Done and on with the next

Report cards, parent/teacher interviews, crazy first term DONE! I am looking forward to second term, it shall be far less of a mess than this one. To cap it off, I started with a class of 18 rug rats, and for math it was boosted up to 24 with 6 early language learners to help through major math terms, on top of which a handful of second language learners I already had in the class to help with lower level of language comprehension. Then, a slew of unusual parent issues and things that seemed to come in large waves, and THEN my class was split in two, a month ago, but only part-time and I was still in charge of giving full-time report cards marks, comments, and interviews for 18 of the 24 students, 10 of which I only still had part time. All that and only able to use half my classroom space because the other half is in rotation to the pre-k kids for use of our smart board. Major report card vamp 2 weeks before they were due, teachers responsible for compiling and arranging in final order, based on a an elusive draft curriculum and anything else we chose to use, sort of, still not clear on that no matter how many questions I ask, yet keep it linked to all other grades and the high school too, wait, do I know that information? Nope...... Oh, and major changes in my TA help halfway through the term. Vague is all this forum can handle, specifics would baffle. But its done, term two has great promise in store. Parent/teacher interviews were the last of my stress for now, and they went incredibly smooth, so much for all my worries. Ah, looking ahead to new, leaving behind the old, wonderful:)

Back to work

Here we are, the night before another day another dollar. We are back to work tomorrow after a nice week off, though more than half of mine was spent on report cards and getting ready for term 2. YIKES!!! Term two already. My class has shrunk from 19 students to 10 (most of the time, sometimes there are three cute little Korean ESL kids that join in for Math class, no English but adorable smiles and delightful giggles.) 10 is heaven, though I am still taking all 19 for science and social studies, at the moment, but at the end of this week it will be my ultimate treat, with just the 10 and me. The tough part is that I still have to do report cards for all 19 for this first term....and I lose 3 weeks assessment time for half of them.....plus some other time for some this and thats at the beginning of the semester, are you following? Cuz I don't think I am:) Anyways, after this first term reports hopefully I will find life to be a little lighter and a little easier. The students are still so cute and I love seeing their smiling faces everyday. There is no shortage of tattles and "he did this" and "she did that" but they are still so stinkin in cute! Makes my day exciting, makes me feel like I can participate in someone's life and affect that little being in a positive way somehow with a simple "well, what do you feel about that?" or "let's talk about it together". Simple things, simple conversations, these, even the tough ones, get me through each day. Mini people are so full of life its great:)

WOW! Long time no blog!

Oops, seems we have neglected to keep up on our posts, with the craziness of school and all that is going on, I think we have just felt there is little time to do much. BUT, thankfully this week we got a break and spent a few days in Beijing exploring some areas we have not ventured into before. One place being an area called the 798 District. Now, markets in China are fun and all, but they are exhausting, with all the vendors trying to entice you in, trying to haggle you into paying outrageous prices, sometimes even grabbing at arms and bags, its almost like a scary movie when someone finds themselves in a cave of grabbing moaning hands:) So, we have done the usual, and made some connections at those markets, but we decided we wanted to try something new, and 798 turned out to be a GEM! 798 is an area that holds a large number of old factory and industrial buildings. Old brick walls, metal stacks, and strange pieces of heavy machinery litter the 3-4 block area and are now a part of the plethora of art pieces also on display. The area has quite a number of public galleries, along with unique clothing shops, tea houses, leather shops, trinket stores, jewelry stores, and more. What lies within this space welcomes the old and new and modern all together. Everywhere you go the walls are smattered with art and graffiti, people are mulling along exploring each new jewel they find, and the walkways and alleyways are constantly being used for photo shoots (it would seem that 50 percent of asia are photographers with all the latest and greatest in gear, and the other 50 percent are models, quite amusing:) It was hard to believe this place is in China, there was so much appreciation for art and raw aesthetics that it seemed too unpolished to be here, but it really is, and a number of people were there appreciating it. Definitely a place we will go back to, and if any of you ever make it to Beijing, a place you should drop by, but give yourself a whole day, you'll need it:) Here are only a few pics, it was pretty crowded in most areas where there was some really funky art pieces so I couldn't get any shots, it was the holidays so people were EVERYWHERE! More next time.