Teachable Moment - Placement #3

Happy Monday!


Kind of seems like an oxymoron doesn't it? Happy and Monday in the same sentence.

I realized that it's been a while since I've written a "Teachable Moments" post - so here goes. I'm now half way through my third placement. And to be honest - I'm not loving it. I love the school, the kids and the subjects. I'm in a Grade 12 "Living Cultures" class, a Grade 12 "Individuals and Families in diverse societies" class and a Grade 10 history class. The school is really amazing, a very close-knit community that is very involved in fundraising and other school activities.The teachers are all great and seem to be very close with each other and all-in-all it's a really interesting school.


So you're wondering what I dislike about this particular school. Well, the problem is this: The students and teachers are all very close-knit - but I don't fit in. I realize it takes time to build relationships, but my previous 2 placements were very inclusive and always tried to include me. Here it doesn't work that way.


Take last week, between lunch and my associate teachers' prep periods, we're essentially off from 11 until 1:30. Well 11 rolls around and my two associate teachers decide they're going out for lunch - and leave me alone in the office for 2 hours.


I'm not saying they need to include me in everything or that I should have been invited, but at the same time I constantly feel like the new kid on the playground - and we all know that's not a nice feeling. 


It's gotten to the point that I dread going there every Tuesday. Short of asking to be included (which I wouldn't do) I'm not sure how I can change this. Any thoughts?

A zen kind of moment

Hello bloggers,

I'm trying to squeeze in a quick blog while I'm sitting in my Social Science class. I think I have something like 4 drafts saved now of posts that I've started and discarded in the last 2 weeks. Every time I sit down to write, something else gets in my way. I've been pushing myself to get all my work done lately, and the final stretch is finally upon me. There's about 4 weeks left in my semester, and then I'm off for the summer!



Now that the weather is getting better and Spring is upon us, I've made a pact with myself to get active and get myself into shape. I've been toying with the idea of getting back into yoga for a while now - and when I say "back into" I'm referring to the semi-attempt I made in my 3rd year of University when I took an "Eastern Philosophies" class - so on Tuesday the Bestest and I attended our first yoga class. 


It was about an hour and a half of poses similar to the one pictured above accompanied by zen-like music and  the soothing voice of our yoga teacher. We emerged feeling fit, healthy and slightly-less-stressed-out. Yesterday we felt stiff, sore and slightly-hit-by-a-car-like. Today seems better though so I have faith it will work


Side note to the Bestest: look at the picture I found, wonder how many classes before we can do poses like that - something to look forward to?

looks painful, no?

I learned two major things from my first class: ex-dancers seemingly have the WORST balance in the world, and knowing the difference between left and right is VERY helpful when doing Yoga - both things I will be working on next week!

Some pictures from Malta and an update on my life

I managed a whole 2 posts in all of March - yikes! I'd like to say that I'm now back in full swing, but that simply isn't true yet. It may not be true until the middle of May at this point, as school is really starting to swallow me up completely. 


I've been home from Malta for almost 2 weeks now and still have not found the time to write about my trip in any great detail. I think I've literally been spending all my free time working. Yuck. Some girls from my class and I have started coming in early before class and staying later just to try and catch up on assignments and lesson plans. 


Aside from school, things with me have been good. Quiet, but good. Last Friday I took a much-needed break from school work and spent the day doing errands and having lunch with the Bestest. It was definitely much needed. I will stop here and head back to my books, but before I go I'll leave you with a few silent images of Malta - and a promise that a post about my trip will follow shortly! 

Downtown Valletta 

Gozo Island

St. Julians

Leaving on a Jetplane (or 2)

Just a very quick post (while I'm in class, I'm such a good student, I know) to let you all know I'm off to Europe (via a 4-hour layover in NYC) as of tomorrow morning! It will be just over 24 hours of travel time, so I expect to arrive in Germany feeling like a zombie friday morning.

Since I'm only gone a week, I want to avoid the typical jet-lag symptoms as much as possible, so I went out and bought "No Jet-Lag" a herbal medication that is supposed to help reset your internal clock a lot faster. I'm not too optimistic about it actually working, but at this point I will try anything.

I'm not bringing my laptop with me this time as I have plenty of books to read courtesy of the bestest that should hopefully keep me occupied. I will return with a travel journal and lots of pictures on the 21st!

crawling out of hibernation! and going to Malta!

Why hello there! Remember me? Your former blog friend who has now been reduced to a stressed-out tantrum-throwing mess? Yup that's me. I'm crawling out of my hole just long enough to announce that I'm still here but I've had zero time to blog the last few weeks. I googled "stressed out" and this is the first picture that came up. Appropriate I would say.

My trip to Morocco has now officially been cancelled, with the unrest in the Middle East/North Africa, we thought it was simply too dangerous - so I'm going to Malta instead!

Malta, a very small and beautiful Island just south of Sicily - and a place I know next to nothing about! I'm very excited, and I've been doing some research whenever I've had a free moment recently. I'm hoping to go out and buy a guidebook today and really start marking down some places to see. Regardless, this is a much-needed break and although I have a ton of work to do between now and then, I can't wait until thursday!

I will leave you with some images of beautiful Malta (courtesy of google) and will be back to post again before I leave! I promise!

Have a great week everyone!