Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving!  I hope that you had a blessed day filled with family and memories. 

I had the opportunity to spend the day with my niece, nephew, Mom, brother, and sister-in-law.  It was our first year to not spend it at our house b/c we traveled to their place.  It appears our traditions are slowly changing, but as long as we are together, I guess that is all that matters.  It was a good day with great food, good conversation, and relaxing time together.

How did you spend your day?

And . . . because an educator's job is never done, we spent part of the evening working on my nephew's Science Fair project.  Yep!  We know how to spend a holiday. 

Busy November & a Science Conference

The last two weeks have been quite busy.  The weekend after Halloween was slow and restful, but then it got busy.

I spent the evening of November 5th through the afternoon of November 9th about 4 hours south of my home at a state Science conference.  I was blessed to hang out with some great people, learn a lot, get a little exercise, and enjoy a little time away. We were really busy, but it was also relaxing and a really wonderful time.

While at the conference, I had the opportunity to hear Adam Steltzner. He was great! He played Bass in a Rock Band at 21 and was a Rocket Scientist at 30.  Amazing story on how he became interested in Science and started on his path toward NASA.  When he finished speaking, I still wanted to know more.

Adam Steltzner

"Adam Steltzner, the lead mechanical engineer for the crucial entry, descent and landing events when the rovers reach Mars, agrees. On top of being an award-winning teaching fellow at the University of Wisconsin, Adam was also in a rock band. And he loves his job at NASA.

"'It's certainly been the high point of my career. . . working on this essential phase of the mission," he said. "It's been an absolutely incredible experience, very gratifying.'"  Retrieved from http://marsrover.nasa.gov/spotlight/marsapalooza02.html on November 16, 2013.

Girl Led Girl Scout Meeting

Tonight, our Girl Scout meeting was truly girl led.

One of the Brownies had chosen to lead the other Brownies in the Senses badge.  She brought everything she needed, so I had them work in a separate room.  She did a great job working through the activities.  The girls had a great time!

Our Junior who was going to lead the badge work for her group did not make the meeting, so I had the Cadettes work with the Juniors.  The Juniors chose to work on the Drawing badge.  All the girls chose the parts they wanted to do and began the badge.

All I did was get out Fall/Thanksgiving foam pieces for them to do a craft while we waited for everyone to arrive.  I then went between the two groups monitoring them.  That's it.  Great meeting!

Halloween

For many, Halloween is (or was) a night to dress-up, walk the streets going door-to-door, and trick-or-treating.  Children begin at very early ages and continue through high school in some areas.  Adults carry on the fun by throwing and attending Halloween parties. Some children attend Fall Festivals, trunk-or-treat, and city and/or church celebrations.

For me, Halloween was first and foremost my dad's birthday.  I hate that I never had a conversation with my grandparents about having a child on Halloween.  Dad liked his birthday.  In pictures of my first Halloween, he is dressed in a mask and I have on a little costume.  He walked me to the neighbors' house to trick-or-treat.

Growing up, before we could go trick-or-treating, we sang "Happy Birthday" and had cake.  Yes, it was always decorated for Halloween, and I always looked forward to it.  I was never really into the dressing up part, so Halloween was a birthday celebration for me.  When I was in college, I came home, baked a cake, and took it to him at the football stadium where he ran the clock and the press box for whatever home games there were those nights.  We sang in front of his friends and left cake and plates/plasticware for them.

While my street can be pretty spooky at night, we never had many trick-or-treaters.  On non-game nights, Dad stayed home with our cat, Blue, which was totally black, and waited for trick-or-treaters, if there were any.  Mom walked the streets with us as we gathered candy.  As an adult and as Granny aged, we would go to her house to hand out candy.  She would get as many as 500 trick-or-treaters in a night. Granny loved Halloween, seeing all the kids dressed-up, and visiting with everyone.

After Dad passed away, we spent every Halloween helping Granny. But . . . before we did that, I would get cookies or cupcakes, and I would take my niece and nephew to the cemetery.  We would sit on a blank, sing "Happy Birthday," and tell Grandpa whatever they wanted.  We didn't tell anyone what we did.  It was just for us.

This Halloween will be a little hard.  Dad isn't here.  Granny isn't here.  The kids don't live here.  Not really sure what Mom and I will do this year.

It just might include cookies or cupcakes.  :-)

Spiritual Gifts--Fulfillment

I started a Bible Study last week around Spiritual Gifts.  The first session was about the Bible verses discussing Spiritual Gifts, what they were, if we see them in ourselves, and if we are drawn to people with specific gifts or talents.

Tonight's lesson had us look into our past for events or times when we felt fulfilled.  I had a hard time with this.  We were to list the event or time and then what talents or characteristics we had to make that happen.

Have you felt fulfilled?  What do you think makes you feel fulfilled about one thing and not another? What talents or characteristics did it take to do that event or activity and feel fulfilled?

When others shared a time they felt fulfilled, some had a hard time deciding what talents or characteristics it took.  Others around the table told them what they saw in the person or what it took to do the event or moment.  It was neat to hear what others had to say to support one another. 

Our pastor challenged us to tell others what gifts or characteristics we see in them.

Teaching Reading for a Change

Today, our district held Professional Development for all 7th-high school English and Reading teachers. On our campus alone, we had 18 or 19 teachers out for this training.  Some of the ELA and Rdg teachers as well as a few others went to Love and Logic training.  In total, we had 21 teachers out.  8 positions were not picked up by subs, so any and everyone covered classes today.  I had the opportunity to teach 7th grade Reading for 2 periods, and I really enjoyed it.

Everyone has their niche, and I prefer the 7th graders to the 8th graders. I will work with both, but when I have a choice, I choose 7th grade.  I guess it is because they are so much like my 6th graders I taught for years and loved.  8th graders have a few more hormones and a lot more attitude.

The hard thing about covering a class is, like subs, you don't know what you are doing until you walk in the room.  Once I'm in there, I want to make the lesson my own.  Today, I had to tweak a few things b/c there wasn't enough time to finish what was assigned.  I also don't like students to work independently, silently for a whole class.  I broke up the lesson with discussions, which the students enjoyed.

I would go teach Reading again.  I really enjoyed it today.

Science Professional Development

Today was a Professional Development day for our district.  Science had the opportunity to do some vertical teaming with the high school teachers during the morning.  During the afternoon, the middle school teachers worked together to create videos.  Each teacher was assigned a standard.  They had to create a 10 minute video to teach teachers the standard. They then created a 2-4 minute video to teach students the standard. A lot of good, hard work was done. I can't wait to see the videos.