First of all, I want to apologize for my sporadic blogging spurts. I've noticed a slight theme in the way I blog- nothing for forever, and then 18 things all at once :) I just have to get into the mood and ... I've been in the writing mood slash have some material to write about :)
This time, I want to write about my latest class assignment. In my science class, Unit 3 was called "Our Fascinating Earth!" (If you have a sixth grade Abeca book sitting around, you can check it out :)) The different sections dealt with the plates of the Earth, volcanoes, earthquakes, fiery rocks, hidden treasures (like gems and petroleum), magnets, and caves.They were all topics that I thought my sixth graders would really enjoy learning about; unfortunately I didn't have the time to do them all in detail. So, instead I did the first section of plates by creating a booklet and presenting important material, and then I divided the class up into six groups and had them do the same with the rest of the unit.
The requirements:
~ Complete a booklet that is
-informative
-gives all the vocabulary words I gave the group
-written in a way that is easy to understand (words your classmates will know)
~ Be the expert on your section- YOU WILL BE THE TEACHERS!
~ Discuss how you will present as a group- Will you have written everything into the
booklet or will the students need to copy from the board? Will they look up
anything on their own, or will have all the answers available?
~ Do you need copies of the book pictures or diagrams you've created?
~ You must have some sort of visual aid- an experiment, examples, pictures
~ Everyone in the group must participate and be able to answer questions
So, that was the assignment. We had a week and a half to work on it, and the kids actually did a really awesome job and enjoyed it. My favorite part of this 'experiment' though was actually watching the kids teach. I kind of gave them complete reign of the classroom. I became a student and sat in the desks, and they were in charge of making sure everyone had all the information, understood the concepts, paid attention, and that we finished on time. It was quite the experience. :) I think it not only gave my students a taste of how difficult it can be to try and keep everyone's attention and still teach something, but it also gave me a taste of being a student- that I as the teacher need to have lessons that will hold their interest and I need to have control of my classroom so everyone is able to learn and benefit from the classroom time. I found myself definitely drifting during the presentations, sitting and waiting a lot, being bored... and yes, I must admit, I felt like causing problems just for the attention of it. I got annoyed with the kids talking, but then I got in trouble for talking several times! - and it wasn't even always to 'help' another student (which could be a legitimate excuse for talking, I've realized). I was a little bit embarassed about the getting in trouble thing though. :) It reminded me of a class I had in college when the professor sent an email to my friend (a guy friend, a very cute, charming guy friend...) saying that him and I needed to stop talking in class and paying attention! GAH so embarassing. but anyway :) It was funny to see my kids in the 'discipline' role- I told them they could do what they needed to to keep order (within reason of course) It was funny to see them taking my discipline tools and using them- and those tools working! The group in charge was 'completely' in charge. For example, one member wanted a drink; he was shocked at the power I allowed him by saying he was in charge if he wanted to get a drink. :) But it's true- I never give bathroom breaks, but there have been two times this year that I had to go so bad that I "gave" a bathroom break as a "reward" :) Power of the teacher. :)
Another thing I noticed a lot more being in the student's seat was how much my sixth graders enjoy answering questions. As far as I can tell, there is no reward for answering questions, and still they're fighting to particpate. I saw several kids get upset when they didn't get called on, and one boy even teared up a little and hid his face! What is that? ;) I'm sure some of it is just a desire to show everyone how smart you are that you know the answer, but at some point, knowing the answers and being smart isn't cool anymore. I hope it takes my kids a little longer to realize that part of school. :)
I have some pictures of the various projects, but I took them with my phone since I'm without a working camera and I'm not quite sure how to move them from my phone to my computer yet so.... you'll have to take a raincheck. :) I'll let you know if more delightful learning experiences come up!
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Adventures in Christmas Programing.... continued
I don't know how many of you read my blog of last year's Christmas extravaganza, but basically, I got lost and was super frantic and pretty nervous going into it. So, this year, I wanted to be prepared!
