Lots of Learning!

This last week was wonderful. Of course there were a few moments of frustration with some kiddos- especially since I didn't have much of a voice the first half of the week!- but for the most part the kids and I enjoyed each other. I even had several who didn't want to go home for the weekend- they wanted to stay in school with Mrs. B! That's always a good feeling.

The previous teacher had left me lesson plans for last week and that was a help because I was able to focus on getting to know the kids and their learning styles and behaviors and not stress about what to teach. However this week I am on my own! I went in to school today to work with my mentor teacher but instead the previous teacher happened to be there so she talked with me for awhile. I got lots of insight into why the class is the way they are. I think the teacher was a very nice woman and her heart was DEFINITELY in the right place but, and she agreed, our styles and philosophies are way different. She also informed me about other teachers in the hall and the way the administration is- from her point of view. Some of it I had already figured out and others...well... that's her point of view. I did NOT like when she told me that she was ok with a handful of kids not being able to read at the end of first grade!! She said this happened every year and she was ok with that because they just weren't ready to learn to read and hopefully they picked it up later but if not that's ok because there is plenty of adults in society today who are just fine and can't read!! WHAT?! Not ok with me. But overall I really liked chatting with her and it broke my heart when she started to cry- she really loves teaching and her kids. I think she is sad that she is retiring and she even told me she envies my youth but she hopes I will understand her more when I am her age. I told her I envy her experiences!! Teaching is such a fine balance- yes experience is a big part to a successful teacher but you also need to stay young at heart and stay abreast in new theories and willing to try new things. A teacher should always be learning how to be better! Needless to say it was an eye opening few hours.

So instead of working on lesson plans and learning about the 6+1 writing traits I talked with her. Tomorrow and Tuesday I'll go in after lunch and get some actual work done. It's only a 3 day school week because of parent teacher conferences but luckily the principal is conducting those for me. I also have to give a unit test because the kids just finished the end of unit 2 in the curriculum the previous teacher used. I'm excited/nervous/overwhelmed and all kinds of emotions to have so much responsibility! I'm going to be bored in student teaching the first couple of weeks when I'm supposed to just be "observing"!!

Matt is doing great. He had a wonderful 24th birthday. Thursday I picked him up from work and I had brought clothes for him to change into (instead of going all the way back home). After he changed I took him to his favorite (well, the only one we've tried) chinese restaurant. We bought everything he wanted so we would have plenty for leftovers (and boy did we)! After that yummy dinner we went home where I surprised him with an acoustic guitar (a Fender)! He had NO idea that I had bought him that. I ordered it 2 months ago from guitarcenter.com and it has been SO hard to keep it a secret!! Especially when during one conversation he was saying he hated that brand and all sorts of stuff (he claims he was talking about electric guitars). I had the guitar shipped to our friend's house and it got here while Matt was gone- thankfully, because lots of times the two guys check their mail together and he would have seen it! I also had made him a cookie cake which turned out yummy if not so pretty. Overall I think he had a great day- even after a bad day at work. Yesterday we bbqed and the Barreto's stopped by and ate with us. Ribs, burgers, chedder dogs, corn on the cob, baked beans, buffalo chicken cheese dip, and of course more cookie cake! We stuffed ourselves and then he had to go to guard duty =-( Luckily it was only 12 hours 6-6 but that still stinks for me- I hate going to bed alone!

So now both Barr's are working hard and staying busy. Little Barr (Elvis) is doing what he does best- sleeping! We are dogsitting 2 dachshunds for this lady at church so he'll have some buddies for a few weeks. Good practice for Matt who swears he wants another dog even though he complains when he has to walk this one!! Oh and no Paris for the Barr's this Thanksgiving. Army stinks but oh well. We've got great Thanksgiving plans with two other families and a couple of singles soldiers and we plan on seeing the new "Christmas Carol" which comes out here that weekend. Matt is planning on taking leave so we can travel without problems with the Army!

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Long Term Sub

Today I was asked to be a long term sub in 1st grade. Originally I thought I was headed to a 5th grade class for 2 days but they decided they needed me in 1st. So what is a long term sub? Well just like it sounds a sub who is in the same classroom for a "long" term! The first grade teacher resigned for personal reasons and they do not have a replacement so I will be subbing until they find one. This could mean this week or for the rest of the month or semester! Unfortunately I can't sub any longer than this semester due to student teaching. Several teachers and I agree that UTT should allow this to count as student teaching! Grr. Oh well its more experience and I am grateful for it! Today the class seemed pretty good. There are some definite kids who are used to being "babied"- when if they just listened the first time instead of talking then they'd know what to do! Then I have other kids who are GREAT helps- couldn't do it without 'em! :-) There are a few minor things I am going to slowly restructure beginning tomorrow (well I started today with seating arrangements on the carpet!) but for the most part I want to keep it running as is. I'd hate to change them now then when the permanent person takes over it get changed again! But in the mean time I can think of a couple of things to make the class run a little more efficient as well as teach the same material but in a different manner. I don't think the old teacher would mind- she seemed like a great lady!

