Career Change: The First Week of School

After 4 straight days of 14-15 hour work days and very little sleep, I finished up my first week of teaching and let me say this right up front:  I ADORE MY KIDS!  They are funny, smart, kind, and genuinely good kids.  Although, I feel sad for so many of them because they have made some really, really poor choices. Two of my senior girls are pregnant and there are many, many more (boys and girls) who have a child or two.  These babies are giving birth to babies.  Some of my other students have just about given up on school and I have to convince them that getting an education is important.  I do have a few who are committed to their education and want to go to college. I plan to do my best for all of my students. But....

Because I have fallen in love with all of them and do want to do my best, I had the first (of what will be many) panic attack/crying jag tonight on my way home from school.  All of sudden, I realized that I'm in way over my head and I have all these kids who are looking to me to teach them and I have no clue of what I'm doing!  By Tuesday morning at 8am, I need to have a week's worth of lesson plans to my principal and assistant principal and (thanks to TFA's non-training) I'm in full on panic mode.  I will be spending the next 4 days in sheer unadulterated terror, scrambling to figure out what I'm doing. You might wonder what I did to cope with the panic attack.  Simple enough - I ate a pint of ice cream.  Emotional eating is probably not the best way to handle this, but it was the best I could do in a pinch.  Besides, Edy's Slow Churned Mint Cookie Crunch is really, really yummy.  

What do I need to do this weekend?  By Tuesday morning, I need 4 days of lesson plans for 5 classes on 4 subject matters and they must include differentiated instructions for my ELL/Special Ed students. They all have to have assessable learning objectives and must include a "Think-Pair-Share" or a "Think-Write-Pair-Share" activity - something my students loathe (by the way, I loathe them too).  I have zero clue on where to start.  On top of all of this, I also need to include 10 minute mini-lessons for grammar and vocab because all of my students are severely lacking in these basic skills.  OMG!  WTF!  

It's days like this that I wished I still drank!  :-)

You know when they say "Be careful what you wish for, you may receive it."  I really wanted to have diverse classes - well I got it, much to my chagrin.  See, the other two new English teachers (Cheryl and Chris) whom I mentioned in my previous blog are also teaching 5 classes, except they teach the exact same 5 classes.  Cheryl teaches 9th grade writing and Chris teaches 9th grade reading.  So they basically need to create just one lesson plan and duplicate it for all 5 classes.  Boring day?  Yes!  Almost zero stress!  Hell yes! So yyyyyyyyeah... be careful what you wish for!

Can you take back a wish??

Career Change: The First Day of School

This day started very early with arriving at my school at 7:00 am.  From that point until just after 4:00 pm, I was constantly on the go and moving.  Wow, it was a long, exhausting day. But I will say I have some of the most amazing kids! 

Of course, my day did not start easily.  I got to my classroom and I had a plan to show my students an great segment that was featured on Anderson Cooper about a high school student who went "From Homelessness to Harvard."  It was a good thing that I decided to test the television setup.  Turns out, I had no sound coming from the television. Naturally, I jumped on the phone to talk to the IT department but got voicemail.  ARGH!  Fortunately I had a bit of time before I needed to panic.  The television needed to be working by my 2nd period class.  Fortunately, I got through to someone during my 1st period, which is my personal planning period, and the situation got fixed.  After that, it was just back to back meeting and greeting students, giving them my big pitch on what goals we will accomplish this year and a bio about little ole me.  I lucked out when I announced my Yankees fan status that I had at least 3-4 fellow fans in every class. Whew.  That could have been disastrous!  :-)  For the most part, the students were great, although many were not thrilled to be back at school and not happy that I gave them homework on the first day.  Oh well, what can you do.  

The funniest part of my day was after I got home.  I had given my students an exit slip asking them what they wanted from me for the school year and received some really funny responses which ran the gamut from bringing in baked goods to no homework.  Um, yeah, "no homework" is not going to happen.  A lot of my students asked me to challenge them, other asked for "easy classes."  Which do you think I'll do??

In addition to this blog, I plan on documenting my first year with photos.  Check out some photos on the "My First Year of Teaching" Shutterfly site.  I'll upload more photos as I take them. 

A Pretend Wedding! Who's In?

Today, I was chatting with my favorite Starbucks barista, Monica (yes, I spend way too much time in my local Starbucks), who regaled me with a story of a wedding that she and her boyfriend attended yesterday.  It was quite the shindig from all accounts - a big outdoor wedding on a farm, a huge bonfire, live music, overnight camping, pig on a roast, farm fresh breakfast this morning, etc.  I said to Monica that it sounded like a great party and that it makes me want to plan my own wedding. Of course, I have one big issue with that - no significant other. And seeing as how I'll never be getting married, I told her that I perhaps I could plan a "pretend" wedding.  She was on board with the idea.

