Pro Cert Blues

This school year, as is required by the wonderful state of Washington, I'm doing my Professional Certification. In a nutshell, it is a portfolio that all new teachers have to put together, guided by module questions, to prove that we are, in fact, capable of doing the job we've been doing for several years. And we have to pay for it. Awesome.

Sometimes I wonder how this came to be. Who on earth would ever think of such a requirement for new, underpaid teachers? The answer: bureaucrats. Only bureaucrats could come up with something this silly. In my head, it went a little something like this (cue fantasy music)....

Bureaucrat Schmuck #1: Hey, I've noticed that our state test scores are really low. What are we going to do about this?

Bureaucrat Schmuck #2: Well, we already have high state standards from which all our teachers teach and our universities have strict expectations.

Bureaucrat Schmuck #3: We could encourage parents to play a more active role in their children's education, or have them turn off the TV and video games, or fund all the programs we require.

B S #1: Nah. It's probably the teachers' fault. We should require more of them.

B S # 3: You mean more than the 60+ hours most of them put in every week, and their being available to parents and the obnoxiously low pay?

B S #2: Yeah, they should have to go to more school. You know, to prove that they actually learned what they learned in college.

B S #1: I like that idea. We could give them all kinds of requirements, little to no support, no timeline and of course, they should have to do it while still working a full-time job. And they should do all this in their first five years of teaching. Sounds great!

B S #3: Wow, it sounds really expensive. How are we going to pay for this?

B S #2: The individual teachers will pay for it, of course. We can't go wasting our money on teacher education.

B S #3: Hmmmm... young teachers don't make much money and many of them are still paying off student loans. Does that seem fair?

B S #1: Fair? What does that have to do with anything?

B S: #3: Well, okay. But do you really think the teachers are the reason for low test scores? They seem to be putting in a lot of time and effort.

B S #2: Are you suggesting that the problem is with students and parents? HA! No Child Left Behind tells us that all kids can perform at grade level.

B S #1: Yeah, it's not as if lack of parent support, poor diet, language barriers, learning disabilities, unhealthy sleep habits, abuse or neglect have anything to do with test scores. Come on!

B S #3: I guess you're right. But if we're going to require all this work, these teachers will at least get some major college credits or an increase of pay, right. Just like getting a master's?

B S #2: Are you serious? No way! We're doing this for their own good. They'll thank us later for all the hours and money spent. It will make them feel like better teachers. And that's what's important.

B S #1: Amen!

Tootin' My Own Horn

I found out yesterday that I got a position I submitted for. Whew! Not that I had any competition, so really I got it by default.

It's the English-speaking half of the 4th grade Dual Language. Our school has been growing our DL program each year by one grade and 4th grade come next.

This couldn't have come at a better time. I've been beyond frustrated and overwhelmed with education lately. It seems like there are always meetings and trainings and paper work and parents to talk to and lessons to plan and implement. It's exhausting. And no matter how much I work, how many papers I bring home and how many hours I stay late or come early, it never ends.

I had started to think that maybe teaching wasn't for me. Of course, I'm absolutely useless outside of the classroom. I have no skills whatsoever besides teaching other people's kids. Truly. So what would I even do?

But with this new job, I'll essentially have two classes. I'll teach reading, two blocks of math and writing/literacy. All in English. My Spanish counterpart who has yet to be hired will teach reading, two blocks of science/social studies, and writing/literacy. We'll have one class in the morning and then will switch for the afternoon. What makes this so great for me is that I don't have as many lesson plans because I don't have to teach science and social studies (I hate teaching social studies!) and I get to teach math, which is my favorite. I know, weird.

I also really love the whole idea behind Dual Language. Kids get to learn in their first language which research shows is better for all kids, they then transfer that knowledge to the language their learning, become more sensitive to other cultures and languages, and by the end of 6th grade are fully bilingual and biliterate. Of course, I think most kids are still stronger in English just because it's all around them. That means that our Spanish speaking kiddos don't have to give up their home language to be successful and can take pride in their culture and language. It also means that both English and Spanish speakers are more ready for the global economy.

