School Days

So I have to observe teachers in the classroom for the classes I’m taking right now, so Tuesday I found myself observing the same 4th grade teacher I established a relationship with last semester. Basically, she rocks. I had a grand time observing and helping out the students with their assignments, one of which was a tree exercise that brought us outside for a bit - bonus. One kid who is in the class is one of my favorites from the after-school program - the kind of kid whose family life is far from perfect and yet she is one of the kindest, most helpful and loving kids I’ve ever met. The kind of kid you also watch closely to see if she’ll give up on the kindness as her strategy toward life at any minute. Anyway - she was as delighted to see me visiting her class as I was to see her, and she said to me several times that she was excited that she was the only one in class who knew my first name (we go by first names in the after-school program). At the end of the day, she handed me a folded-up and colored-on piece of paper. I opened it to a picture and writing that said, “To A. For your first visit to Room 34. Love, E.” It was so sweet - and it’s now on my refrigerator.

The downside of the day was that I asked the teacher if I could student-teach with her next semester, and she said she had to think it over because she currently has a student teacher for this fall (not a surprise someone else would pick her). I’m hoping she’ll say yes, but I understand if it feels to much for her, especially dealing with MCAS tests in the Spring. I’m going to observe some more teachers in the school just in case I have to ask someone else.

Instead of completely stressing about the timing of my student-teaching perfectly coinciding with E.’s maternity leave, we decided that I should just quit work a couple weeks earlier to get a head-start on student-teaching. I’ll lose some money out of it, but it will be worth it to know that we don’t have to find childcare once E. goes back to work. I feel relieved.

Speaking of E., she now has a big belly, and we are both coasting along with only 15 weeks left. I think we are both doing well to not drop into the I-have-to-be-prepared-for-everything craze. When I get the urge to buy a parenting book or add “learn more about what research says about discipline techniques” to my “to do” list, I stop myself by remembering that our parents certainly did none of it, and we turned out just fine, thank you. I’m relying on a moderate dose of information and opinion, instinct, and most importantly: flexibility and patience. I’m hoping this will work.

A weekend without classes + fall has finally arrived = a happy me.

I’m over it

It seems I’ve moved past the stage of whining and groaning about my fall that has me scheduled up to my ears and am now diving head-first into it all with my planner always at my side and a good dose of “it will all be over with in a mere 3 months.” Classes have started and I’m excited about some of them, and also excited to catch up with all of my classmates. Some started this crazy journey with me in January, on the 1.3-year track, and will graduate beside me in May, so it all feels pretty cool that it’s coming to the end.

Setting up my student-teaching for next Spring is proving to be kind of tricky, so I’m glad I’ve started the process early. I’m on a pretty tight schedule - trying to start it in February and time it perfectly during E.’s maternity leave, without any gaps so I can take over childcare when she goes back. Finagling both my program and a teacher to work with might be difficult, but I’m banking on it working out. I need to find out more information on what exactly my program requires of it.

Work is…a challenge to say the least. But I’m trying, in the midst of having to endure work-related conversations where I SO don’t care that on the care scale? I’d be in the negative. So I think my strategy should be to focus on the positives about this job and stick to that. I find that whenever compelled to offer my opinion about something, it comes out sounding so jaded and negative that I watch in horror as the words come stumbling out, then promise to myself I’ll try harder to keep retreating from any unnecessary input. It doesn’t do anyone else any good, particularly if they are the sort to be all chipper and bouncy about work-stuff. Ugh.

Since I’ve been so busy, I’ve been so exhausted, and before I had schoolwork to do I turned on the TV one night to see what the world watches. So I watched and episode of H*roes, and then Ch*ck. I didn’t care for the first, too much drama and too much violence, and just all in all too involved (why I usually don’t care for dramas). I liked Ch*ck better, I think because the character was young and cute and it involved computer stuff, but it still incorporated real-life downers like buildings blowing up and such. BOTH shows infiltrated my dreams over the course of the next few nights - in one dream I was an immigrant mom picked up by these cops who insisted on shoving plastic bags over my two babies, then I was detained in a prison where I spent a lot of mental energy plotting exactly what to say to the person who would be my only phone call, which happened to be my supervisor in real life. Then I had a dream about a building about to blow up. Um - my dreams can get pretty hairy as it is - so I figure I don’t need any more help in that department. No more prime time for me (what ever happened to the good ‘ole fashioned SITCOM? You know - funny, wraps up at the end, filmed in front of a live studio audience, etc? Call me when those come back on).

…and again…and again….

