April 2010
2 posts
Sometimes
I feel imprisoned in my school. There is so much commotion, so much movement, so many voices, loud, trying to be heard. I have to struggle and strain my voice just to get a word in with my seventh graders. It makes me want to fall to my knees in tears, and the thought of doing it again in the next period or the next day breaks my heart right in the middle of class.
Sometimes, one can just tell...
January 2010
8 posts
I say this as the husband of a gifted teacher...
hurricane-k:
therealestsocksinthegame:
dailyhuff:
Treasure the teachers in your life. Part of my wife’s gift is the joy she takes in her work. She works incredibly hard - if you break it down into hours spent on job-related activities, she’s probably only making a few bucks an hour, overall - and it is clear that many of her students respond. It is clear from correspondence she’s received...
Quotes from yesterday:
“Miss, I found you on Facebook!”
“You did? I thought I made myself unsearchable….”
“Oh, we can’t see your page but we can see your picture. I didn’t want to friend request you, but my dad did.”
“I thought I made it so you couldn’t see my picture…”
“Did you do that because of us?”
...
My spelling bee took five minutes because my kids cannot spell.
Ice skating with my seventh graders: A+ - they loved teaching their teacher how to skate. Also, I did not fall once, which made me feel quite smug considering the fact that at least one student confessed her burning desire to watch me “break [my] butt.”
Teaching a group of 29 students to play mafia after a field trip: D (Only because I was able to find some humor in the disaster that...
Student: Miss, you need to get a pair of heels.
After mentioning something about my roommate…
Student: Whaaa? A ROOMMATE?! Where do you live?!
Me: In an apartment
Student: You have a ROOMMATE?
[Girls scream shut up to this kid]
Me: Yes
Student: WHY?
[Girls continue to scream at the kid to shut up]
Me: Guess I just can’t afford to live alone.
Student: but a ROOMMATE?
Me: What is wrong with that?
Student: There’s...
[After reading I Have a Dream]
Student: Miss, what was it like when you were growing up? Do you remember people being treated this way?
Me: What?
Student: Well, didn’t you grow up in, like, the ’60s or ’70s?
Me: Um. I grew up in the 90s.
October 2009
4 posts
DISILLUSIONMENT PHASE
After six to eight weeks of nonstop work and stress, new teachers enter the
disillusionment phase. The intensity and length of the phase varies among new teachers.
The extensive time commitment, the realization that things are probably not going as
smoothly as they want, and low morale contribute to this period of disenchantment.
New teachers begin questioning ...
Sunday through Thursday, I constantly feel like I...
I just need to stop. I find it so hard to breathe lately, and I don’t really know exactly what it is. I can’t really pinpoint where the stress originates from, but I have had constant anxiety since the summer. And I feel sad. A lot of the time. With absolutely no reason. By all means, I am incredibly lucky to be blessed with things like my family, a job, great friends, an amazing...
What makes "teaching for America" so hard?
I have been doing a lot of thinking during my long rides home through traffic on the beltway, and within this amorphous mass of thought I actually came to a legitimate realization about what makes TFA so difficult for me. Before I started teaching, I heard countless people say “it’s the hardest thing you’ll ever do;” I heard this so much that it became a cliche to me, and...
September 2009
2 posts
crying into souffles
natface:
unicornfandance:
natface:
I don’t cook or bake anymore because it reminds me too much of doing those things with him. Is it possible an entire aspect of my life could be obliterated because of its connotations? I used to dream about making different things every day, experimenting, and now I can’t get myself to pick up a spatula or look at my lovely cookbook (that he bought me). I...
August 2009
1 post
July 2009
2 posts
Institute -- halfway through
We have two weeks left of institute, meaning that we are more than halfway through our training period, and our work in our regions begins very soon.
Well, at least for some people. I am still not placed. I recently had a phone interview for a middle school language arts position, which I thought went really well, but apparently the interviewer didn’t think so. I am trying to be patient,...
One week in...
I just slept in…til 6:15. We only have a half day today, then it’s the weekend!
June 2009
53 posts
End of induction, and just the beginning...
Induction ended today, and tomorrow marks the beginning of institute. This is TFA’s five-week training program that will hopefully prepare all of us to become teachers who will lead students to significant gains. It is baffling to think that five weeks from now, I will be ready to enter a classroom prepared to tackle the issues that my students and I will face in order to, as Teach For...
Induction, Day 2
Induction has been great so far. Yesterday’s sessions were not 110% interesting, but most of them were engaging and interesting. We learned a lot of statistics about educational inequity in our region, which I will be sure to post a little bit later today. Suffice it to say that the information is sobering.
There isn’t a whole lot to say about induction thus far, but I am about to...