The Christmas show is a big, big deal. Each class performs a dance number and there are mini-acts in between. This year, the actors were actually from our school so that was pretty cool. They did different acts of Jesus's miracles in between the songs. My group was made up of all the fifth and sixth grade girls, a ninth grader with a flag solo (brought me back to my color guard days... :D), and in the last week we added four fifth grade boys to lift pieces of fabric up and down. Mrs. Lopez (the fifth grade teacher) and I have been practicing with the girls for a month, so to have the boys thrown in at the last minute was a little bit of a challenge, but it turned out ok :) All this week we've had extra practice time, and gone down to the Vida Abundante church in Gracias because that's where we actually performed. Friday morning we had a full dress rehearsal and then sent the kids home at noon and had lunch. After lunch, we came back to decorate and set up chairs. Last year the decorating probably took us four or more hours and was super stressful, but this year almost everything was already done! So, we were able to go the homes of one of the teachers and relax and shower. Later, I joined Ana and Maggie to help Ana's girls with their make-up. (I was in charge of eyeliner and eye glitter :)) I made sure to stay with other teachers the whole night so I wouldn't get lost trying to get back to the church and we made it right on time- showered and everything!:) My girls all looked great and were pretty excited/nervous. There were a lot of important people at this event - I know the mayor was invited, I don't know if he was actually there :) The school asked the church to videotape the performance so maybe I'll have a DVD to show anyone interested :) The only problem with the recording was that the solo flag girl walked down the middle of the aisle, twirling her flags right where teh camera was set up. So, we had them move the camera. Problem one averted. Next problem, my girls were supposed to leave their row, walk around the back of the chairs and go up the side aisle to the stage. There were so many people there though, that not everyone had a seat and there was a crowd of people just standing in the back. I went through and asked them if, during the first song, they could make a path so my girls could get through, but two minutes later, the crowd in the back had doubled with people that hadn't heard my message and it was so crowded, I didn't think the girls would be able to get through anyway. So I had everyone switch spots and we just decided to inch past the fourth graders sitting in our same row. Problem two averted :) When my girls finally lined up, they all got a wine goblet with a little battery candle in it that they turned on. Everyone looked so pretty and the girls got ready to go on stage. I walked with them to the stage and then headed over to the reserved teacher's chair- except there was someone sitting in it and I had no place to go. By this time, the lights were off and the students were getting in their places. I somehow got wrapped up in the big piece of fabric the boys had and I was SO SCARED I was going to be standing there in this piece of fabric when the lights and music came back on that I panicked and just scrambled around until I was on the floor out of the way :) I wasn't really in a place where the girls could see me, but they did really well on their own, plus I think Mrs. Lopez was at least in sight. I tried to take video, but, again, my camera angle was not the best :) SO! Hopefully those DVDs are sweet! :)
Since ours was the second dance, we got it over pretty quickly, and the girls were able to sit and relax the rest of the time. It was a pretty great show, and although it had its stressful moments, it all worked out and everyone was pretty happy about the whole night :)
I'm soooooo excited to be coming home in less than a week ... although I'm not sure I'm ready to trade the sunshine for the blizzards... :/ I'm currently sitting outside sweating my face off, slightly burning my fingers while typing on my black keyboard :)