Here's the idea:  I'll ask a few of my actor friends to play the important roles of fiancé/groom, minister, witnesses, etc. and then we'll invite real guests who, of course, will bring real presents - and have the party of the century.  I figure it's the least I should do for all the weddings that I've had to pay to attend.  Reminds me of the episode of Sex and the City ("A Woman's Right to Shoes") when Carrie Bradshaw registers herself at Manolo Blahnik, in recognition of her just-announced marriage to herself in order to replace a pair of stolen shoes. 

Waddya think??  Actor friends: anyone have a minister's costume or a tuxedo and are willing to play some demanding roles?? 

Career Change: OMG - What The *Bleep* Was I Thinking??

I made a promise to friends that I would be completely transparent about my career change - so here goes my latest meltdown.  I was doing okay and feeling... wwwwweeeeellllllllll - not exactly "confident," but feeling that at least that I could handle anything that was thrown my way - that is until a few hours ago.

Today, I was sitting in what TFA euphemistically calls 'professional development.'  As I have discovered repeatedly over the past few months, that is an extremely loose interpretation of what we have received.  TFA had asked myself and a few other corps members to take English Language Learners Teaching training which is all about how to differentiate daily lessons for those students for whom English is not their primary language in order to assist them with their language learning skills. As my school district is 90% Hispanic and a predominant number of them are ELLs, it seemed like a good idea to take this training. The problem is this training went like sh*t through a goose and I left the class significant more confused than ever about teaching ELLs.  Generally these classes should be taught over a significant period of time, but our training has been in a matter of a few hours. Not nearly enough!  Me being an "old dog," this "new trick" is freaking me out! I'm not worried about teaching the actual content of literature to my students.  That's not the issue.  But what do I do if (more likely, when) I have students whom barely speak English??  The writing of essays, papers and journals accounts for a significant portion of their final grades, but how can they write papers for an English class if they can't even comprehend basic English.

I never, ever want to feel that I've harmed a child in any way, shape or form and because I haven't gotten the quality differentiated instruction that TFA swore they would provide, I'm wigging out that I'm going to screw up one of my students' education! I know I'm a smart girl, but I just don't know how to do any of this and I see students in less than 2 days! So back to my original question:  WHAT WAS I THINKING?!?!?!?!  I don't know if I can do this!  My stress level is pretty high right now.  High enough that I bought a half pound of assorted chocolates on my way through South Station in Boston and have made a significant dent into eating the entirety!  <sigh>  I'm never going to lose these last 30-ish pounds. 

Okay, enough self pity.  Back to the grindstone ... I have "miles to go before I sleep."  Although sleeping is pretty much the last thing that I've been doing for the past few days.  Hello, insomnia, my old friend.

Career Change: Exhausted and Going Broke, But...

My classroom - although I've
since reconfigured this set up!

...having more fun than I could ever imagine!  I've been absolutely slammed with work over the past few days, but I thought I'd do a quick summary of how it's going so far.

Over the past couple of days, I have spent nearly $500 in getting my classroom prepared! OY! I might add that's $500 that I can ill afford, but seriously, I needed stuff!! I want my kids to walk into a well-organized and fun classroom on Monday.  Wait...what?  Did I just say Monday?  <shriek>  Okay, now that's out of my system for the moment, I'll give you a brief summary of the past few days.

It's mostly been sessions with all sorts of staff from the Lawrence Public School who told us about who we see for what services.  Tonight, there was a Freshman orientation and I got to meet a couple of my new students.  Lovely, lovely kids. There have been lots and lots of meetings with the 2 other new English teachers (1 is a fellow TFA-er (Chris) and 1 is not a TFA-er (Cheryl) and both are AMAZING people that I'm thrilled to be working with).  We're trying to meld our minds together on ideas for the new year.  We're all freaking out a little bit because we don't have a curriculum from the district yet.  <shriek>  Okay, I may continue to shriek every few minutes.  Now I'm lucky that my predecessor left a prodigious amount of books in my room (see the photo below), but Chris and Cheryl are crazed because they have almost no books.  Books have been ordered by our administration but these things take time.  I've been a little behind the 8-ball simply because I have to rush to get a lot of clerical things done, like a drug screening test, reference checks, paperwork, etc., all while trying to set up my classroom. Tomorrow, we've got a faculty meeting, some more professional development and continuing to set up my classroom.

Ah, see the beautiful
books.

This weekend, in addition to having to drag myself into Boston on Saturday for TFA-related (useless) professional development, I have to create 4 different syllabi for my classes and come up with a week's worth of lesson plans for those classes.  Plus, I have to read the teacher's manual which I think is probably as long as the Bible - I'll find that out tomorrow.  So basically my weekend is already a washout.  But you want to know something, I am extraordinarily happy.  Weird, huh?