Being the wife of a pregnant woman, coming out has a whole new meaning to it.  Yesterday: first day of classes, doing the usual interview-your-classmate-and-introduce-them-to-the-class exercise.  So I’m paired with a pretty cool guy who is asking me the 4 required questions that are on the board: occupation, academic program, something else mundane I can’t remember, and then “anything else you want to add, like married, etc.”  So - I answer all the questions, then add at the end that I am married, since EVERYONE in my program is pretty obsessed talking about their families all the time, and when a classmate recently learned I was married they were completely shocked because I don’t have to talk about it every other second.  So - I’ve learned to get it out there, like everyone else.  So - when I tell this guy I’m married, he quickly says “Kids?” I pause, then say something like “Well, I’ll be a parent soon, when my wife gives birth in January.”  He responds well, saying that should be very exciting, etc.  BUT - when it is time to introduce one another, I notice he leaves that part completely out.  I can’t say I blame him all that much - it had to have been a shock, and then he would have had to say a phrase to the entire class he has probably never uttered before.  So it didn’t surprise me or ruffle my feathers too much, but I decided that when I introduced HIM I didn’t need to mention the fact that he has two kids.

Thus is the everlasting adventure of coming out as a non-bio mom.  I think I had a feeling, in theory, that it would be different, but…um…it REALLY is.  I never realized how much I relied on the “oh, you are married!” comment and then, if I’m feeling lazy or just don’t want to deal at that particular moment on that particular day, I don’t have to reveal that I’m married to a woman.  I know that those days are gone.  My little corners of hiding and momentary safey are dwindling quickly, and I know it’s a great thing, but it’s also kinda sad to see them go.  I have to buck up and approach the world with full armor now, and worry instead about protecting someone else.  I also need to be a good example that our family is nothing to hide or be ashamed of.  And unfortunately, in this world that’s a lot of damn work.  But I guess that practice makes perfect…

Caution: Mind Explosion

So the best part of my day today was when I crawled out of the dark hole that is my office to take a break from the mind-numbing computer-screen-or-paper-based activity because there was chocolate in the common area, not just any chocolate but REALLY GOOD chocolate that I just couldn’t pass up at 3:00 on a Friday afternoon. As I consumed mass quantities of dark, milk and mocha solid sugar I started shooting the breeze with a co-worker, also struggling to focus on work and was instead sprawled out on the Ikea couch also eating lots of chocolate and two of our student workers and the conversation drifted in and out of several topics but it didn’t matter what we were speaking about, because the interaction made my day. And I realized how carefully I navigated some tidbits of revealing my life to these students - tightrope walking that professional separation - and I had an immediate sense of what it means to mentor (the meaning of which is described as: “a wise and trusted counselor or teacher” from the first website that just popped up after my web search). I believe myself to be trusted, but am hoping to pass as “wise” as I find myself offering more advice of “been there, done that” to students as I get older and somehow they stay the same age. I enjoy this back-and-forth relationship - I’ve always been into listening and giving advice to friends and helping them figure out what’s best for them in a given situation. I’m finding I enjoy the similar back-and-forth that comes with interacting with younger people - but instead I might have some experience in what they are going through or trying to figure out. Enter mentorship. But I hope I don’t become that person, who, upon hearing your question launches into some diatribe that is so obviously all about them and the whole time you are thinking, “Ya, that’s how it was for you, but I’M ME.” There’s a fine line between offering up your experience as gospel and helping someone figure out what’s best for them.

Case in point: a young co-worker asked me today about a local, large, and semi-well-known fair coming up. I immediately launched into the story of my first (and hopefully last) visit, which I hated because the fair was too damn big, with too many damn people, and filled with too many damn things to buy. My co-worker took the information in and I could see it totally changed her view of the fair, after which I back-peddled with something like, “But, if you have a lot of energy, you may like it!” I don’t think she’s going. Did I just make her choice all about me, launching to quickly to my point of view? I see older people around me do this all the time. It’s hard to hold back your experience when you have a story to tell - but I think it can get in the way of being a good mentor, by which I mean offering up advice when it is asked for and recognizing when someone needs to figure out something on their own terms (ok, so maybe the co-worker thing was a bad example, because she did ask me about it, but you get the idea).

And thus we conclude our Friday afternoon random-crazed-tangential thought that didn’t really have to be written down but wasted the precise amount of time so I can now get the F out of here and start my weekend. Peace.

Plethora

Thanks so much to everyone for your kind words - it really helped me through. The funeral was really tough to take, but so moving to hear from so many people that my Aunt touched in her life, and the best thing I heard the whole weekend was her mother, my grandmother, say to me, “I’ve made my peace with it, I hope you will too.” This coming from a woman who has now buried 3 of her 7 children. How can I dwell on death after hearing that?

