World Peace and Other 4th-grade Achievements

I watched this video yesterday and I've been thinking about how cool it would be to be able to do something like this with my students some day.

Worry

One thing that is interesting about being a teacher is how your work follows you everywhere you go.  You go home and you still have to plan or grade work.  You leave after a hard day and you cannot help but think about your students from time to time.  I went out with Ariel this weekend and saw one of my students who was out with his family.  It is just interesting because it is good, there is something very good about being involved in the lives of other people in such a way that you do not leave them and yet, there is something good about being able to disconnect from you work and just relax and be yourself.  I want to be better at doing that.  I spend too much time worrying about things.  That is something I want to focus on.

I've been thinking about this worry and anxiety that keeps me up at night.  I think it has something to do with not being able to say "no" very well.  I need to say "no" to some of my thoughts and I need to say "no" to some people in my life who have some very specific expectations for me.  I'm sure that it would be easier if I could just say no and not be so worried about what these other people were thinking.  I guess I need to have some dignity, that is what I need to make sure of.  I'm often too afraid of offending people.  It's something I need to work on.  I shouldn't be laying awake at night, it's not healthy. 

Enjoying it in the midst of it

This was a hard week for me at school.  One of my co-workers was gone because her father passed away so, I had to try to help the substitute (who was amazing, by the way) and then, there was a situation with a family that I had to help with and it took so much emotional energy that I couldn't sleep.  I was so worried about the situation that I was awake almost all night long.  The next day, I was exhausted.  By Saturday, I was very tired.

Even so, Ariel and I got up early and headed to our Literary Workshops.  We had both done our homework.  We wrote a character sketch and came up with a "challenge" for our character.  We enjoyed the workshop, even though there was this one participant who couldn't stop talking.  That was a really fun time.  When it was done we headed back across town.  On days like that we both wish that we lived closer to the center of the city.  

Today is our 3 month-aversery so, yesterday we went and ate at a favorite restaurant to celebrate.  After eating we headed home.  I was exhausted and fell asleep.  It felt like such a waste of a beautiful day but, sometimes you just have to do what you have to do.  We went to the grocery store to pick up a couple things we needed for dinner.  Then we ate pancakes and I tried to get some work done for school this next week.  Planning is like a second full time job.  This is our last full week before we start to have days off left and right in November.  

I was thinking a few days ago about how this is one of those seasons that even though I'm tired a lot, I feel like I'm enjoying it while I'm in the midst of it.  Sometimes, it seems that I only realize how fun or special a season of my life was when it was all over.  

Talleres Literarios

If you spend very much time with Ariel or with me you'll find out that we love to read and write.  Ever since I graduated from college I've had a lot of "I wish I had studied English" thoughts because there were so many literature and writing classes that I would have loved to take.  No, I don't regret what I studied, it was perfect for me at the time but, ever since then I've been a sponge for literature and writing.  Ariel and I both hope for formal opportunities to study in order to improve our skills and open up opportunities to teach and share our love for words and ideas.

So, when we got the news about the Talleres Literarios en Panama, we were ecstatic.  We had heard about these Literary Workshops over a year ago and were waiting anxiously for more information, when a couple weeks ago we finally got news that they were accepting applications for the Talleres Literarios en Panamá.  These are going to be a year of weekend classes taught by Panamanian, Latin American, and Spanish professors and writers.They will do a survey of Spanish-American literature and provide writing workshop in poetry and prose. It's fantastic.

It's being sponsored by the Spanish Agency for International Cooperation and Development.  This sponsorship makes the program very formal.  Three Panamanian universities and the National Institute for Culture are also involved, all these institutions make it a potentially fantastic place to grow and learn about other opportunities.  One of the goals of the Spanish partners in the program is to present the participants with opportunities to study in Spain and hopefully remain involved in promoting literature and writing after the program is over (that is something that interests Ariel and me very, very much).

Something that makes it even better is that the coursework follows the literature content that I'm supposed to be teaching to my 9th graders.  This makes it a perfect way for me to be better prepared as I teach my students.  I'm really excited about starting this tomorrow afternoon!

study club

Today, I started something new.  I am an official “Study Club” teacher on Tuesday’s after school.  The fact is that it is a great way to earn a little extra money.  I was thinking about the fact that I like teaching, I love students but, I don’t just stick around for an extra hour or two for fun.  