Oh, and one other thing, it's official - all of my classes are the honors classes!  1 Freshman, 1 Junior and 2 Senior classes and all honors. <shakes my head>  I don't know what I did right over the past year to have this unbelievable treasure dropped in my lap, but I will take the very rare gift that I have received and run with it.  Okay, time to get back to work... or perhaps, I might just go get some much needed sleep. I haven't been sleeping much over the past few days because of my mind spinning from everything I need to complete before the start of the new school year on Monday.  <shriek>

Career Change: The Job Offer (Part 2)

You know that old saying "Good things come to those who wait??"  Well, that is definitely the case when it comes to my career change.  I have very exciting news, but first...

Let's review where I was on the job situation:  I had been hired for an ESL position in Revere, but due to not passing the ESL MTELs, I was unhired, for which I was relieved as I didn't feel qualified to do that job.  For the past couple of weeks, I've been going on a flurry of job interviews, which ran the gamut from higher elementary grades (5th and 6th) to high secondary grades (11th and 12th) from as far north as Lawrence to all the way down to Somerville (a town just outside Boston) and everywhere in between.  Today I went on my final job interview.  Why final? Because today's interview resulted in a job offer!!  YAY!!

My new teaching position is perfect and is exactly the kind of job that I was specifically looking for.  I have been hired by one of the high schools in Lawrence, MA - the Business, Management & Finance High School.  A little background about the Lawrence school district:  this district is a Level 5 turnaround district, which means that it has been taken over by the state and is in receivership.  There has been a huge turnover in personnel and it was the one school district that I was itching to work for because of the exciting changes going on and that it is a TFA partnership district that is the closest proximity to my home (a mere 30 minutes away).  The campus of Lawrence High School (pictured above) actually houses 6 different high schools - my new high school is one of them. 

At 8:00 am this morning, I went on a job interview with the principal of BMF High and it went extraordinarily well.  By 11:30 am, she had called me and offered me the position.  I went back this afternoon and got a chance to see my new classroom.  No chance for any grass to grow under my feet, as new teacher orientation starts at 8:30 am tomorrow morning.  Whew!  

My new position is:  teaching 2 classes of Freshman (1 reading and 1 writing), 1 class of 11th grade honors and 2 classes of 12th grade college prep.  The 12th graders are probably going to hate me because it's World/British literature.  According to one of my colleagues whom I met this afternoon, the 12th graders typically do not like British lit.  That's just a sad state of affairs for them because it's my favorite, which is why they're going to hate me!  :-) 

I am truly excited and thrilled for my new position. So much so, that I spent a good portion of the day celebrating, which included eating 2½ pieces of disgustingly greasy, yet oddly delicious pizza and an obscene amount of candy. I get to meet all my new kids next Monday.  I suspect that each class will have anywhere from 20-25 kids per class.  This promises to be the most challenging, exhausting and totally thrilling job that I've ever had in my life and I can't wait to get started.  I'm sure I'll have days that I just want to sit and weep and other days I'll think are the best days of my life.  It's going to be a great adventure and I can't wait to begin.  Again, stay tuned for future updates!

Wish me luck!

Singin' in the Rain?? You Must Try It!

Okay, I didn't actually sing or dance like Gene Kelly did in the movie, but last night I walked home from a friend's house in the pouring rain - thunder and lightening included - and it was AMAZING! I am certain that everyone at some point in their childhood splashed through puddles in the rain, but how many of us do it as an adult?

Early last night, I walked approximately 15 minutes across town for a small dinner party at a friend's house. Later in the evening, when I noticed that there was lightening, I decided to head home before it started to rain as I didn't have an umbrella on me. Well, "best laid plans" and all that, suffice to say it didn't work.  Five minutes after leaving my friend's house, the skies opened up and there was a torrential downpour. Instead of starting to run or ducking into a place to wait out the storm, I decided to continue my walk and it was just glorious!  I had the best time - surprisingly so.  Along the way home, I met a few other people who got stuck in the rain including a couple who were howling with laughter because it was incredibly fun. They decided to embrace the experience as I did. By the time I arrived home 15 minutes later, I was soaked to the skin and freezing, but I didn't care. The experience of walking in the rain was well worth the minor discomfort. I wish I could verbalize why it was so exhilarating. I guess it's something you just need to experience first hand.

The next time there's a downpour, don't grab your umbrella.  Just head out and try walking around and see what it's like. I promise you it doesn't disappoint. The only 2 changes I would make if I decided to do this again in the future is: (1) to wear different shoes - flip flops are horrible for walking in the rain so I took them off and walked barefoot.  Walking barefoot was actually pretty sensational, but a little painful after 5 minutes of city street walking.  The second change is to either to be wearing my contacts or have little windshield wipers on my eyeglasses. Looking through eyeglasses that are streaming with water is a bit difficult.

All in all, Gene Kelly had it right - walking, singing and dancing in the rain is joyous!  Sing it, Gene.

