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(One of my pictures. Not as good as the Dude's)In this busy, crazy life of mine, it is a relief to sit down and watch a documentary on PBS. It's like yoga for my brain. The mellow voices. The long camera shots. The beautiful history. Such a relief from modern, jerky, witty, speedy, extreme TV. It inspires me to look into history, to start reading good, rich literature again. It reminds me of the richness possible when we take time to enjoy the world around us, to study it, to fight for it. At this moment, I am laying down on my couch, looking at my beautiful story-filled piano, listening to words that inspire me.
We live on such a beautiful earth. What am I doing to improve it, to document it?
Tonight I pick up my Wallace Stegner again, hoping for dreams about the land.
(or was it just because I forgot to add this part, and was too lazy to go back)
I fake screamed no less than 3 times today because I am reaching the end of being nice and patient about my room not being done. We are a month into school people! Can't you hurry up and finish already!?!?!
Sigh. I guess I need to rearrange my priorities. It must not be important for a teacher to have a classroom to teach in and be organized in. Silly me.
I realize that the "trend" in education now is for everything to be research based. I whole heartedly support that. Go for it. But is it really necessary to list every single researched source in the middle of your thought. I find your thoughts hard enough to understand what with your posturing vocabulary and your abundance of acronyms, and then you break it up with a set of parenthesis with strange names and dates sandwiched in between. My brain is tired enough from trying to keep up with differentiated instruction and classroom management techniques during the day to try and really understand your over abundance of references in the evening.
And while I'm on the complaining train, what's with telling me "In chapter 3 you will learn about (insert something mildly interesting here).....In chapter 5 you will learn about...." ETC, ETC, ETC! Just teach me in Chapter 1 what you want to teach me in chapter 1. Wait until chapter 3 to talk about chapter 3, and please, PLEASE leave chapter 5 in it's place. Don't waste my time and yours by adding all these hints of what is to come.
Sincerely yours,
A surprisingly informed reader
1st Graders: Are you married?
Mrs. The Dude: Yes, I am.
1st Graders: Do you have children?
Mrs. The Dude: No, not yet.
1st Graders: You should have children
Sigh. From your mouth to God's ears, my darling children. I know He is listening to our prayers, and I know we will have children some day. I'm just getting a little (O.K. A LOT) impatient to know when exactly those sweet spirits will join us.
Today with the 6th grade class we discussed the Mr. Bean episode where he uses dynamite to paint his room. The silhouette of the person left was what started the discussion.
And the best thing that happened today? The Dude decided to cut out a time sucker that he's been involved in lately. Hurray for him, and hurray for us being able to spend time together without him having to check his email every 5 seconds!
Mrs. The Dude: Why is it important that we clean up our mess?
Kindergartner: Because Jesus wants us to keep the earth clean.
Mrs. The Dude: What is different about drawing this way? (blind contour)
5th Grader: I don't have to care if it looks weird. It's fun when it looks weird!
(There was much giggling as we looked at our blind contour drawings of the person across from us.)
This is why I teach.