You really do have to pay people to do that kind of thing; it’s not something that is really born out of the kindness of your heart –as much as you may love it.  Arriving home two hours later than usual once a week will be worth it in the long run.  Plus, it’s only once a week when Ariel has to teach a class anyway, that means that he isn’t done with that until I’ll be getting home anyway, so it actually works out really well.  

I hope that it turns out to be a good choice and helpful in the long run for my students and for Ariel and me.

"the rest of your day is in Spanish"

A couple days ago I was leaving work and one of my favorite co-workers stopped and said, "So...the rest of your day is in Spanish."  I thought this was funny since I am the Spanish teacher here... the fact is that almost all of my day is in Spanish.  It's been interesting to be the Spanish teacher here.  The fact is that teaching turns you into a pretty good student.  I hope my students are also learning. 

The school has a pretty tight nit community.  The fact is that most of the people that work here have some other type of connection to each other or the school (they have a child who is a student or they go to the Church where the school is located).  This makes it much harder to enter into the community.  I also am a teacher who goes in and out of classrooms so, I'm not quite as close to any particular group of students or to a team of teachers.  My Spanish team is kind of random.  To be honest, sometimes I feel like I am the department psychologist.  I do a lot of listening to other people's complaints.  

Anyway, I have decided that I want to do some more writing.  I'm going to try to write something everyday in the month of October either on this blog or on the Contrapunto blog in Spanish.  I think that the only way to get into the habit of writing more is forcing yourself to do it.

One month...

As of last Tuesday, I've been married for a month.  It has been a busy, exhausting month but, when I think about all of the things thay we've done this month I think that getting married and living in Panama are two wonderful choices I've made in life.

Let me see, in the month of August I started teaching Spanish to 4th, 5th, 7th and 9th graders at an international school here in Panama city (less than two weeks after getting married).  I've partially moved twice this month and this week will move (hopefully for the last time) into a more permanent house.  It should be a great place to live.  I've also purchased a car and started driving in Panama city.

If you've never been to Panama you will not be able to grasp the significance of some of those acomplishments.  Driving in Panama city is one of the scariest things I've ever tried to do, I have to admit that I feel quite proud of myself for even being willing to try.  It also opens up the possibility to do a lot of things that are just impractical without a car.  We even discovered a fantastic coffee shop relatively close to my work, a great place to meet up, chat and read a book.

I've started teaching and that is a responsibility that I love.  I am thrilled to be a teacher.  This week something very exciting happened.  The International Book Fair of Panama.  Ariel and I were in heaven there.  The greatest thing that we discovered was a new literary non-ficcion journal that is starting up.  It is called El Guayacan.  I'm super excited to see something like that happening here in Panama.  I want to figure out how to be a part of something like that.

I am excited about what is happening in Panama culturally and I'm excited to maybe get to be a part of it!

hello storytime!

I am about to leave Washington, DC to embark on a new chapter of life.  I'm going to get married and will be learning to live life together with Ariel.  It's not surprising that I'm feeling introspective and re-visiting my sometimes neglected blog. 

I have a feeling that I'll be writing a bit more frequently for a while.  I'll have so many exciting new things to write about!  Getting married, living in Panama, starting a new teaching job, making new friends... I'm sure the list will be endless.  

To make things even better, I'm marrying my best writing companion.  We have always enjoyed writing together so, this space and others will probably be kept up with more diligence since it's something that we both enjoy and want to do with our time.  This will probably make my mom very happy, since recently I have not been very consistent in telling the stories of things happening in my life.

Needless to say, if you read my blog... welcome back.  =)

I vote for...

Today, as I was taking the kids downstairs to dismissal we walked by a sign that the youth program had put up for a t-shirt design competition they were having and the sign said something like "Vote or Dye" (my second graders couldn't understand the pun) so, first they were kind of freaking out about that. 