A Motorhead's Dream...

Reason #876 why I love living in Newburyport - a classic car show! 

I fully admit it - I am a motorhead!  Always have been.  I love cars.  If I were to win the lottery tomorrow, by Saturday, I would have already picked out about 4 different cars that I would be planning on purchasing and contemplating a few more. Watching car shows is a favorite guilty pleasure - Top Gear being the best of the best.

So imagine my delight that upon arriving home today (after a really horrid day, which included waiting for AAA to show up to jump start my car), I discovered that there was a classic car show in Newburyport ("Crusin' the 50s") for one day only!  Happy happy joy joy! Christmas came early.  Although why they called it "Crusin the 50s" when there were cars dating from the 30s through the 60s...  Boggles the mind.  <shrugs>

I hadn't heard that this car show was happening so this ended up being a very nice surprise! I even bought a Crusin' the 50s t-shirt.  Yeah, okay, I'm a nerd.  I fully embrace my nerd-dom. Pictured above is just one of the many cars that I would purchase if given half a chance - a classic 'Vette!  Below is probably my all-time favorite classic car - 1965 Ford Mustang.  This would be my first purchase - although I'm not a fan of the color. I would prefer blue or red. <growl>

If you'd like to see all the photos that I took, check out my Crusin' the 50s photo album.  Enjoy, fellow motorheads!

Security is an Illusion!

Do you remember when you gave up your security blanket or teddy bear or whatever it was that you thought kept you safe? I learned at a fairly young age that life isn't always as secure as we think it is -- that it is tricky and fleeting.

Yesterday, as I was out for my daily walk, I passed two of the most adorable girls who were riding bikes with their dad. They both had training wheels on their bikes and all of a sudden I had a flashback moment to when the training wheels came off my bike. That's not hyperbole, I'm talking literally. I can't remember exactly what age I was but I imagine it was around the age of 5½. My training wheels came off in a rather unusual way. What had happened was: I was flying down the hill of the street I was living on (sans bike helmet, of course because no one wore helmets back in the '70s), secure in the knowledge that I had 4 solid wheels under me. Unbeknownst to me though, the training wheels on my bike had loosened up and were about an inch or two from the pavement. Goodness knows how long I was riding around like that, but my father noticed that the wheels weren't actually doing anything so he removed them and off I went. There was no fanfare, no major celebration, just life going about its merry way. But it was also a lesson that I learned quickly about how many things in life can be just an illusion. 

Yesterday's memory helped clarify some things for me. It reminded me that nothing in life is safe. Something for me to remember when I'm freaking out over why I don't have a fall placement or any other of a number of things in life which I think are invulnerable. Just a little reminder that just when you think your life is secure, the training wheels may just come off.  (Yes, that was hyperbole.)  The only thing you can truly count on in this world is yourself. 

Career Change - Teach Abroad?

I've been thinking of planning yet another adventure - teaching abroad.  I'm not ready right now - at all, but I'm thinking that perhaps when my commitment with TFA is up in 2 years and I've got my Master's degree that perhaps it might be time for me to revisit my dream of living and teaching abroad. While living and teaching in England has been, and will always be, my first preference, I'm sure that would be difficult to get a work visa (let alone finding a teaching position) there...as will anywhere in Europe. Anywhere in Europe (pretty much) would be my second choice after England, but most likely everyone wants to live and teach in Europe. Competition for those jobs would be fierce. The areas which have a ton of teaching positions available are Asia, the Middle East and Africa, but I don't know if I'm quite that adventurous. If I had to choose one of those, I'd probably choose Africa. (Going on safari!) I suppose there's always South or Central America as well. I have a friend who has been living and teaching in Japan for nearly 10 years and he loves it! He's been trying to convince me to move there for ages. Fortunately, I don't have to make this decision today or even anytime over the next 2 years. I have plenty of time to research my options before making any decisions, but I really think I need to do this before I'm way too old to do it.

Of course, I could combine live/teach abroad with getting my PhD, then I might be able to swing Europe.  Hmmmmmmm. Also, if I could find a place in which slightly odd-looking, witty, sarcastic plus-sized women are considered attractive, then I'd be set.  Shoot, I've come full circle back to England.  :-)

I have always wanted to live abroad and I truly have nothing that tethers me to staying in the US except for a handful of friends and a cat. I keep hearing stories from all my fellow TFA corps members who have studied extensively abroad and I really want to have that experience. I wish I had seriously looked into teaching abroad this past year, but in 2 years I'll still be relatively young and can perhaps still do it. Thoughts?