Today I went to the Dr. For those of you who spoke to me this weekend you know how awful I was starting to sound. Well last Monday my throat started hurting. By Friday I was coughing/having chest pains. Unfortunately it was a 3 day week so the clinic was closed and I was not about to wait in the ER for 8+ hours for chest congestion- especially not here where they're so quick to admit you for any tiny thing!!! So I saw the Dr. right after school and he scolded me for waiting so long yadidadada because now the crud has gotten in my lungs and I have early signs of bronchitis. I could of told him that- I seem to get it at least once a year! The main reason I went to the doc was because my ears were beginning to hurt (they're fine- its just the pressure) and because the mucus has been so bad its literally choking me, especially in my sleep! So he gave my a antibiotic, a pill that will stop the cough so my throat won't hurt (it's so raw that touching the OUTSIDE of my neck hurts!), and an albuterol inhaler because I can't breathe. Plus he said I can keep on the tylenol severe multisymptom and mucinex (however that just seems like WAY to much to me so after today I'm not taking that stuff). Through all this I haven't "felt" sick i.e. tired, etc but I took it easy this weekend hoping I could rest it away (so such luck).

Matt is doing fine. He's still waiting on seatbelts for his car so he's annoyed at "me" right now ;-) Naw not really just annoyed that he's got to shower/change at the gym after PT since I have to get to work as well. However I think he'd rather do that then have less money and an unpleasant bored wife! He's sluggin his way through 2 college classes this term and trying to get them finished before he goes to WLC (see below). We've been watching Christmas movies every night and he's super excited that "Jingle All the Way" has arrived in the mail today! (Why this and not the seatbelts???)

Hope everyone else is doing well! Please keep the families of Fort Hood in your prayers as well as the families who's soldiers are about to deploy from here. Also the families who's soldiers are returning now! People don't realize that they still need your prayers when they get home- it's a tough transition (I always thought that was silly but it is SO true!)

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Christmas Cheer!

Yesterday I finally got Matt out to Rothenburg ob der Tauber and it is now his favorite city just like me! Unfortunately we forgot how early it gets dark now (4:30!) so we only got to see the Christmas stores but that's ok. Matt was in HEAVEN (as was I)! We even gave in and bought a few more items. After a doner and a schneeballen (a traditional Rothenburg desert) we were headed home only to hit HORRIBLE traffic on the autobahn. Silly me hit the detour button on our GPS..never again at night! It sent us through pitch black twisty roads and lots of villages- probably beautiful during the day but terrifying at night!

Today we were lazy (well, I am sick- sort of). I skipped CCPP because I didn't want to be coughing all over the kiddos and instead Matt and I watched Eagle Eye- Awesome movie! Then Matt was dying to put out the new Christmas items and seeing as how he was in Iraq the last 2 Christmas's and this is our first Christmas together since 2004 AND since he'll be gone most of December I gave in and while listening to Christmas music we decorated our house. The house looks great and we can't wait to get our tree!! Now we are watching The Grinch and I am enjoying a cuppa (cup of hot tea- it's what my British friend Lisa says)! Here are some photos of the Christmas decor- but see Facebook for everything!:

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I fell asleep at Taco Bell!

So I am physically and emotionally exhausted so this is going to be brief:

Matt had to go 5 hours away on Tuesday to drop off Ammo. On the way there his humvee ran out of gas (broken gauge). They spent 4 hours on the side of the autobahn and were never "rescued" so finally the other humvee left got a tank of gas and came back. After getting to the barracks room he shared with 3 other guys- all on cots- at midnight they were woken up at 5am to begin the day. They got to the ammo place at 8 but weren't seen until 1pm. They never had ANY food thanks to a Sgt. who wanted to get going (yes, hurry up and wait). At 4ish I called Matt and they FINALLY stopped at a McDonalds for food. He got home at 9:30pm and crashed. So in my book he was gone 2 nights because I didn't really see him last night. Thankfully they didn't make him come into work until 10am today so he got to catch up on sleep.