Then, one of my students called out, "I vote for Miss Hannah" and another chimed in, "Me too, I vote for Miss Hannah" and I looked at them curiously and said, "Why would you vote for me?" and they replied with a shrug, "I don't know...it said vote or die."  And I thought I was going to get some great compliment.  Nevertheless, I kind of liked being "voted for" even if it was to spare them from death. 

excuses, excuses

I could come up with hundreds of excuses for why I haven't written very much recently.  I have so many things going on, I'm getting married, it's the end of the school year, I'm moving back to Panama, it's spring time in DC, etc. etc. etc. but, to be honest, all of that is bogus.  The truth is I have MORE to write about than I have in a long time and I've just felt overwhelmed by it all and haven't come around here to let my feelings out on the screen.

I know I have no obligation to anyone else to write but, I do disappoint myself when I don't write.  What a strange thing.  So, I'm going to start by talking about my weekend.  I have a theory about "catching up" with friends or anyone, you really have to start by asking what they did that day or that week before you can go back however many months or years you're behind.  So, I'm going to do that...in the next post.

happy (lunar) new year!

I forgot to say "happy year of the tiger" to everyone on Sunday.  I've been enjoying the "lunar new year" stamps these days as I've been loving the snow break to write cards to my friends. I think this is going to be the best year of the tiger ever.

That being said, we went back to school today after our snow storm break.  We were thinking of all the snow related compound words like "snowman", "snowball", "snowflake"... I also had to respond to the principle's question about individual's intent to return next year.  

To be honest, I teared up as I was writing it.  I am going to miss it there.  I have had a very good experience and feel like I've learned a lot.  The people have been so incredible and I'm so thankful for such a wonderful team of people.  I know I'm not leaving yet but, I want to make the most of it.

Not that I'm completely sad.  The truth is that I'm mostly happy because in addition to having to say goodbye to lots of wonderful things in my life, this year is also going to be filled with new and wonderful things (like getting married) and hopefully experiencing and learning in another school setting.

Snow! Snow! Snow!

So, if you didn't know about it already I have been in DC this past week with school canceled due to an overwhelming blizzard like snow storm.  I've actually enjoyed it, I feel like I'm living something historical!  I was also trying to recover from a pretty bad cold so, being forced to stay in was helpful.

The best part about being caught in the biggest snowstorm in the recent history of Washington, DC is that it has allowed (or forced) me to rest and reevaluate my life in a really good way.  I have had time to set goals for the next few months and think about what I'll need to do to meet those goals.  I've been working on pick up some important habits that I've let go of.  I think that integrating important habits that allow me to read more, write more, and be more active will give me an overall sense of health that is important.

Apprentice: learner, prentice, works for an expert to learn a trade

I have a lot of things rushing through my head right now. I’m tired. Being a teacher is hard. Being an apprentice is not as hard but, it’s still hard. I am being convinced, more and more, without a doubt teaching makes a difference. Teaching is probably one of the jobs that make the biggest difference in people’s lives. It may also be one of the most difficult jobs out there.

My education was so random and varied I don’t think I realized until the past couple of years that teaching is what I have been wanting to do all this time. I have wanted to be involved in helping develop stronger communities and giving people the opportunity and reasons to dream and create. All of that is hopelessly idealistic and I intend to stick to it. What it looks like in reality is much less lovely and much more incredible. The obstacles are bigger than you could imagine and the rewards are much more subtle --students learning that they like to eat vegetables, parents getting their students to the doctor, and other non-“standard based” accomplishments.

I have been working with such dedicated and excellent teachers. I admire them so much. I feel so honored and inspired working with them. Our students are actually reaching their “grade level” standards. I am exhausted but, I intend to learn all that I can so that I will also one day be as good of a teacher as the ones I’m working with right now. Their unwavering dedication to children and their learning is incredible, patience, so much patience, work, so much work, and commitment. It’s fantastic. It’s hard.

I left work feeling so disappointed. How are we supposed to teach children whose parents are caught up in their own emotional messes? If they are not nurturing their children and giving them safe homes with relationships that are secure? Some of our children are so distracted by their relational poverty that they have a very, very hard time learning. It’s difficult, but it’s still so important what we do, in spite of all the odds being against them and us, they are STILL learning. It’s hard but, it’s unbelievably rewarding.