On the TFA front: Last week's Round 0 was (as I predicted) exactly that - a big, fat zero!  It was an almost complete waste of my time and money. The only saving grace was the fact that last Wednesday through Friday's sessions will count toward my Master's degree. Beyond that, it was an annoyingly frustrating week of pointless drivel. Today started much the same.  In fact, I staged a walkout right after lunch...now, granted it was a walkout of one (me!), but a walkout all the same.  After spending the entire morning reading a book because I couldn't do any of the work that they assigned us, I got fed up and said that I was leaving.  If I could have staged a coup d'état, I would have. All the work that other CMs were doing had to do with setting up their classroom culture. Kind of hard to do when you don't have a placement. The classroom culture for a 5th or 6th grade class would be markedly different than a 10th or 11th grade class, so it's impossible for me to come up with any plan and, theoretically, I could be hired for anything from 5th through 12th grade. I did have a job interview last week for a 5th grade Humanities (English and Social Studies) position, which would be pretty fantastic, but so far, I haven't heard anything. I'm also continuing to apply for positions outside of TFA.  Stay tuned...

Strange Olympic Trivia...

Did you know that 'tug of war' was once an event in the Summer Olympics? Seriously! Or that during the 1904 Summer games in St. Louis, the gold medal winner of the marathon was administered a concoction of eggs, brand and strychnine during the race? Weird but true. Or that live pigeon shooting was once an event? Yuck!

While tooling around the internet last night, I stumbled upon a fantastic website - Mentalfloss.com, a site of random, interesting and amazing facts, which had posted these facts and other strange Olympic trivia. For anyone who is a fan of the games, you might find this trivia to be a really fun read.  I know I did!

Today is the final day of the Olympics and it has been a fantastic two weeks of inspirational stories and incredible sportsmanship. The United States athletes did fantastically well (unsurprisingly), but the Great Britain athletes did their home country proud. Well done, GB! I don't know what I'll do with my evenings now.  Oh well, it is just a mere 2 more years until the 2014 winter games, which will take place from the 7th to the 23rd of February 2014, in Sochi, Russia.

By the way, for my fellow Harry Potter fans, Mentalfloss.com had another interesting article, 13 Brazen Harry Potter Knock-Offs From Around the World.  Well worth a visit to the site to read that article.

Seinfeld - The Best Sitcom Ever?

Yesterday, as I was watching Elaine Benes "dance" for the umpteenth time, it occurred to me just how much I love watching reruns of Seinfeld.  In the 20+ years since the first episode of this show aired, I have probably seen every episode a dozen times and yet I still find that show to be hilariously funny! So it got me thinking - is Seinfeld the best sitcom of all time? In my humble opinion, I would give a resounding "YES!" Okay, hear me out for a minute on why I have chosen Seinfeld. First, I will acknowledge that Jerry Seinfeld is a terrible actor but for some reason that didn't affect the quality of this show. Why? I can't really answer that question, but it just didn't. Plus how can a show about nothing with 4 of the most obnoxious characters be so brilliant? Again, I don't know but it just is. Mostly the reason I chose Seinfeld as the best sitcom ever is that it is timeless, the characters are relatable, and Seinfeldisms are now a permanent part of the lexicon.  Let's break those down:

Timeless:  Yes, Seinfeld is timeless. I can't imagine that there won't be a time when we won't be able to find an episode of Seinfeld on television. Plus, the show is consistently funny - no matter how much time has passed.

The characters are relatable: Definitely! Much as we hate to admit it, everyone knows someone who is just like Jerry, George, Elaine, Kramer, Newman and every other character on that show. If you don't know someone who is similar to a character on Seinfeld, then you probably are the Seinfeld character.  Additionally, much as we hate to admit it, each one of us wishes we could be like those characters. Yes, at times, they're rude, repellent, and shallow, and yet, we still love them!

Seinfeldisms:  Who hasn't used or heard of "master of your domain" or "yada, yada, yada" or "no soup for you" or "Festivus for the rest of us" or "spongeworthy" or "not that there's anything wrong with that" or "giddyup"?  Anyone?  Anyone??  I thought not.  Is there a more quotable show? Okay, I recognize that  I Love Lucy is a hilarious and timeless show, but is anyone using "Vitameatavegamin" on a daily basis?  Um, no!  If you want to see the complete list of Seinfeldisms, check out this page.

I will give honorable mentions to the following American sitcoms which are hilariously funny and timeless (in no particularly order): Frasier, M*A*S*H, Friends, I Love Lucy, All in the Family and the hundreds of other sitcoms, but none of them can hold a candle to Seinfeld. I would also like to give honorable mentions to the following British sitcoms which I think are equally uproarious (in no particularly order):  Black Books, Father Ted, Absolutely Fabulous, The Office (I don't care for the American version but the British one is brilliant!), Blackadder, Monty Python's Flying Circus, Fawlty Towers, and dozens more.  If you're a fan of British comedy but haven't seen any of these shows, you need to check them out!

Anyone disagree on my conclusion of the best sitcom of all time?  Feel free to prove me wrong.  Meanwhile, here are some of my favorite moments from Seinfeld.  "Sweet fancy Moses!"

