachers, we should seek to work ourselves out of a job, to create students who are so intrinsically motivated to learn that they choose to do so on their own. The only way (in my opinion) to do this is to hit them from all sides-- to show them the relationship between the concepts they are being asked to learn and the environment they are in, to show them the changes and challenges that education can provide in their lives, and to motivate them with visions and tastes of the paths they can choose to follow.

Education should form the entire being, and this cannot solely be measured with a standardized test. It can't be measured by anything other than the passion, integrity, intelligence, creativity, and imagination of the people our students become. I grew up in that world, Mr. Bush, and I know that given the tools and opportunities, my students can flourish too.

When love is all you have

Let's talk again about the differences that nurture makes in our childrens' lives. I look at my niece, and i look at the lives I'm entrusted with every day, and words fail me.

Pictures don't.

I wanna teach

I wanna breathe teaching and talk teaching and love teaching, and I do-- in my soul and my heart of hearts, but I don't.

Today was actually a welcome relief-- four of my boys gone, and a calm and productive day. I felt like we communicated, like we learned. The problem is it feels like this is a change when it should be the norm.

I don't mean to complain. I have always been a dreamer, idealistic, and it has always been a challenge for me to reconcile my dreaming nature to the reality that is the world around us-- how much do you compromise, what do you hold tight to (even when you know it is false) because you like the comfort of the feeling, and because you truly believe that the world will follow if it only knows the beauty you know.

I remember reading the Pedagogy of the Opressed (Freire) for the first time in college, and being enchanted by the language of teacher-learner and learner-teacher, the idea that the roles of teacher and learner are only temporary, rotating titles.

I feel... blue. Winter blue. Disillusioned blue. That blue that the ocean takes on just before the storm. (or is it just after)

Just make the tests come. Then maybe GWB will stop whispering sweet nothings into my ear while I try to sleep.