All that to say, I think I'm more ready to stick with education for a while. And I'm stoked to teach 4th grade again. Third graders bug me.

Back in the saddle again

We had our "Meet the Teacher" night tonight. Shockingly, well over half of my class showed up to get a glimpse of the lady who will be running their lives for the next 10 months. Last year, I think four kids showed up.

Most of the kids seem very sweet. They answered my nosy questions politely and then shyly hid behind their parents.

I had one mom, however, who said this upon taking her leave, "I hope we won't have to see too much of each other this year." As in, "I know my kid is a brat and we'll be in contact for sure but I'm hoping that he's not too obnoxiously misbehaved that we have to hang out all the time." That's what she wanted to say.

Makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

For those of you who are really bored

Three Things

Three names I go by:

1. Giordi

2. Mrs. Yunge

3. Geebs

Three jobs I've had:

1. Teacher

2. State Park worker

3. Babysitter

Three places I've lived:

1. Prosser

2. Nampa

3. Burlington

Three favorite drinks:

1. Water (yep, I'm that boring)

2. Mojitos

3. Iced tea

Three television shows I watch:

1. The Office

2. Jeopardy

3. Ugly Betty

Three of my favorite foods:

1. frozen chocolate chips

2. Stir-fry with lots of veggies

3. raspberries

Three of my favorite restaurants:

1. Buenos Aires Grille

2. Burlington Cafe

3. Arby's

Three things I couldn't live without:

1. lotion

2. clean towels

3. cell phone

Three things I can't stand:

1. using a dirty/wet hand towel

2. people/things sitting on my unmade bed

3. poor table manners

Three things I'm decent at:

1. cooking

2. teaching

3. napping

Three things I'm looking forward to this weekend:

1. my parents' visit

2. getting our back handrail up

3. Beth preaching at church again

Three things I'm addicted to:

1. chocolate

2. my husband

3. Facebook (Ugghhh! I hate that I said that.)

Really?

Sometimes I want to be a stay-at-home mom.

And then I have days like yesterday and I remember that I'm not tough enough.

I brought Jack into the bathroom with me like I usually do to take a shower. I get the garbage out of reach, bring some toys in (although he prefers to play peek-a-boo with the shower curtain and play with tampons), and close the door to prevent escape. We were both doing our thing and I closed my eyes for the ten seconds it takes me to rinse out the conditioner and when I opened them, there is my darling boy standing in the tub with me. In his pajamas. Awesome. He stealthily climbed into my shower fully clothed and diapered. So I had to strip him down and finish my shower with him screaming at me to hold him, as he doesn't really like being in the shower.

After I got both of us dried off and myself wrapped up in a robe that doesn't fit (more on that later), I took him to his room to get dressed. Upon completion, I started picking up stray objects only to turn around and see him standing on the rocking chair knowing that any second he'd fall and kill himself. So I get him down and continue my cleaning and when I turn around again, he's digging in the dirty diaper pail. Gross.

After we get that all sorted out, I shut his bedroom door and took him into the living room to play with his toys while I attempted to put myself together. I came out after a few minutes and noticed he was eating something. A stray Cheerio or graham cracker, you ask? No, it was orange and rather stringy. That's when I realize that he's been chewing on our old orange chair that needs to be reupholstered desperately.

Are you kidding me? All of this happened in a fifteen minute time span and I'm running around in a robe that keeps falling off my shoulders and won't stay tied. (There's an image you wanted in your head.) It was like having twins and a puppy at the same time.

We eventually get out the door, because, as my mom advised I "just needed to get into to public. I'll be nicer to him in public." We went to the library for a little play group. It was our first time attending and I didn't know what to expect. There really wasn't much to it, just other moms and their little kids. Jack was the only boy. Consequently, he was the only kid who didn't sit nicely by his mama and play gently. Oh, no. He was the screeching kid running at full hilt who was throwing little plastic balls all over the place. That's my little gentleman. He actually wasn't being naughty, just energetic.