The Christmas show is a big, big deal. Each class performs a dance number and there are mini-acts in between. This year, the actors were actually from our school so that was pretty cool. They did different acts of Jesus's miracles in between the songs. My group was made up of all the fifth and sixth grade girls, a ninth grader with a flag solo (brought me back to my color guard days... :D), and in the last week we added four fifth grade boys to lift pieces of fabric up and down. Mrs. Lopez (the fifth grade teacher) and I have been practicing with the girls for a month, so to have the boys thrown in at the last minute was a little bit of a challenge, but it turned out ok :) All this week we've had extra practice time, and gone down to the Vida Abundante church in Gracias because that's where we actually performed. Friday morning we had a full dress rehearsal and then sent the kids home at noon and had lunch. After lunch, we came back to decorate and set up chairs. Last year the decorating probably took us four or more hours and was super stressful, but this year almost everything was already done! So, we were able to go the homes of one of the teachers and relax and shower. Later, I joined Ana and Maggie to help Ana's girls with their make-up. (I was in charge of eyeliner and eye glitter :)) I made sure to stay with other teachers the whole night so I wouldn't get lost trying to get back to the church and we made it right on time- showered and everything!:) My girls all looked great and were pretty excited/nervous. There were a lot of important people at this event - I know the mayor was invited, I don't know if he was actually there :) The school asked the church to videotape the performance so maybe I'll have a DVD to show anyone interested :) The only problem with the recording was that the solo flag girl walked down the middle of the aisle, twirling her flags right where teh camera was set up. So, we had them move the camera. Problem one averted. Next problem, my girls were supposed to leave their row, walk around the back of the chairs and go up the side aisle to the stage. There were so many people there though, that not everyone had a seat and there was a crowd of people just standing in the back. I went through and asked them if, during the first song, they could make a path so my girls could get through, but two minutes later, the crowd in the back had doubled with people that hadn't heard my message and it was so crowded, I didn't think the girls would be able to get through anyway. So I had everyone switch spots and we just decided to inch past the fourth graders sitting in our same row. Problem two averted :) When my girls finally lined up, they all got a wine goblet with a little battery candle in it that they turned on. Everyone looked so pretty and the girls got ready to go on stage. I walked with them to the stage and then headed over to the reserved teacher's chair- except there was someone sitting in it and I had no place to go. By this time, the lights were off and the students were getting in their places. I somehow got wrapped up in the big piece of fabric the boys had and I was SO SCARED I was going to be standing there in this piece of fabric when the lights and music came back on that I panicked and just scrambled around until I was on the floor out of the way :) I wasn't really in a place where the girls could see me, but they did really well on their own, plus I think Mrs. Lopez was at least in sight. I tried to take video, but, again, my camera angle was not the best :) SO! Hopefully those DVDs are sweet! :)
Since ours was the second dance, we got it over pretty quickly, and the girls were able to sit and relax the rest of the time. It was a pretty great show, and although it had its stressful moments, it all worked out and everyone was pretty happy about the whole night :)
I'm soooooo excited to be coming home in less than a week ... although I'm not sure I'm ready to trade the sunshine for the blizzards... :/ I'm currently sitting outside sweating my face off, slightly burning my fingers while typing on my black keyboard :)
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
it's not really looking a lot like .....
CHRISTMASSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I found this article while wandering facebook. I know it's a bad habit to spend lots of time on facebook stalking people, but in this case, I was pretty pleased with my findings! :)
http://www.relevantmagazine.com/god/deeper-walk/features/23640-why-advent
I think this article is really interesting because I LOVE LOVE LOVE Advent. I know I have to blame this on my parents because it was always a big deal at my house, but honestly, sometimes I miss doing the Secret Angels more than I miss Candlelight services. :) That's ok right? Anyway, so read the article if you want, but it's mostly just because I've been doing Advent in my class the last couple weeks. They all love it, and that makes me pretty excited. :) Also, our Christmas decorations were due on December 5th, which was EXACTLY 12 days until our last day of school- December 17th! So, guess what I did for my door decoration? I definitely have "Sixth Grade's Twelve Days of Christmas" with a big posterboard shaped like a house with twelve perforated windows. Monday (the first day) I had kids outside my room for about 30 seconds before I came out of the classroom and FOUR of the windows were popped open. I was so mad... but I guess I should have known that would happen? I made a big sign that said not to touch the windows and gave my kids a big lecture, but there are an awful lot of people in the school that really, really want to see what's behind the windows because everyday I see 2-3 that have been opened or reopened. SIGHHH. :) But, for the most part, getting into the spirit of Christmas has been great. For movie night this Saturday, we made chili, snickerdoodle cookies, and hot chocolate and watched Elf. This Saturday we're planning on Home Alone :)