Being good...

Today was a half-day at school. I often do a lot of testing and paperwork on half-days. We had a student get in trouble for switching numbers on the 100 chart today. He was warned several times to pay attention but he didn't and then he switched the 66 and the 99 on the chart. It's so unlike him, he's a really good kid most of the time. Then, he was flicking people with his fingers as they were going back to their tables. I had to take him to first grade to allow him to re-focus then I had to talk to him seriously and he almost started to cry. He told me that he had two important cards in his bag and I let him go get them, they were apology notes from his behavior earlier in the week. I hope he pulls it together because I like him when he's being good.

Today is a full moon, I'm not sure how that has contributed to my mood today but --all in all-- I've had a good day. Today the School Review Board came to "review" our school. That is how the school continues to have recognition as a school, getting funding and all that type of stuff. We had someone in our classroom observing in the morning and then I was invited with a group of 10 other teachers to participate in an "interview" with the people who were reviewing our school. I felt flattered to have been chosen. I'm not sure why they picked me but, it was a good experience.

I also taught my second writing lesson today. I was nervous because it was with the more difficult class to manage. I enjoyed teaching the lesson and I hope that the students got it and were into the writing. I'm excited about them seeing writing as something that they can and want to do. I think that it's so much fun to write. I stayed late at school today. I was thinking about how school is such a refuge for me. I like how it keeps me completely busy and occupied.

I left and got a phone call from a good friend in Vancouver and I was so happy to talk with her, it has been a long time. There are a lot of people that I haven't talked to in a long time. I think that it gets harder to stay in touch with people as time goes on, in part because there are more people to keep in touch with and in some ways, it's harder for me because I'm doing better at being completely present to the people around me. Which is good even if it makes it harder to stay in touch with people.

Not long after I got off work a good friend from Idaho arrived in DC and I went to meet him and took him to my friends place where he was going to crash on their couch for the rest of the week. It was so good to see him. He's another friend that I hadn't seen in 2 years! It's amazing how quickly time flies. I'm excited to go back to Idaho at Thanksgiving but, there will still be a lot of people that I'm not going to get to see when I go back. It's kind of sad in some ways that such wonderful people cannot continue to be active and present in your life after you're gone.

I'm just trying to write, this was totally stream of consciousness, I'm not trying to do anything special, just getting into the writing habit again. I like it. That's it for tonight.

"I was just imagining that I was the abominable snowman.."

So, after I taught my lesson on "realistic fiction" --I think I failed to communicate the "realistic" part well-- one of my students had a little incident where he got caught trying to bite another student's arm. (That sounds worse than it was.) The moment he got caught and was sent to the teacher's table to do his work he burst into tears. He was quite upset that he had gotten in trouble.

I had to walk him downstairs to dismissal and asked him what had happened. In his raspy little boy voice he said, "I-I-I didn't mean to bite her. I-I was just, I was... I was just imagining... I was just imagining that I was the abominable snowman." I looked at him trying to remain serious without busting out in laughter, "So, that was why you were going to bite her arm?" "I was just imagining I was the abominable snowman!!" he continued to tell me as if that made all the best sense in the world. I had to tell him very seriously how we are not allowed to bite people, even if we're imagining that we are the abominable snowman.

Oh my, it was funny. His "realistic" fiction story is going to be fantastic (literally).

Today, I taught my first writing lesson at school. I was so nervous! At the same time, I was super excited. I am so excited about watching the students learn to see themselves as writers. I made a couple mistakes during the lesson but, I think that as I teach I'll do a better job and the students will do better as well. I'm still nervous but very excited. I've been thinking about the fact that I have so many interesting stories to tell from working at my school and I've also been thinking about how much I am in need of writing to process my internal messiness. So, once again, I'm resolving to write more.

The last writing unit that the students were working on was all about "small moments" it is that idea of writing about a moment that was significant in some way and describing everything, absolutely everything about it. How it felt, looked, smelled, sounded, etc. I loved that writing unit and have been inspired to take up writing again, as a student, not as someone who thinks that they can write but, someone who needs to write to be sane and is still learning how to do it well. It is a freeing thought and I think I'm going to try to do more writing.