But then he saw it. A stroller that wasn't his. A stroller he could easily climb. Did I mention he's a climber? Yeah, he climbs everything. So for a while, I let him climb the thing. He wasn't hurting anything, mostly just sitting in the seat. Then he decided to stand up. Not okay. So I pulled him off of it over and over again. Every time he squealed and ran right back to it. Then I tried facing it toward the wall and dropping the tray to make it more difficult to climb into it. No good. He just crawled right over that tray and screamed some more when I dragged him off of it. So charming.

It was one of those times when you feel that all the other moms are wondering why I can't get control of my obnoxious child and why I let him act like such a brat. But that's the thing, he's not a brat. He gets lots of loving, firm and consistent discipline. He's almost always well-behaved. But if there is something to climb, dang it, he's going to climb it. End of story.

So, to all you stay-at-home moms, nice work. I really look up to you. And you deserve a break once in a while. And contrary to what you may be thinking, I really do love my little terror fiercely. He's great fun. He just drives me nuts sometimes.

The Post I've Been Avoiding

I said in my last post that I'd explain my (very) prolonged absence from the blogging world. I wish I wouldn't have because then I wouldn't have to try to put to words all this stuff that's been swimming in my head and heart. And also Sarah Culver wouldn't be bugging me to post again. But I did say that so here it goes:

I gave up blogging for Lent. I know what you're thinking: Lent ended months ago. It's time to get back in the saddle. But the whole process didn't quite work the way I intended. I wanted to have this beautiful spiritual experience wherein my abstaining from blogging and all other social-network type things would give me the chance to really draw closer to God and become wrapped up in Him. It didn't work that way.

Don't get me wrong, I haven't rejected my faith and become some sort of demon-worshipping heathen who sacrifices small animals, but it just wasn't what I wanted. Of course, it's my fault. Instead of taking my normal blogging time to hang out with Jesus and really dive into the Word, I found other things to do. There were always laundry or dishes or Office episodes just calling my name. And those voices seemed to be louder than His. At least, I chose to listen to those voices more often.

I did try sometimes and I don't know about you, but I've never been a great pray-er. You know how there are some people who seem to just melt into prayer as if it's totally natural to them, as if it's what they were meant to do? I'm not one of them. I know I'm meant for constant communication with my God but sometimes my mind just drifts and eventually I'm planning the next week's math lessons or making a mental grocery list. So needless to say, I was pretty discouraged when Lent ended and wasn't looking forward to the prospect of explaining my absence from my blogging. But I also know that part of really sinking into communication with God is being honest. This is a start.

Nate and I recently took a class at church about Wesley's Three Simple Rules (how Nazarene are we?? I'm almost embarrassed!) This class really challenged me. The rules aren't simple at all: Do no harm, Do good, and Stay in love with God. If you really start thinking about them, it can get your head spinning. I mean, how do you never do any harm? What if it's unintentional? What if you think you're doing good and actually doing harm? What about corporate harm? Yikes!

So we finally got to the Stay in Love with God part and I have to admit, this didn't excite me as much initially. I tend to shy away from the really personal parts of Christianity. I love discussing how to be a Christian in community and what it truly means to show love to all, even non-Christians or those we don't agree with. I have a terrible tendency to get all wrapped up in the politics and socio-economic facets of it. Terrible. That's not what it's about, really.

When we started talking about different acts of devotion like worship, prayer, communion, fellowship, etc I saw things differently, especially prayer. I realized that I don't have to do those long, drawn out, churchy prayers. I don't have to use a formula. I can just be and if I drift, God still loves me. I also learned a new way to keep myself in focus: I say over and over again "Lord have mercy; Christ have mercy" and instead of praying words for every situation, I pray mercy over all these situations through images. It's so simple and yet so transforming. Praying for mercy in all circumstances truly changes my motives. I'm praying for God's will and grace in all.

This isn't to say that I've got the whole praying thing figured out. I'm still working on it and there are lots of times that I have to force myself to put everything else aside and just spend time with my Creator. 'Cause I need His mercy too.

