a wee little update

1. I'm currently listening to Boy with a Coin by Iron and Wine. If you don't know the song go youtube it right now.

2. The second block of practicum starts on Monday. I'm excited but not, (and I don't care if that doesn't make sense, it does to me).

3. My students are reading the book Night, which means that I need to have it read for Monday. It's only 120 pages, but it's a Holocaust memoir. It's going to take me some time.

4. I finished reading Esther last night. I've read it before, but I'm currently borrowing the Message version of the Bible from a friend, and so it's a bit different, but I'm liking the Message version at the moment.

5. My housemate is having a party at our place tonight.

6. I created a kick ass field trip to L'Anse aux Meadows (and if you don't know what that is, you definitely need to google it. Go on. Right now.) which I have to hand in at 3 today for my history curriculum class.

7. I started playing the ps3 game, LittleBigPlanet, which I totally love.

8. I think I might read Joshua next.

9. I can hear the wind howling outside. I like the sound. But I don't like that in just under an hour I have to go outside.

10. How much of a problem do you think it is that I'm addicted to tea?

October 50th 2009

I walked in a few minutes late to my English class yesterday to see the overhead slide with October 50th 2009 on it, and my favourite TA standing at the front.

He had just started a story about why the month of November is a dead month to him.

2 years ago he was teaching somewhere in the far east - not Budapest but somewhere near there/out there. Where he was teaching there was a little store that sold amazing samosas. He was told however to never get anything else from there but the samosas. Well one day, there was nothing else open and he wanted some veggies and so he went to this little store and got the veggie curry. The next day he woke up with a huge rash, his mouth and lips were so read and swollen it looked like he "had been french kissing an iron" and his feet were so swollen that they wouldn't fit into his shoes. He also has no known allergies. He was like that for a week, and he had to go to school to teach with a shirt, tie, and flip flops.

Last year he broke his leg on Nov 1st.

This year he got H1N1 that then developed into pneumonia.

Thus, the dead month of November, and why yesterday it was Oct. 50th.

fav article of clothing?

Do you ever wake up and just feel kind of off? You've woken up, nothing has happened yet, you're still in bed, and yet, something doesn't feel right. Something feels off.

Now, some people call that getting up on the wrong side of the bed in the morning, which is a weird phrase, and I personally think a dumb one. I'm sticking with feeling off.

Feeling off is how I started my day this morning. My alarm clock shrieked it's beeping WAY to early this morning (I worked at 6:30 am) and it woke me up from the deepest of slumbers. It scared the crap out of me, and I swear unsettled my soul.

I went to work, and then I was leaving I felt that one of the managers was slightly bitchy towards me, which I realize is probably/was probably me just projecting my crap day onto her and reading her from my perspective of a crap day, but still. I wasn't that happy.

I then proceeded to sit through 5 hrs of class, - 2.5 hrs of which there was one particular female who I wanted to chuck something at for being such a nincompoop.

I also have a zit on my face that has its own gravitational pull, which did also not help me in the feeling better department.

The day redeemed itself at the end because I watched a movie and hung out with friend, then I talked to my mum for a bit and now I'm in bed with my laptop writing this. I was going to work on an assignment, but the website isn't working where I need to get my information from, so I think I'm going to go to bed.

I love bed. I love pillows. I love covers. And I particularly love p.j. bottoms. They are in my top 3 fav list of articles of clothing. Sweaters being number 1 of course.

Anyway, since I can't stop yawning I'm going to go to bed and snuggle into my covers.

While I sleep however, you can answer me a question: what is your favourite article of clothing?

Lost: Good English TA. If found, PLEASE return to my class section

For my curriculum English class, we have a big group lecture at 8:30 on Tuesday morning. Then later on in the week we have a smaller seminar. There are 3 seminars and thus 3 TAs, or at least there was.

My TA was awesome. He was funny, cynical, smart, and didn't take himself too seriously. There were group discussions, music, sharing of books, thoughts, ideas and most importantly snacks.

He made the class decent, (which is a serious achievement, let me tell you. That large lecture is no picnic).