I found this article while wandering facebook. I know it's a bad habit to spend lots of time on facebook stalking people, but in this case, I was pretty pleased with my findings! :)
http://www.relevantmagazine.com/god/deeper-walk/features/23640-why-advent
I think this article is really interesting because I LOVE LOVE LOVE Advent. I know I have to blame this on my parents because it was always a big deal at my house, but honestly, sometimes I miss doing the Secret Angels more than I miss Candlelight services. :) That's ok right? Anyway, so read the article if you want, but it's mostly just because I've been doing Advent in my class the last couple weeks. They all love it, and that makes me pretty excited. :) Also, our Christmas decorations were due on December 5th, which was EXACTLY 12 days until our last day of school- December 17th! So, guess what I did for my door decoration? I definitely have "Sixth Grade's Twelve Days of Christmas" with a big posterboard shaped like a house with twelve perforated windows. Monday (the first day) I had kids outside my room for about 30 seconds before I came out of the classroom and FOUR of the windows were popped open. I was so mad... but I guess I should have known that would happen? I made a big sign that said not to touch the windows and gave my kids a big lecture, but there are an awful lot of people in the school that really, really want to see what's behind the windows because everyday I see 2-3 that have been opened or reopened. SIGHHH. :) But, for the most part, getting into the spirit of Christmas has been great. For movie night this Saturday, we made chili, snickerdoodle cookies, and hot chocolate and watched Elf. This Saturday we're planning on Home Alone :)
turkey day
For Thanksgiving, we got Thursday and Friday off , so we got a four-day weekend! The school runs on a United States schedule, so that's why we celebrated Thanksgiving at all. The school actually puts together an entire weekend of activities, so we were pretty excited about spending some time getting to know Tegus.
Wednesday night, we were going to finish (or in my case, start) packing for our trip, but the power went out. I think we sat around for quite awhile when Shelly suggested we should play Sardines in our house and take advantage of the pitch blackness. For those of you who have not played Sardines, it's basically a reverse Hide-and-Seek game. ONE person hides and then the entire group searches for the person. If you find the hider, you hide with them, and the next person to find the both of you hides also, and so on until the last person finds the entire group. Most of us were not that excited about the game, and I personally didn't think it would possible with a space as small as a one-story house, but we went for it anyway- and it was pretty hilarious. Us four girls played, and Maggie and Tyler joined us so it was quite the night. We were all surprised at how difficult it was to find people, and how giggly we were when we found them! :) The last hiding place was Tyler hiding on the wall surrounding the shower- pretty good one to end on. :)
The power finally came back on around 10 and we finished getting ready and went to bed. The next day, we were in town by 6 to leave on the bus for Tegus. The school let us use their bus and driver all weekend, so it was like having our own personal tour guide service! :) We got to the hotel at about 3 (the roads were pretty awful with construction, it really shouldn't have taken us 9 hours!) and settled in. The four of us girls decided to stick together and ended up in a rooftop room. It was really beautiful. We had our actual room, a little balcony overlooking the street, a walk out big porch room, and THEN stairs that went up to the roof with a gazebo and seats and a beautiful view of the city. It was pretty amazing. We relaxed for a little while before getting dressed up for our fancy Thanksgiving dinner. This is the only day of the whole year that I get/have any reason to wear cute high heels, so I was pretty happy about that! We went and ate at the house of one of the administrators of our school. Everyone that has an important position in our school district, so that was pretty cool to see all of them again. They had made us a traditional Thanksgiving meal- turkey, gravy, sweet potatoes, cranberry sauce, and relish trays. We also has some delicious apple cider and cheesecake.