New Faves

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know I've been MIA. I'll 'splain later. 

But for now, I just have to let you all in on my newest obsession. For those of you who don't know this about me, I have a tendency to go through "phases." These phases can involve all kinds of things: foods I eat over and over again (Cheerios was a big one when I was pregnant. I've also eaten yogurt and fresh berries like it's going out of style), shoes, different types of clothes (cotton peasant skirts, anyone?), and websites. I get this obsessive side from my dad. My brother, Cade, has it in him too. I think it drives my mom nuts.

Well, these new obsession are websites. Oh, dear, I could spend all day on both. The first is Overstock.com. I know what some of you are thinking: "Umm...hello, Giordi? Welcome to 2005. Where have you been?"  And the answer is: I don't know. I mean, I had heard about it but never meandered over. The other day there was an add for it while I was checking the news and since I had nothing better to do, I meandered. 

Wow. All that wonderful furniture and bedding. All those shoes. I could literally spend hours just looking. I don't need to buy anything. I'm happy just to look and dream. 

The other I found in a  home decor magazine. It's called sproost.com and the basic idea is that you take a short style quiz by looking at various rooms to determine what your aesthetic is. Brilliant! It's so fun, I've done it twice. So then when you're finished, it tells you what your style combination is (mine is Vintage Modern/Contemporary with a hint of Cottage Chic) and how you can decorate accordingly. They also give you some ideas of things to buy you might like, and let me tell you, they were spot-on with me. Of course, that doesn't mean you need to buy anything, and I certainly won't at those prices but it's fun to look anyway. And it's nice to have a direction to head when decorating. I always feel so scattered and this helps me focus a little.

So, if you've got a few minutes, you should head on over to these sites. Way fun. Total waste of time.

Sicko

Thursday wasn't a good day.

It didn't start off so badly. It was pretty normal, actually. But around 1:00 I got a call  at school from Jack's babysitter who told me that he had thrown up, seemed to have a fever, and just wasn't being himself. Great.

Luckily, I could get a sub in quickly and I picked him up by 1:30. He already had a weight check appointment later that day but I called the doctor's office to see if they could get him in any earlier and if he could see a real doctor.  They were so helpful and they squeezed him in about an hour earlier than he would have been. So the two of us went home for a while to wait until it was time to go. Jack slept most of the time and the rest of the time he just lay on my shoulder. He really wasn't feeling well at all.

About twenty minutes before our appointment, I got the boy all loaded up in the car, grabbed the purse and diaper bag and reached for my keys that are always in my purse. 

Hmmm... no keys.

They were in the house. The locked house. The locked house that has no spare hidden anywhere for such an occasion. It's a good thing I didn't lock the car earlier so at least we could sit in the car while we waited for the locksmith to come rescue us. As we were waiting, I called the doctor's office to let them know we'd be a little late. The locksmith people assured me that someone would be over within five to ten minutes and they didn't lie.

The only problem was that in the short time we had to wait, Jack started fussing in his car seat so I picked him up to cuddle him for a while. That's when it came. All the food the child has ever eaten came spewing out of his mouth and onto both of us. It was smelly. It was slimy. It was completely disgusting.

So here we are, sitting in the car, covered in baby vomit, locked  out of our own house, and late for an appointment. The locksmith eventually gets here (hallelujah!) and promptly lets us in. I apologized for the smell and in all his nineteen-year-old superiority says, "Yeah, you've got something on your pants." Thanks, dude.

So we get in the house, change (Jack into his pajamas and me out of my dry-clean only work clothes. Bummer.) and hit the road. By this time, we're about 45 minutes late, which means we could have made the first appointment beautifully. They are still gracious enough to fit us in somewhere and we find out the Jack is gaining weight but that he's got some bug that we just have to wait out. We did make it home without  incident, though.

I thought that this would just be a quick little thing, but he's still been acting sick. He threw up a few times yesterday and is still acting like he feels terrible this morning, which is why I'm home now. Poor kid. Hopefully we can take care of it. And hopefully we can do so without anymore major puking incidents. We'll see.