The Naming Ceremony

(reference to The Giver, by the way)

Well, we've all known this day would come - the day when I finally change my blog's title from my online name at school (since this blog was started as an assignment) to something cooler.  I've been thinking about this for weeks, people, and I'm coming up blank!

Requirements:
- have something to do with me and/or my family
- not be lame

Possible nickname to throw into the mix:
- She

Possible "catchphrases" to throw into the mix:
- "I'm sure I don't know."
- "I hate to break it to you, but ____(compliments myself)_____."
- "Whaaaaaaat."

Thoughts based on friends' blogs' titles:
- J and my names don't start with the same letter, so there goes a "squared" title.
- This is not a crafty blog, so it can't contain "made" or "sew(s)," etc.
- Also not a teaching blog, so although that's what I do, I don't want the title to reflect that.

Favorite quotes:


Other:
- something based on the URL? No - requirement 2 (to be referenced from now on as R2).
- My favorite color is orange.
- This blog has no specific topic - optimism, spiritual stuff, teaching, babies, husband, the Beatles, movie reviews, recipes... It's mostly about what I do and whatever I'm thinking about.
- I do not live in a big city.
- I love fairytales.
- "Family name: Established ___."  R2.  Some people can do it; not me.
- I speak Spanish.

Moral of the story:
The title of this blog will probably change all the time now, until I finally find something that works. Wish me luck!

student teaching

Yes, it has begun.  Student teaching.  It's fun but also exhausting, which is the reason for not having posted lately.  I've been taking notes, though, because there have been some cool experiences.  My goal is to post them as they come so I can be more on top of record-/journal-keeping, but here's a collection from the past couple of weeks.

I've been trying hard to learn my students' names, since there is friendship (and also teacher authority) in knowing people's names.  Cool experience #1 was a girl making the comment to someone at her table that "she's really good with names."  I had, in fact, hardly learned any names from her particular class - she heard me say the one or two that I either knew or had looked at off people's papers on their desks.  I think it still does something for the class environment, though, if everyone thinks you know their names.  :)

There was a test right before I started at the school.  Almost every person failed that test - as in, like, 20%'s and such.  I was the one who graded those tests.  Unfortunately for me, one particularly interesting and (at the the time) vindictive girl found out and wasted no time in making sure people knew that I was the one who had graded them.  Nevertheless, I was not too worried, because to be honest, I'm not terribly worried about being popular here, but I was a little nervous - I didn't know how much damage she could cause for me.  And as much as I didn't care if people loved me, I also didn't especially want her making enemies everywhere for me.  The next day, though, she came to the classroom after school and asked for help in preparing to retake the test.  A minute later, as another girl got up to ask my mentor teacher for help with her retake, Girl 1 said to "ask her for help instead.  She's better at explaining it, trust me."  Now, I'm not saying I'm better than my mentor, although I may have been for that particular girl.  The point is that she didn't hate me, now we're friends, and that was a somewhat monumental moment for me - the moment my students started to see me as a competent teacher.

Two students that are cousins were in after school making sure they were ready for the end of the term.  Because it was after school, when they talked to me, I spoke to them some in English.  We talked about getting married, what school to go to, how one of the cousins is brilliant.... just generally got to know each other.  It's fun when they start to see you as a real person instead of just a teacher :)

I saw one of my students at the grocery store! She's a bagger there. And she recognized me! I felt kind of bad because I didn't recognize her at all - it was just after a couple of days of student teaching and she sits in the back.  But it was still fun.

Yesterday we introduced a Powerpoint assignment that they'll be doing about families.  My mentor gave them an example using her family, and afterwards, they all also wanted to see mine.  Proving my theory once again that it's good to use examples from your own life - it's fun to see evidence of teachers' lives outside of school!

Dakota

And, on that note, this song has me completely wanting to name a daughter Dakota :)

Brandy Alexander

This song completely has me wanting to name our daughter, if we ever have one, Brandy Alexander.  Something about it makes me feel like it would be perfectly acceptable, even though I know the name Alexander isn't a girl's name, even for a middle name.  Listen to it and then try telling me I'm not right.

Note:  I just looked up the lyrics for the first time and learned that the song is not, in fact, about a girl named Brandy Alexander, but a boy that's being compared to a Brandy Alexander, which is an alcoholic drink, another thing I didn't know.  Soo.... Pretend a Brandy Alexander isn't a drink and that the words are "Brandy Alexander is always getting into trouble," since I always thought that's what they were, and and then try telling me you don't agree with it being a cute name :)