Induction, Day 1
I just finished Day 1 of induction, and I love TFA so far! All of the people I met today are really nice and incredibly motivated. We had a great dinner complete with speeches tonight, and then we were free to do whatever we wanted. I was excited to meet up with one of my friends from school, get ice cream, and take a nice long walk around Foggy Bottom and Georgetown. It is really nice to be on...
induction today
Today is my first day of TFA induction. Freaking out.
Aaaah the part where the Coach visits Saracen at...
bingoparaphernalia:
The grandma! The cake! The drawings! Matt saying “I love you, Grandma.” on the way out the door! It kills me.
Oh, whiskey.
Friday Night Lights is AMAZING! :)
agghhhh
I can’t wait to get out of this house.
Brothers never flush.
Brothers can’t park.
Dog ate brand new underwear.
God dammit.
Annoying
I just went to see how much the Rocky III USB drives cost, and the website has Clubber Lang listed as Mr. T. Excuse me, that is not the character’s name. Kthx.
Gym tales
Today a very large dude congratulated me for how much I was squatting. Like, he actually said “congratulations.” At first I thought he was making fun of me, but when I probably looked bewildered at the fact that he was even talking me and saying congratulations for no apparent reason, he said, “It’s a compliment. That is a lot of weight for your size.”
He later...
Note
katoleary:
wannablessedbe:
Sometimes, people say things like “real women have curves” or “Marilyn Monroe was a size 14” to try and make themselves feel okay about the fact that their bodies are unacceptable in our culture. While I agree that it is an inaccurate thing to say, and/or probably causes further damage to people’s self-esteem, I do not understand why these slogans seem to whip...
Pilot dies in flight →
Yikes.
It's weird reading things written by people who...
it’s like, wow, you actually existed. I was looking through old messages in my inbox and came across a few written, in jest, by someone very close to me who recently passed away. How strange that something so silly would later make me tear up.
It is hard to explain, but I think that writing truly does immortalize a person. She wrote that message. She created it, and it is still here, and...
first new entry: but, but-- we both like Rocky 3!
failmail:
Hi [redacted], this is [redacted], obviously. I was just emailing you because i had only talked to you once before thanksgiving and that was the only time in like three months that i had even spoken with you. I havn’t had the balls to being the first one to say somthing first, and i think im scared of what you might say. I know i cant change anything and believe me after about 3...
A good column on the current state of DC area... →
Go PGCPS :)
Quick, quick, quick
Here is what I did yesterday when I only had about 40 minutes to work out. This could take you less or more time than that, depending upon how much you need to rest between sets and whatnot.
Cardio: 15 minutes on the treadmill. My normal treadmill workout always includes some incline walking and intermittant sprints at a full incline. I noticed that someone had posted a recommendation to do...
On my personal food pyramid
carrot cake has been a fairly well-represented food group since Sunday.
Reblog with an interesting fact about yourself.
afghanibanani:
gnomechomsky:
sylvysparrow:
quizzical-frisson:
duhtrav:
I won the Fall Out Boy - I Don’t Care video contest and get to be in their next music video.
your turn.
Oh my gosh, I don’t think I can follow that so I’m just going to fall back on my default lameness of “I have a Jonas Brothers tattoo and I am fully aware of how redunk that is.”
I was a child model, and when I...
Hey internet (2)
sistermarymartha:
numbersixspeaks:
jhnbrssndn:
What was that film where the Italian girl keeps saying “MAHndi, TUESdi, THURSdi, FRIDi, WEDNESdi…”?
(Thanks Tumblr™ for not letting me enable answers. This question’s been bugging me for days.)
Srsly? I think it was The Godfather (part 2?)
My grandmother’s kitchen? That’s how my CT family pronounces the days of the week.
It isn’t...
“It is unlikely that you are getting out of shape, at least as much as you think...”
– I’m hungry: I am grossly sweaty because I just ran and I am getting slowly more and more out of shape.
So, Nicole actually is a fitness expert/certified instructor and she is way better at fitness advice than Nutritionista. The food advice over there is basically: don’t eat good/delicious things,...
I am grossly sweaty because I just ran and I am...
natface:
Curse you, carbonara pizza!
Also, Tumblr is a ghost town today.
It is unlikely that you are getting out of shape, at least as much as you think you are! Cardiovascular detraining only begins to occur 2-3 weeks after training decreases or stops, but you have been running fairly regularly. Muscular strength and endurance detraining begins to occur 2-3 months after training is decreased...
My party doesn't end until the food is gone.
Right?
Brunch = carrot cake.
Wannado City →
My friend works here. I wish they had this when I was growing up. It is such an awesome idea!
Teach For America = Patience
One of the areas of my personality that I have been forced to develop the most since joining the TFA corps is my patience level. I am the type of person who will put something back at a store if the line is too long, so this is certainly not a bad thing. The regional team works really hard to get everything clearly communicated to corps members as quickly as possible. Things, however, are often...