Past Lives...

Have you ever been to a new place and swear that you’ve been there before - even though you know you haven’t? This past Sunday, I went out for a bike ride and ended up at the Spencer-Peirce-Little Farm, in Newbury.  Over the past year, I had ridden or driven by the farm dozens of times and never stopped by. The SPL Farm is a "230-acre site [which] includes a late seventeenth-century manor house that served as the country seat of wealthy Newburyport merchants and an attached farmhouse that was home to a Lithuanian farm family for most of the twentieth century." This site has been lovingly restored by Historic New England.  Walking through the restored manor house, one could feel 400 years of history imbued in the house. In fact, a woman on my tour swore that she had been there before, but couldn't remember when. While I didn’t experience that same feeling, I could see how someone might feel like that if they had lived in that house during a previous incarnation. But it started me thinking about the times that I have experienced a feeling of visiting a place before.

In May 2000, I traveled to Paris for the first time and I just fell in love with the City of Light. But odder still, I sensed that I had been there before and felt completely at home. I hadn't expected to feel welcome at all - mostly because the French are ... well, French and aren't a very welcoming people.  But it wasn't about the people of Paris but the city itself. Even though I knew nothing about Paris, I knew instinctively where I was at all times. I swear that I have lived there at some time in a past life. I experienced the same feeling in September 2001 when I traveled to England. Not while I was in London, which felt unfamiliar, but the minute I traveled to the English countryside - particularly Bath - I had that same feeling of having lived there before.  And that's not just the Anglophile in me talking.

Perhaps during the French revolution, I was a Parisian aristocrat who, with the assistance of a brave stranger, eluded 'la guillotine' by escaping to England and lived out the rest of that life in the English countryside. No, wait, that sounds familiar. I'm thinking of Baroness Orczy's novel, The Scarlet Pimpernel.  Sorry!  It's probably something much simpler. Perhaps I worked as a lady's maid or a governess to a wealthy family who lived in the English countryside and traveled occasionally to Paris. That's probably more likely.

For giggles, I googled "past lives" and came across a website in which you input your date of birth and it'll tell you who you were in your last life. I captured the results - below:

 

Now this 'diagnosis' was really funny, but I'm not entirely buying it. Anyone born on the same day as I was would get the exact same results - not a very personalized result. Truthfully, I would love to actually have someone do a past life regression on me, but I don't know anyone reputable enough to plunk down a chunk of money on something so frivolous. If anyone has a solid recommendation though, I'd consider having it done. I think we can learn a lot from our past lives - particularly about how not to repeat past mistakes. 

Career Change - Round Zero

Today, I started two weeks of what TFA is laughingly calling "professional development" time.  Erm.  Yeah, okay.  Whatever you say.  What is it really?  A complete waste of time, energy and money.  If I go by what the daily schedule is showing, it'll be two more weeks of sitting around and discussing our placements, the achievement gaps in our region, visions and goals for our placements, designing our classroom management plan, and "reflecting" on the visions and goals we're written.  Sound familiar?  Yeah, it's everything I just spent 5 weeks doing in Philadelphia, only now the focus is on our fall placements. Of course, the worse part of these two weeks is that I quite literally cannot do any of the work due to not having a fall placement at the moment. When I made my complaints known to staff, I was told that whatever I came up with could apply to any classroom.  What?!?!  <sigh>  It's going to be a long two weeks.  I suppose I'll pick up something important over these two weeks, but probably not enough to warrant the complete waste of time.  

On the upside, in the week I've been home, I lost 4 of 5 institute pounds I gained.  Now, only 31 more pounds to lose and I'll be at my target weight.  Ugh. 

Letting Anger Fuel My Workouts!

As I've mentioned in previous posts, I really hate working out and, even though I've been working out pretty steadily over the past two years, I still loathe it. But I have discovered a way to get a great workout - anger. Anger is a fantastic motivator. Friends keep telling me that I have to rid myself of anger over some past friendships but, due to my peculiar brand of OCD, I find that a difficult task. I tend to obsess over past hurts and wrongs and have a hard time letting go of those emotions. Currently, I have four ex-friends who screwed me over in a huge way and, if I even think about these backstabbers, my temperature rises to incredible heights. Yesterday, I was cleaning out some old emails and came across a message from one of these people and I thought my head was going to explode in anger. Just seeing her name and reading this old email brought back all that fury. Deciding I need to walk off some of my ire, I strapped on my sneakers and headed out for a walk. Arriving home an hour later, I was drenched in sweat and my anger had dissipated. Eureka!