THEN

He up and left. He's gone to go and do research on some obscure topic in education. Thus, our seminar has been taken over by the other 2 TAs. The past 2 weeks have not been pretty.

Week 1 without awesome TA = talking about learning contexts, such as socio-economic status, nevermind the fact that we have a whole other course devoted to it, and it has nothing to do with the strict subject of teaching English.

Week 2 without awesome TA = today. The TA today, is a middle aged woman, who likes silence all the time, except when she deems it necessary for people to talk.
That did not go over well with the class today.

We talked, she would of course say, "SHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!"
We whispered, she said, "SHHHHHH!!!!"
She wanted complete silence.

Then came the MOMENT

Someone sneezed.
Someone else said bless you.
"SHHHHHHHHHHH!!!" admonished one of the teacher candidates.

That was it. We all laughed uproariously.

The TA glared at us.

At the end of the class the TA announced that she believed that our original TA was not coming back next term either, and that she was potentially going to be taking over the seminar, permanently.

Someone PLEASE return my good original English TA!

We Will Remember Them

"They shall not grow old, as we that are left grow old.
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun, and in the morning
We will remember them.

We will remember them."

-Laurence Binyon

hehe moment

Currently I am sitting in my EDST 429 class (it's all about teaching ESL).

Today we got an assignment about fortune cookies. The point was to get our ESL students to see what they are, and write their own fortunes so that they could practice English.

Our professor brought us fortune cookies.

So what did my table do?

We opened them, ate them (except me, I don't like eating fortune cookies) and then we got to the best part. The actual fortune.

We start reading our fortunes, and then we added the classic "in bed" after it. (And maybe I suggested it first)

(For those of you who don't know this childish activity. You add "in bed" at the end of your fortune, just for laughs)

Example:
You have common sense and a lot of charm.
Someone is looking up to you. Don't let that person down.
Your persistence will pay off soon.

We sat in the back of the class, chortling over these fortunes.

We're that mature.

Best 10 min of my day so far. And it's only 10:12 am.

Ted Talks

Today, something amazing happened.


My English Curriculum class is usually...less than inspiring let's say, but today I actually received some worthwhile information.

That information came in the form of a video clip. The speaker is Sir Kenneth Robinson, and he has this talk that's 19 min long, but that talks about how the education system is squashing, without remorse, the creativity of children and students.

It's presented in the format of a stand up comedian, and it's hilarious. It's hilarious and it raises some really awesome points.

What does that mean?

That means that you should take 19 min out of your busy schedule and watch it.

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity.html

Why? Because it'll be 19 min very well spent.

I. Just. Don't. Know.

I don't know what I want to do with my life.

I do know that I don't want to be a teacher for the next 35 years. It's just not happening. I won't make it.

I like the idea of going into editing and/or publishing but I don't know how to go about getting into that without getting a second undergrad degree (which let's face it is not going to happen).

I missed the deadline for SFU in BC which offered editing and publishing programs. The deadline was Nov 1st. It's Nov 5th. So I can't apply there until next year.

UBC and UVIC have MFA (masters in fine arts) programs that involve creative writing and UVIC also has an internship where you can spend a year with a publishing company in BC.

The Walrus has a 6 month unpaid editoral internship but that starts in Jan and I'm still in teacher's college so that doesn't work out for me, so if I wanted it I would have to wait until the next one showed up.

I also have to admit that jouralism doesn't really turn my crank. I'm not that interested in the news and I have no desire to be a newsreporter. I like the Walrus internship because you get to do so much behind the scenes, editoral stuff (yeah I know, wasn't that descriptive).

I could put my name on the supply teacher list and see if I'll get hired by the end of next year. I could teach abroad. I could just get a random job and work for a year. While doing that I could also write my book. I could backpack for a year.

See. I DON'T KNOW WHAT I WANT TO DO. And for the editing/publishing stuff I DON'T KNOW HOW TO GET INTO IT.

I'm frustrated.

I feel like I need to have this all figured out now - forget now, I feel like I should have had it figured out yesterday or 3 years ago or something.

I just don't know what to do. I don't know what I want. And thus I don't know how to go and get anything.

I. Just. Don't. Know.