Before I continue, I feel like I should specify who 'we' is since it's different than when I usually write. This weekend was planned for all the extranjeros - or all the people that live here, but aren't actually Honduran :). So that included from Gracias, Shelly, Catelin, Jennifer, Maggie, Tyler, Justin, Tabitha and I; from La Union, Amelia, Andrea, Jake, and two girls from Great Britain, Bryanny and Holly, and Vicente- who is Honduran, but was our 'tour guide' for the whole time. Thursday night, we chilled for awhile, but went to bed pretty quickly because we'd been up all day traveling.
On Friday morning, I was up at 6 and probably went to the bathroom 8-9 times by the time we left at 9.... Thanksgiving dinner was sooooo good but my body is not used to so much richness all at once! :/ So that was a fun way to start the day.... and it continued. :) We went to Valle de Angeles, which is a really nice pottery town about an hour away from Tegus. Before we left for our 'trip', I had to ask the bus driver to stop at a pharmacy so I could grab some Immodium before our trek :) (Is it called immodium in English too? Sometimes I just don't even know haha). We had lunch in Valle de Angeles and then walked around and shopped. I think the only thing I bought there was a hairpiece made out of coconut, but it was still nice to walk around and look at all the pottery and homemade jewelry. We went back to the city and visited Vida Abundante's clinic and I actually got some new glasses! So that was exciting. Later, we went to the mall, which was a little overwhelming, but I managed to still buy a Dunkin' Donut. :) Friday night, we went to a restaurant with a mini-golf course so some of us played golf and ate some good food. (I did not play mini-golf; I just ate :))
Saturday we got up early-ish again and went to another town called Ojojona. Ojojona is another pottery town, but it's pretty cool because you can almost always find people working in the shops on the pieces that they're going to put out on the shelves later. We bought some things there, and I found some delicious carrot bread that I ate, regardless of my previous stomach problems... bad choice. :) Those stomach problems just stayed with me all weekend ;) We got back to Tegus and went to some other little shops because some of the girls needed materials to decorate their rooms for Christmas. After that we all returned to the mall to shop some more and then saw Harry Potter in the theaters. I think I mentioned in another blog that I'd never seen any of the movies, so my roommates and I rented them on itunes and watched them all (except 6, which isn't on itunes for some reason)over the course of a couple weeks. I was basically caught up for number 7 and it was fun to go see a movie. We also ate a really good Italian restaurant. Saturday night, we ordered pizza and invited everyone up to our rooftop room and hung out and talked. Sunday, we left for home!
When we got home, we were all SUPER tired. I don't know if you remember from last year, but my idea of vacation is sometimes only sitting in the air conditioned room with the tv on.... I think we got one show of Friends in and that was all the tv we saw this weekend :) So the constant running around was a bit much for me, but we still had a good time, and it was nice to see the different areas around Tegucigalpa.
Monday, we got back into the swing of things with school. This Friday is our big Christmas program so everything is a little crazy, but I think it will go well!
Wednesday night, we were going to finish (or in my case, start) packing for our trip, but the power went out. I think we sat around for quite awhile when Shelly suggested we should play Sardines in our house and take advantage of the pitch blackness. For those of you who have not played Sardines, it's basically a reverse Hide-and-Seek game. ONE person hides and then the entire group searches for the person. If you find the hider, you hide with them, and the next person to find the both of you hides also, and so on until the last person finds the entire group. Most of us were not that excited about the game, and I personally didn't think it would possible with a space as small as a one-story house, but we went for it anyway- and it was pretty hilarious. Us four girls played, and Maggie and Tyler joined us so it was quite the night. We were all surprised at how difficult it was to find people, and how giggly we were when we found them! :) The last hiding place was Tyler hiding on the wall surrounding the shower- pretty good one to end on. :)
The power finally came back on around 10 and we finished getting ready and went to bed. The next day, we were in town by 6 to leave on the bus for Tegus. The school let us use their bus and driver all weekend, so it was like having our own personal tour guide service! :) We got to the hotel at about 3 (the roads were pretty awful with construction, it really shouldn't have taken us 9 hours!) and settled in. The four of us girls decided to stick together and ended up in a rooftop room. It was really beautiful. We had our actual room, a little balcony overlooking the street, a walk out big porch room, and THEN stairs that went up to the roof with a gazebo and seats and a beautiful view of the city. It was pretty amazing. We relaxed for a little while before getting dressed up for our fancy Thanksgiving dinner. This is the only day of the whole year that I get/have any reason to wear cute high heels, so I was pretty happy about that! We went and ate at the house of one of the administrators of our school. Everyone that has an important position in our school district, so that was pretty cool to see all of them again. They had made us a traditional Thanksgiving meal- turkey, gravy, sweet potatoes, cranberry sauce, and relish trays. We also has some delicious apple cider and cheesecake.
