Prefix Spin!

This past long weekend was fall break -- which was increddddible. Very difficult to come back to Messiah though, although I do love this school so much. :) Erich and Jisu and her parents were in town -- first time to America for her parents; they don't speak English so it was lot of nodding and smiling.... sooo great. I love the reminder of how much I love other cultures and languages. I can't wait to experience more after I graduate. :) We went to NYC (Statue of Liberty, Empire State Building at night -- too beautiful, Central Park) for the day where Eric met up with us. I went home with him and saw his family. It was really, really nice. We watched a lot of the TV show The Big Bang Theory, went apple picking, shopping at Kohls (for teacher clothes), and out to lunch. Saturday was his 22nd birthday so we had breakfast with his family, then opened presents and since my birthday's next week they gave me a present too: a teacherly outfit from Kohls :) and then they got us both a $50 gift certificate to the restaurant Duke's in Harrisburg that overlooks the Susquehanna River. :) We drove back to Philly for my family reunion which was also nice.

On the other note which is what this blog is about, today was a good day at school. Over the weekend I chose to forget about school and enjoy being at home. I'm getting better at compartmentalizing in this way. If I'm at home, I'm at home and I am not thinking (or worrying) about anything else. I was told I was doing a word study activity for Tuesday morning, so Sunday afternoon I looked up an activity and decided on Prefix Spin, a game with a spinner of various prefixes (such as: un, dis, mis) and a base word deck of cards. The first player spins to get the prefix and picks up the top card; if it can make a word it's written down and that card is kept. Player with the most cards, wins. I came in 2nd, and I played with 3 of my students. They loved it, and here's a picture below (taken from above since I can't show their faces).

I was supposed to teach a math lesson this week on polygons, but that will wait until next week Thursday to I can be better prepared since the 4th grade math teacher didn't get back to me until today.

Ummm..

I don't update this thing enough. And even now I feel like I don't have time because I want to watch the episode of Parenthood that I missed this week because I was too busy tackling one of my staff members.

I wouldn't be surprised if you did not understand all of that. The gist:

1. Steelton is an... interesting school. I had my second read aloud today and I read the book "John, Paul, George & Ben" -- a hilarious historical fiction book telling some history about John Hancock, Paul Revere, George Washington, Ben Franklin, and the fifth not-mentioned-in-the-title lad, Thomas Jefferson. They kids were cracking up, and they loved it. It took 10 minutes to do.. significantly shorter than I had planned. Oh well! :)

2. I am dropping A&P. This is not teacher related, except for the fact that I hate retaking it because I just wish I wasn't graded for it. I wasn't doing too hot, my advisor told me to drop it, I took her advice, I raised my grade slightly to make it look better on my transcript, I can focus now on my education classes and I am HOOOOOME FREEEEEE.

3. This is really becoming an update on my life. Eric is coming this weekend because it's homecoming weekend. His youth pastor's wife graduated from Messiah and two years ago she and her husband came down and we went out with them. We get to do it again! Plus, there's a dance, and powderpuff football, and a soccer game, and just two days of being with my love. :) Could life get any better? I submit that it does not! :)

4. There is no number 4. I am really, really happy.

5. I took a Strengths test to find out my 5 strengths and here they are:

-empathy (I can understand and put myself in others' shoes to understand their situations)

-developer (I see potential in others)

-positivity

-woo (winning others over)

-individualization (I see others as individual, unique people, not as a 'type')

... so more or less? I think so. :)

6. I should really do my writing for Anita's class tomorrow, so then I can watch Parenthood.

And the end.