Time home = time to reflect

It is really amazing what a couple of days and nights spent at home can do for the body and mind. I feel reconnected, rejuvenated, and reinvigorated. Maybe it was the fresh air, the fresh faces, or the fresh conversation, but I'm ready to head back to Houston with a new mind set. I have a job to do, and I don't think I've been doing it very well. If what I am doing is so important, and unique and impressive, why don't I feel that way every day?  Each lesson I plan should be important, unique and impressive. Each student should feel important, unique and impressive. Every MINUTE should be important, unique and impressive. OK, I know every minute is pushing it, but it's the goal and I don't feel like I've been meeting that goal.


Back to Houston, and back to the grindstone.

I'll miss you, Portland.

What's For Lunch

On Fridays, I assume the role of Teacher on Lunch Duty. This entails me walking around our very crowded cafeterium (cafeteria + gymnasium), making sure a food fight doesn't erupt. Friday is by far the best day for lunch duty because the principal puts his iPod on shuffle and connects it to the speakers. He has great taste in music, and the kids seem more mellow. Some dance a little, which makes us laugh, and time flies by when you are singing along. 

As I was walking around and monitoring my students' eating habits, I started to make notes of what they were eating. Here is a short list, with items that are served at school in blue, and items brought from home in green:

• Some sort of fish patty 
• croutons, cheese and ranch dressing all mixed together 
• a big bowl of chicken salad and white bread and doritios 
• flaming hot cheetos and a yummy looking browny
• breakfast burrito 
• unidentifiable meat on a bun 
• soup
• madagascar cupcakes
• disney princess cupcakes
• a jar of peanut butter
• more flaming cheetos
• sandwich

Yummy, no?

P.S. The Mountain of Grading keeps growing.

Make like a tree...

Bio-Diversity


I miss the season of autumn. Houston doesn't have a real autumn, but this false, pseudo, not-real autumn that consists of sunny days with highs in the low 70s, and no beautiful fall colors.

I remember walking across campus with one of the Hawaiian students at UP freshman year (Robbie), and seeing him see the colors for the first time. It was really magical to see his eyes light up and just stare at the colors. I miss the cherry trees and the color of red that they became.

Thanks, NYT, for bringing me some autumn, and some fun.

AIDS and Blood Diamonds

I'm trying to piece together some interesting outside resources for my students for when we study Africa. I want to them to write a paper either about Blood Diamonds, or the AIDS epidemic. If you know of any great books, movies, articles, or anything else, please let me know.

Cheers,
Ms. Redman

I lost count of what week it is

It's Monday morning, and I'm not exactly prepared, but it's OK. My students are going to be starting a new unit this week studying Asia. I'm pretty excited for them, since it means that I'm going to show Slumdog Millionare, and we are going to study the war in Iraq and the middle eastern conflict. This unit will be big on writing!

I'm getting so excited for Thanksgiving, I can't even explain it. I cannot wait to see my family.

:) New Seating Chart = Genius

7th period has been driving me crazy for about 14 weeks. Today, I put them in a new seating chart and LIFE.IS.GOOD. Students are more engaged, it is quieter, and I'm not shouting over people.

I just hope 8th period takes to their new placements just as well.

Water + Computer

And you can guess what happens.

:-(

At least it's not my Mac. It was the school Dell. Those things are pretty much rocks, so hopefully, once it dries out, it will be just as crappy as it was when I got it.

The Mountain

This is the homework I should have graded this weekend. Well, actually, this is only part of it. Oh well. I have 2 off periods tomorrow to get some of it done.

In other news, this weekend I went to a Third Eye Blind concert, made pizzas, laughed a lot, drank too much wine, spent time with wonderful people, saw downtown, saw the typical Saturday night downtown crowd, got kicked out at closing time, played shuffleboard, and stayed out way past my bedtime. Success, but not something that I can do multiple weekends in a row.

Is shuffleboard an olympic sport?

I can't wait for Thanksgiving and cooking, and eating and seeing family and friends and sleeping, and the Saturday market, and the Portland skyline, and the Portland radio stations. 

This week in my classroom, my students learned about the history of Russia. Thursday and Friday were spent understanding Lenin and Stalin through pictures, quotes and some other resources. Some of the quotes that I used are pretty amazing. Here are my three favorites:

"Death solves all problems - No man, no problem." - Stalin

"One man with a gun can control one hundred without". - Lenin

"Ideas are more powerful than guns. We would not let our enemies have guns, why should we let them have ideas." - Stalin

My students had really great discussions about these quotes and pictures and stories. It sure is something when students grab ahold of an idea, especially controversial ones.

This is what happens when they see you in high school...

My desktop picture is a photo of my dad and I when I was in high school. This photo:

When I was opening up iTunes, the questions about this photo drew some interesting questions/statements from my classes. They included "Is that your husband?", and "Wow, Miss. You were really small." Mr. Schindler's 2nd period sophomores said, in response to hearing those comments: "I thought you were like 40, so I can see why they thought you were married."

My responses? "No, that's my dad, but he does look pretty young", "Um, thanks", and "What? You just told me I look 40? Thanks."

I think I'll photoshop a picture of Taylor Lautner and put me in it, and then put that as my background. I wonder what their responses will be then...

Has anyone else heard some ridiculous guesses/comments about age come out of your students' mouths? I'd love to hear some more.

The Countdowns have Begun

I'm counting down the days until:

New Moon: 17 days

When I fly back to Portland for Thanksgiving: 21

When I leave for Barcelona: 39

That's a lot to look forward to!!!!!!!

A Day in the Life...

Some of you may be wondering what a typical day looks like for a first year teacher. If you fit into this category, allow me to break a typical morning for you.

5:00 AM My first alarm usually goes off. I fumble around, and depending on how much I need to get done at school in the morning and my immediate need of a shower, I either get my butt up, or I set the snooze for 30 minutes.

5:15 AM Shower time, make up time, hair time

5:45 AM Breakfast? Yes.

6:00 AM Brush teeth, scramble to find keys, papers, throw a lunch together, find cell phone and shoes

6:15 AM Out the door! Time for my commute, which I lovingly think of as the reason I will someday have high blood pressure.

6:45 AM At school, and it is usually still dark out. Time to sign in, check my box, put my lunch in the faculty work room, and go unlock my door. Now I can clean my desk, which probably looks like a national disaster area, update my board for today's objectives, and print off any last-minute papers. If I'm really ambitious, I'll update my grades and/or get the rest of the week's lesson plans in order. Also a great time to check out celebrity gossip!

7:45 AM Students come in for homeroom, and my whirl-wind of a day starts!