As for me well a friend of mine is out of town for the week leaving her husband with their 4 kids (10, 8, 6, 2). He called Tuesday night and asked if I could help him with the kids this morning because he had a doctor's appointment in Heidelburg. Of course I said yes! So this morning I got up at 4:45am (yes shocker for me I know I know....LOTS of coffee) and got to their house at 5:30am. He left at 6am and I had the 3 bigger kids getting dressed, eating, etc. About 6:45 the 2yr old was up as well. The big kids took the bus (I offered to drive since I was going to their school anyways but they took the bus) and I took the 2yr old to his babysitter then went to school. It was great for me- felt like I was home with all my rugrats!!

Today I subbed in the same class I had on Monday. It was 90x better than Monday and I hate to say it but partially because one student was absent so it just made the whole day less stressful and easier to focus on teaching and not disciplining. Don't get me wrong- its still a tough group but I'm pretty tough too ;-) I am very proud of myself though- even when the kids were being SO loud I just talked in a quiet calm voice and one or two kids would hear me and they would start quieting others and it was a chain reaction! So you DON'T have to yell to get what you want *hint hint* It may take a little longer (we were late to library because of certain chatter boxes) but the kids and I were certainly less stressed. At the end of the day one boy told me I was "like the best teacher EVer" and then the 5 around him agreed hahaha :-D I saw their actual sub after school and told her the good report and she agreed that one student CAN make a huge impact on the day. She also agreed that while they are a handful it is fun being challenged every day AND it makes the day FLY by!!! I'm going to be so bored next semester in my student teaching class- they are SO "easy" and good!

Well at about 1pm one of the girls I took care of this morning came to tell me she wasn't feeling well. I don't know why her teacher sent her to me- its not like I could leave school and take her home?...but we called her Dad and he picked her up. Then later he called and asked if I could get the other kids picked up and brought home (he was pretty medicated from his doctor visit). After going to ACS and getting the ball rolling on becoming a Respite Care Provider, the library to pick up some books, and SATO to get info on our Paris trip I went and got the little one from his babysitter and the 2 remaining big kids from their daycare. Got them home safe and sound and then had to go pick up MY big kid from work.

On the way to get his haircut (and some Taco Bell because I was/am too exhausted to cook-and yes I dozed off in the food court of the PX eating my crunch wrap- and later while Matt was finishing eating!!!) he broke the "good/bad" news. First off is that tonight he has duty from 10pm-2am so another night I have to go to sleep alone. Second is we wouldn't be able to attend the marriage retreat because he was going to be gone for 18 days in December. Why is this good/bad? Bad because there goes most of Dec. when I wanted to travel to all the Christmas fests with him. We have not spent a Christmas together since 2004- senior year of HIGH SCHOOL!! Yes I know we'll be together for actual Christmas but we had big plans of Christmas fests, Christmas movies, and Christmas decorating/baking to fill up the month of December. Ok so that's the bad. The good is he's going to WLC (Warriors Leader Course) which is "Sgt. School." No he's not being promoted but he has to have WLC to be a Sgt and this also adds to his promotion points towards making Sgt. He still has to get his points to cut off AND pass the PT test.

Ok good night one and all I am soo stinking tired its not funny. Oh one more thing- props to my little brother Cody for being the only sophomore to make VARSITY BASEBALL!!! You are AMAZING and I am SO proud and happy for you :-D !!!!!!!! One step closer to making the Longhorn Baseball team ;-)

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1st Day Subbing

Well first day at SES. I've subbed before but MAN I forgot how much kids like to say: "But Ms. SoandSo does this or that or doesn't let" BLAH! I even told the kids at the beginning of the day: I am NOT Ms. SoandSo. We will do things my way today and there will be no arguing. Ha. Some kids were so bad with this the other students were getting annoyed and reminding them to quit saying that! I can handle "bad" classes but today there were several moments I wanted to put my hands on my ears and sing "LALALLALALA I CAN'T HEAR YOU" because these kids act so helpless/argue with ME/annoy each other/stay off task!! Thankfully I did NOT do this ;-) In fact the principal was in the room for about 20 mins in the morning helping schedule conferences and I thought the kids were acting so bad while she was in there (that was one of the times I thought about covering my ears and screaming) but that afternoon, in front of me, she told the secretary that I did wonderful in that class and that I even handled a certain child very well. Props! Still, I HATE having to make kids be silent but I hate repeating myself 10000000000 million times even more. Even though we ended on what I thought was a bad note- having to scold the kids for behavior problems right before I dismissed them- and as I was dismissing them!- I still had 2 kids say that I was a very nice teacher :-) I will be back in that classroom on Thursday- wish me luck!

Sorry this is short- dinner's almost ready and I am STARVING!!! All I had today was some grits this AM and a PBJ for lunch. I was going to start going to the gym after school but I forgot how exhausted I get. I figured that I'm barely eating and walking/standing all day so that's good enough for me ;-)

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