Before I continue, I feel like I should specify who 'we' is since it's different than when I usually write. This weekend was planned for all the extranjeros - or all the people that live here, but aren't actually Honduran :). So that included from Gracias, Shelly, Catelin, Jennifer, Maggie, Tyler, Justin, Tabitha and I; from La Union, Amelia, Andrea, Jake, and two girls from Great Britain, Bryanny and Holly, and Vicente- who is Honduran, but was our 'tour guide' for the whole time. Thursday night, we chilled for awhile, but went to bed pretty quickly because we'd been up all day traveling.
On Friday morning, I was up at 6 and probably went to the bathroom 8-9 times by the time we left at 9.... Thanksgiving dinner was sooooo good but my body is not used to so much richness all at once! :/ So that was a fun way to start the day.... and it continued. :) We went to Valle de Angeles, which is a really nice pottery town about an hour away from Tegus. Before we left for our 'trip', I had to ask the bus driver to stop at a pharmacy so I could grab some Immodium before our trek :) (Is it called immodium in English too? Sometimes I just don't even know haha). We had lunch in Valle de Angeles and then walked around and shopped. I think the only thing I bought there was a hairpiece made out of coconut, but it was still nice to walk around and look at all the pottery and homemade jewelry. We went back to the city and visited Vida Abundante's clinic and I actually got some new glasses! So that was exciting. Later, we went to the mall, which was a little overwhelming, but I managed to still buy a Dunkin' Donut. :) Friday night, we went to a restaurant with a mini-golf course so some of us played golf and ate some good food. (I did not play mini-golf; I just ate :))
Saturday we got up early-ish again and went to another town called Ojojona. Ojojona is another pottery town, but it's pretty cool because you can almost always find people working in the shops on the pieces that they're going to put out on the shelves later. We bought some things there, and I found some delicious carrot bread that I ate, regardless of my previous stomach problems... bad choice. :) Those stomach problems just stayed with me all weekend ;) We got back to Tegus and went to some other little shops because some of the girls needed materials to decorate their rooms for Christmas. After that we all returned to the mall to shop some more and then saw Harry Potter in the theaters. I think I mentioned in another blog that I'd never seen any of the movies, so my roommates and I rented them on itunes and watched them all (except 6, which isn't on itunes for some reason)over the course of a couple weeks. I was basically caught up for number 7 and it was fun to go see a movie. We also ate a really good Italian restaurant. Saturday night, we ordered pizza and invited everyone up to our rooftop room and hung out and talked. Sunday, we left for home!
When we got home, we were all SUPER tired. I don't know if you remember from last year, but my idea of vacation is sometimes only sitting in the air conditioned room with the tv on.... I think we got one show of Friends in and that was all the tv we saw this weekend :) So the constant running around was a bit much for me, but we still had a good time, and it was nice to see the different areas around Tegucigalpa.
Monday, we got back into the swing of things with school. This Friday is our big Christmas program so everything is a little crazy, but I think it will go well!
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