So one moves forward and busies oneself with the endless daily tasks that thankfully allow us to forget about the big picture for a while. Yesterday was my first day back volunteering at the after-school program, and I was so happy to see the kids there and catch up with how their summers were, learn new card games, and gain a bit more confidence with rule enforcement, one of my personal goals for my experience there. I absolutely LOVE this program - it’s based at the school and is run by this amazing woman who has no children of her own but from whom I’ve learned so much from. Not to mention the kids - all 30 of them - are awesome. They come in after a full day of school and play, eat, do homework, argue, and for the most part are happy and content to be there with us until their parents come at 5:30. I love being there while they unwind from their day and just chit chat, play games, or just sit and watch their amazing energy.

My life continues to feel fuller with each day as classes near and I continue to cross things off my life-list and somehow continue to ignore the invisible item called, “start exercise routine that will enable me to have the energy to do all of these things.” Oops. Somehow the “doing” edges out the “sustaining” on the list. Need. to. work. on. this.

I’m so crazily excited to go away this weekend with my honey to our favorite get-away, and can’t quite comprehend that it will be our last time before baby arrives. We have been traveling a whole lot lately, but not just the two of us. I’m excited for the drive through the mountains, waking up and going downstairs for breakfast in our PJ’s, sitting by the fire, strolling the main street of the quaint small town, listening to live music in the living room downstairs, and most importantly, spending 3 whole days with just my honey. Yae!!

Theory to Practice

*Thanks to J. for helping me fix the font size!

In theory, I generally strive to enjoy being the moment, finding something to appreciate about the present so I don’t get too focused on always wishing for the future. In reality, this is not so easy. Particularly when I have about a zillion countdowns going all at once.

Countdown #1: Leaving My Job: I’m planning on leaving my job at the end of January – everyone knows this as they’ve known I’ve been in graduate school from the beginning, and that I have to quit in order to student-teach. As I formulate more and more what I want in a job, compared to what I currently have, the countdown to the end has taken up more of my focus. Having a countdown span so much time (just under 5 months) is challenging.

Countdown #2: Finishing Graduate School: This whole calendar year has pretty much been a countdown for that, and I’m amazed that I’m 2/3 done with my intensive coursework. I just have to plow through the fall semester, then complete my student teaching, and then I can graduate and be licensed to teach. This countdown feels like a doozie – it not only measures my being done with school, but my getting my freedom of time, focus, and brain space back.

Countdown #3: Baby: Much like graduate school, this entire pregnancy feels like a countdown. Countdown until the end of the first trimester, countdown until we could first hear the heartbeat, countdown until the ultra sound, little countdowns between midwife visits, and, of course, countdown to birth (I’m not sure if the weekly emails detailing every little change in the baby helps or hurts this process). Of course, our due date is also days from my last day of work, and days before I begin student teaching (hopefully), at which point my head will proceed to explode into tiny bits of what its been carrying around for the last year.

Perhaps because I’m in such a countdown-to-future-gains mode, I created mini-countdowns throughout the summer: countdown to my week-vacation in July, countdown to my mini-vacation to Maine to see bestest buds (8 more days!), countdown to our surprise-not-surprise shower (2 more days!), etc.

It’s an odd way of being, this always looking to the future for what I want and feeling this annoying nagging that reminds me I’m still in the present. Perhaps it’s a healthy way to get me through, but I’m afraid in its extreme I’ll forget to notice what I should be thankful for in the present: last months of E. and I sans child, a job with relative peace I’m sure never to get as a teacher, and being immersed in a learning environment with kick-ass classmates (and occasional teachers) who inspire me. Perhaps I’m in countdown overload, and risk not trusting time for what it gives me in every moment. I gotta dig out my copy of Peace is Every Step.

So here I go – trying to be better at being in the moment. It’s a gorgeous summer day out – perhaps I’ll take a nice, long walk.

Destination: Beach

T - minues 6 hours until I’m on vacation for a WEEK! I’m super excited. My plans include:

- sitting on the beach as much as possible (in the exact spot pictured above)

- sitting outside on the screen porch/deck as much as possible

- take a long bike ride on the bike path

- go to P-town at least once

- make a huge dent in the three books I’m bringing with me: Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer, New Rules: Polite Musings from a Timid Observer by Bill Maher, and Among Schoolchildren by Tracy Kidder.

- eat lots of ice cream and food in general

- play with our nephew as much as possible

I think that about sums it up. The first hurdle is getting through my licensure test tomorrow afternoon, for which I have remembered, among other math factoids, the Pythagorean Theorem, slope of a line, and finding the area and volume of various shapes. I actually remember really enjoying geometry and algebra in school, so I was able to find something positive amongst the cramming of 4,578 pieces of information into my head for one 4-hour test. I can’t believe I will have them all completed after this (permitting I pass), and I’m SO GLAD I decided to just plow through all three of them this summer.

Happy Friday the 13th!