There is actually some science behind this phenomenon: Paul A. Davis, a sports psychologist at the University of Wolverhampton in England, and colleagues from Bangor University in Wales discovered that people who are more easily angered exert the most energy while working out. Additionally, angry people can not only workout harder, they also workout longer than their calm, cool and collected peers. So I intend to use my soured relationships to fuel my future workouts and hope that I can expunge these feelings over time.  Meanwhile, I will use these emotions to my advantage. It should be noted that when my anger finally fizzled yesterday, I was a bit of a ways from home and it made for a sucky walk back.  I'll have to better plan my walking path in the future or hold onto my anger longer.  :-)

The next time you are having a bad day, instead of reaching for that pint of Ben & Jerry's ice cream, use that energy to workout your anger. If you need some anger inspiration to fuel your workouts, tune your television to any news report (particularly Fox News).  I find that usually does the trick for me. 

The Big O!

Every two years, I get the biggest thrills for two full weeks! Yes, I'm talking about the Olympics. I fully admit to being an Olympic whore - summer, winter, makes no difference to me. I first remember being enamored with the Olympics during the 1972 Munich summer games. That summer, it was all about Olga Korbutt and Mark Spitz. Between watching the two of them, I swore I was destined for Olympic greatness.  I had high hopes for myself at the tender age of 6.  I remember begging my mother for gymnastics lessons, but to no avail. With five children, there just wasn't enough money for me to be the next Olga.  Four years later (during the 1976 Montreal games), each time I watched Nadia Comăneci score a perfect 10 (seven in total), I seethed with jealousy.  Not that that could have been me.  At 10 years of age, I was still too young to compete, but it could have been me in the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles.  I might have given Mary Lou Retton some competition.  Okay, okay - delusions of grandeur, I know.

This summer's Olympics have been fantastic, so far.  I unfortunately missed the opening ceremonies due to being in Philly without a television but since arriving home, my television has been stuck on NBC. I've watched as much of the coverage as I can. The hardest part of these Olympics is avoiding hearing about the results before watching the prime time coverage - not easy. There have been so many thrilling moments, like watching the US women's gymnastics team winning the gold and Gabby Douglas becoming the first African-American to win the gymnastics all-round gold. Or Michael Phelps winning his 19th medal, becoming the most decorated Olympian in history. (He has gone on to win 2 more for a total of 21 with 1 more swim to go later today.)  How about Bradley Wiggins from Great Britain who wins gold in the cycling time trials less than 2 weeks after winning the Tour de France? I loved seeing him sit on the throne at Hampton Court Palace. Of course, having a Brit sitting on the throne makes sense, but an American?  Kristin Armstrong, at the ripe age of 38, won the gold in the cycling time trials and got to sit on the throne. Brilliant!

There are also the inspiring stories. There is the 35-year old rower from Niger, Hamadou Djibo Issaka, who only took up rowing 3 months ago in a country that is landlocked and 80 percent desert.  It took him nine minutes to finish his heat (a full 2 minutes after the leader), but that wasn't the point. He finished - that was the important part. His plans are to stay in the sport and compete in the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics. There is the female sprinter from Afghanistan, Tahmina Kohistani, who endured all sorts of verbal abuse while she was training to compete in a sprint which would take less than 15 seconds. She is the lone female on the Afghanistan team (a team of 6) and finished 31st out of 32 competitors. That doesn't matter. She has become a beacon of hope to all the women of Afghanistan. There's the sad story of the first female track and field participant from Qatar, Noor Hussain Al-Malki, who collapsed in pain after about 15 meters into the 100-meter dash, having pulled a hamstring. Qatar decided to include female athletes (four in total) in its delegation for the first time. Al-Malki was pushed out of the competition arena in a wheelchair, but she's still a trailblazer for other female athletes from the region.

Many people complain about the Olympics and eschew the games, but there are so many wonderful and inspiring moments. There is an indomitable spirit in the 10,000+ athletes who have spent so much time and energy training for the Olympics and I admire their fortitude. The games are only halfway through and I cannot wait to see what the rest of the games have to show.  I also say "Huzzah" to London for hosting these fantastic games. Well done, Britain! (BTW, if you want to know why Britain rarely wins gold medals, see the Eddie Izzard clip below.)

Step on a Crack, Break Your Mother's Back...

Anyone remember that old wives' tale? I started thinking about all those old superstitions today as I was eating an apple. Why? When I was about 10 years old, someone told me that you can learn the name of your true love as you remove the stem of an apple. As you turn the stem, you say the alphabet. The letter that you say as the stem falls off is the letter that your true love's name begins with. Now of course, I don't believe in this ridiculousness, but what's funny is that I still find myself saying the alphabet as I'm removing the stem. It's just a habit that I cannot stop doing. I started thinking about any other habits that I still do that have absolutely no basis for anything other than it's a habit, because I'm not at all superstitious.

