Happy Birthday

It's my Pake's birthday today--that's my grandpa (my mom's dad). Happy Birthday, Pake! See you soon.

Yeah

I leave in less than two days for Michigan! I'm so excited! Who is coming to Lisa, Kortnie, and Angie's place on Sunday to see me? I am sad that I have to be away from my wonderful husband for three days, though. I'm sure we'll be fine, but I don't like being away from him. I hope that never changes.

Adverbage

One tired teacher.

62 tired fifth graders.

Trying to teach adverbs to 62 tired fifth graders for the first time in your life the week before Thanksgiving break.

Yeah, it doesn't work very well.

Any ideas for how to help kids understand adverbs? Today we played a game where I had a stack of cards. On the cards was something like "Neatly write your name on the board" or "Loudly clap your hands." (Note: this is not my idea--I got it off a website yesterday, but I can't remember where. So, I give whoever thought it up the credit for a great game!). Then I had a student come up, read the card, and act it out kind of like charades. The class had to guess it in 3 tries. If they did, they got a point. If they didn't, I got a point. They really liked the game. They have a pretty easy time guessing adverbs like that, but finding it in the sentence among adjectives, nouns, verbs, articles, pronouns, prepositions, etc is very difficult. I guess they are only in fifth grade (I didn't learn this stuff until middle school), but I just want them to get it at least a little bit.

Where's the Theology section?

Are there any Christian bookstores left that don't sell Cosmo cover Bibles, checkerboards with Scripture verses on them, and a bunch of other useless and cheesy merchandise that people so shamelessly market to the average church-goer? And where is the theology section in the small catalogue I just received from Hage's Chr. Supplies--you have your Christian accessories section, your Rick Warren section, your cheesy figurines section, your 5 steps to [fill in the blank], your Power of a Praying _______________ but no theology section. I mean there are some things in there that are worthwhile, but most of it can go.

Ok, I'm done. :)

Oh, but if Nate and I ever start a book store that sells "Christian" mercandise we will have the biggest theology section around. And a computer science section (I'm just waiting for someone to come up with a "Christian" programming language--heh). And a comics section, a teacher section, a Sci-Fi section, a children't books section...hmmmmm, maybe we'll just open a regular bookstore with a kick-butt theology section. :)

Bragging on my husband

I just have to tell y'all how wonderful Nate is for a moment. I was suffering from major bad cramps today and he was such a great caretaker. He rubbed my arm to distract me from the pain, set up my heating pad, got me pain reliever and water, grilled the steaks (his first time--and they were perfect), cleaned up all the dishes, kept coming to check on me, and much more. I love being married to him. It has been a good four and a half months.

A bulwark?

I know I had looked it up before, but this morning as we sang "A MIghty Fortress is Our God, A bulwark never failing," I still wondered to myself--"Just what is a bulwark?" So I looked it up again and this is what it said:
--A solid wall-like structure raised for defense
--A strong support or protection.

God is our never-failing bulwark. Now you know. :)

What is the focus of your Christmas celebrations?

Nate and I have talked a bit both last Christmas and this fall about what our Christmas time should look like. I recently had my students write a journal about a Christmas in their past. As I graded them tonight, I was reminded what the focus is in the minds of not only children, but adults too at Christmas: did I get what I wanted, what should I ask for this Christmas, what good deals can I get, give me more. Don't get me wrong. I don't have a problem with the idea of gift giving, I just don't think it should be the focus. Nate and I are working on what to do to help it not be the focus. The options include, using the money we would use to purchase each other's gifts and instead buying gifts to give away to those who have less than us. Or, purchasing one practical gift for our home, but trying to focus in our actions, hearts and minds on God's gift of grace in Christ to us. There are other options, I'm sure--doing missions, donating time, etc--but these are the two we are looking at for now.

Again, please don't misunderstand me. I don't mean to make you feel guilty for giving gifts. But I do mean to make you think about what you are focused on this and every day as the most important thing: God's gift to His people of Christ, through which we have every spirtiual blessing (Eph. 1:1ff).

Matrix stuff

Well, I saw it. I'm not going to say much about it right now since there are many who haven't seen it. Go to Nate's blog to the post "The Matr" to link to the abridged parody script for Matrix Revolutions. It's pretty funny and points out many of the holes in the plot.

Going to see the Matrix

After a dinner at Goode Seafood Company, Nate and I are heading to the movies (something that only happens once every 2-3 months) to see Matrix Revolutions. I'm kind of excited, kind of just hoping I'll understand what goes on in the movie better than I understood the second one, and kind of feeling relieved that I get to focus on something other than school for a couple of hours. Oh, and I get to sit next to a hot guy while I watch it.

Hungry?

While my class and I were going over some Language Arts exercises in our books yesterday afternoon, I just happened to glance over at one of my students as he put five or so pages in his mouth and took a bite out of them. For a moment I was just speechless. Then I said, "I can't believe you just did that. Don't ever do that again." A few students asked what he had done--only one had actually seen him do it--but I did my best to move us along. Until I had to stop again to tell another one of my student's to not use his pencils as toy guns. Unbelievable!

Visiting soon!

The tickets are bought and we are coming. An email will be going out soon to K-zoo people on when I will be in the area. In fact, I'm going to go write it right now. I hope to see y'all soon!

A long overdue thanks

I wanted to thank Kristen for her teaching suggestions way back in September. I forgot to acknowledge them. It's always helpful to hear what other teachers are doing.

Lone Bonneville

Nate and I own one of the three Bonnevilles in our city. Mostly I'm on the road as the lone one, though. It's strange after coming from a state with so many of them. Around here there are so many more foreign made cars.

Blogging Slacker

At least that's what I feel like I am. Maybe I'm not so bad.

Today was a bad day. In fact, Nate and I are both having rough days. He has a massive number of tests to grade and a graphics project due tomorrow night. I pretty much just don't want to go to school tomorrow. My kids were disrespectful to me today and the schedule didn't go quite how I planned it. I know that I have to be flexible, but it's hard to be flexible when your students aren't listening and are very talkative.

I don't want to act like teaching has been horrible lately, though. It has been good. I'm just worn out and tired and have had a bad day.