Horoscope Wednesday

Taurus Horoscope for week of July 12, 2007

“Don’t cross a bridge until you come to it,” advises the old adage. But is that really a good idea? The fact is that the world belongs to people who have crossed bridges in their imaginations long before those bridges existed. Let that be your guiding thought in the coming weeks, Taurus. Start visualizing, contemplating, and building in your mind’s eye a certain bridge you want to make abundant use of in 2008.

I can’t fathom what this might be about if it isn’t about becoming a parent. In addition to this horoscope, several other bits of information and contemplation have been coming at me about how I want to parent, to which 1/2 of me wants to dive right into, the other half wants to wait until I’m there crossing the bridge. If Brezney is right, I should start now.

A topic we just finished learning about in class is discipline. On the recommendation of my teacher, I bought a great book that asserts that most parents and teachers assume that punishment alters kids’ behaviors by having them go through some sort of suffering for an action (no TV, etc.). The authors of this book assert that punishment is indeed about suffering, but discipline is about teaching. We will not alter our behaviors if we are not learning from them, and also being understood for the feelings that are behind our actions. I need to read more of this book, but I can tell it will be a helpful resource for both teaching and parenting as I struggle to figure out the most effective way to discipline. My fellow classmates mentioned that it would be difficult to change their current discipline habits now, having children at various ages who are used to the routine, and I think it’s better to explore strategies that are supposed to work before we are in the thick of things.

Another huge bridge we plan to cross next year is to figure out how to keep our child out of full-time daycare for at least a year. We have several scenarios we’ve discussed, which I won’t bore you with here, but we plan to start talking (and saving) this fall and start figuring it all out - which I think is necessary given my requirements to complete my student teaching in the Spring. Oh, to live in a country that actually valued children and supported parenting, but alas….

E. surprised me this morning by saying she decided to come home today (a day early)! We will be celebrating entering the 2nd trimester and my vacation starting in T-minus 2 days!

Home Stretch

It seems like I’ve been waiting for this week for a long, long time.

I just got the 12-Week email from the American Pregnancy Association , since they like to send theirs when you have 2 more days to go until you hit the next mark, as opposed to BabyCenter, who sends theirs the day of (or the evening of) the mark.  Needless to say, this has swayed me to prefer American Pregnancy Association as a much more respectable website.

This mark feels so important, and one I remember looking forward to from the moment we found out.  E. has an uncle who, each time his daughter became pregnant and told people early, would gruffly say, “Don’t tell anyone before it takes!”  Although I don’t agree with this hording all possible responsibility and grief for possible miscarriage for the parents so others can be spared this misfortune of thinking about it and perhaps offering emotional support, some small fiber within me is breathing a sight of relief that we’ve reached the 12-week mark, heartbeat audible, unscathed.  Time really has flown - it feels like that moment was just maybe a couple weeks ago, when in fact it was 8 weeks ago.  Woe.  And I know it will only get faster…

This is also the last week of my summer night class, and the week leading up to my LAST state licensure test on Saturday.  This means I only have 5 more days of cramming all the bits of dividing fractions, American history, and child development factoids into my head to feel prepared for perhaps the single most GENERAL test I’ve ever taken.

Oh, but after Saturday - it’s V-A-C-A-T-I-O-N!!!  Yup - heading down to New England’s playland for the rich or retired - and loving every minute of it.  If I don’t get some great beach days I think I might have to hurt someone. But I’m sure it won’t have to come to that…

It’s a big week, folks.

Motivation: found

I have to admit my surprise at enjoying one of my classes a great deal this semester.  It’s not that I hated all of them last semester, I did enjoy some more than others, but they all left me feeling no less nervous about how I’m supposed to actually be as a teacher.  I left my social studies and science classes knowing how to create a unit and lesson plan, but foggy on all the stuff I know must go on in between learning.

Until my Classroom Management class.  I actually am starting to feel like I am learning the strategies to enable me to be able to turn my back on students for a second and not have paper airplanes immediately zooming toward my head.  More importantly, I’m learning ways to create a healthy classroom environment that promotes student ownership of learning, not just how to get them to sit down and shut up.  It is truly inspiring me, and I’m making all sorts of connections between the social skills I can teach kids in the classroom, and those that, if adults practiced more often, would make the world a better place.

I’m at this point of realizing that I’m equally as excited about teaching these social skills as I am the curriculum, which feels really good.  The theory behind much of this class, The Responsive Classroom, is a great approach that emphasizes emotional and social learning as crucial to academic learning, and the founders of the project are from this area - pretty cool!

I’m feeling thankful to have a quiet summer with which to focus my energies on my classes, and yes, even an empty house to get uninterrupted work done.  I think that, aided by a good night’s sleep last night, I am now ok with being in the “middle” of it all.