I definitely don't worry about cracks in the sidewalk. "Find a penny, pick it up, all day long, you'll have good luck" - um, I'm not wasting my energy picking up a penny. I'm in the "Retire the Penny" side of the debate, so the last thing I want is another useless coin. The belief that it's unlucky to cross black cats, break mirrors, open umbrellas indoors, and walk under ladders is just foolish. The only reason I generally don't walk under a ladder is for safety reasons but I know that I've done it regardless. I will say that if I knock over a salt shaker, I will throw a pinch over my shoulder. Habit! I certainly don't think the devil is lurking over my left shoulder. There is another superstition that you should get out of the bed on the same side that you get in the bed or you will have bad luck. I do get out of the same side of the bed, BUT only because of the way my bedroom is set up. It just makes more sense, but I'm certainly not opposed to getting out on the other side. I don't put shoes on a table, but not because it's bad luck. For hygienic reasons - it would be pretty nasty to put shoes that have been walking the outside streets on a table in which I would then eat a meal on.  Eeeeuuuuuwwwwww!  And can someone explain why 13 is considered an unlucky number?

The theatre-world is rife with superstitions. For instance, you are not allowed to whistle backstage or in the dressing room. If somebody does it, they must go out of the dressing room, turn around three times and then knock on the door and ask for permission to be admitted. You never say the name of Shakespeare's Scottish play while in the theatre - it'll doom your production. And of course, you never, ever say "good luck" to a fellow performer before a performance - always "break a leg," "good show," "knock 'em dead," etc. I have done all of these things!  Maybe it explains my unlucky performing career or maybe it's just really hard to be a successful performer.

Is anyone else still doing some of these superstitions out of habit? Who is doing them out of superstition? There's one folktale that I hope is true - that you can find a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow. I'm willing to continue to look for that one, just on the off-chance.

Music Doesn't Lie - Part 13 (Vivimi)

"Music doesn't lie. If there is something to be changed in this world,

then it can only happen through music." – Jimi Hendrix

It's been awhile since I last posted as part of my Music Doesn't Lie series - last time was June 7 to be exact. But I have a new artist to feature...new to me, that is. My friend, Lauren who lives in Malta, posted on Facebook that she had attended the concert of a singer - someone that I had never heard of before - and then Lauren posted a video of the performer. After listening to the video, I become intrigued to learn more about this performer, Laura Pausini. Ms. Pausini is an Italian soul singer-songwriter who debuted in 1993. Wow, where the heck have I been for the past 20 years that I have been missing out on this gorgeous voice! Granted the extent of my knowledge of Italian singers is limited to Andrea Bocelli and Luciano Pavarotti (one singer that I love, one I don't - you figure out which). 

This talented performer has released 10 Italian-language studio albums, 9 Spanish-language albums and a greatest hits album. She has been nominated for 70 different music awards and has won 38 including three Latin Grammy Awards, five World Music Awards and three ASCAP Latin Music Awards. She has performed several times with the amazing Andrea Bocelli, including one of my favorite songs "Vivere" (whoops, I guess you can figure out the answer to my earlier statement). Although why these two Italian singers sang half of this song in English is beyond me. So much prettier in Italian. She has also duetted with Luciano Pavarotti, Michael Bublé, and James Blunt.

I am just starting to get to know her music and I am already incredibly impressed with her. Picking just one song is a tough decision for I really like all the music I've listened to so far.  I'll definitely give honorable mentions to "Troppo Tempo" and "Benvenuto" but I think I like "Vivimi" best (below).  So beautiful! I haven't looked for an English translation so I have no idea what this song is about but I can imagine. I can't wait to discover more of this brilliant performer's music.

Career Change: Tagxedo Your Students!

Ouch, that sounds painful.  

Yesterday, I stumbled across a pretty cool website - Tagxedo!  Tagxedo "turns words -- famous speeches, news articles, slogans and themes, even your love letters -- into a visually stunning word cloud, words individually sized appropriately to highlight the frequencies of occurrence within the body of text."  It's simple enough. You can either type the words directly, pick a text file on your computer, or choose a website, then choose your colors, your pattern and font, and voila - you have your Tagxedo!  The photo (right) is the Tagxedo of this very blog.  Pretty amazing.

This is a really neat website which I intend to use with my students' writings by creating their very own Tagxedo with their own words. My plan is to start with the "first day student survey" and create a Tagxedo with for each student with their name, favorite hobbies, books, sport, music, etc.  How fun will that be for my kids?!  There are lots of interesting shapes and colors to choose from so each student can have their own special individualized Tagxedo. I figure I can do this throughout the year with different assignments.

I decided to play around a bit and did a Tagxedo of a section of my favorite book, Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen.  The Tagxedo is of my favorite chapter - Chapter 59 (below). Yeah, I know I'm a sap using the heart shape. But I just adore this website and can't wait to use it with my kids in the fall. Fellow teachers, something to try with your kids!

On another note: it's official. I've been unhired from my placement in Revere.  Fingers crossed, everyone, that TFA actually finds me an ELA placement north of Boston.  That would be my ideal position.