Hooray!

Hello blog world! Hope you have all had a beautiful week and weekend, especially after the beautiful Saturday we had yesterday! I kicked my day off with a workout that left me unable to move and then went and ran around at the dog park with Maddie. Then David took me to Firebirds to celebrate the fact that we have made it 2 years without killing one another :) It was a wonderful, relaxing day which has been much needed with all of this teaching and work going on!
In other news, I have finally gotten word from Teach for America and I made it through to a final interview!! I am so excited, nervous, and anxious all at the same time. I made it through the first cut to a phone interview, and then I did well enough with the phone interview to get a final. It will be sometime in March and then I will find out if I am accepted in April. I know that no matter how it works out it will be for a reason, but I would love nothing more than to have the opportunity to be a part of this amazing movement in education.
That about all that is going on in my world these days, Happy Sunday!

"Teach Like Your Hair's On Fire"

While I don't have much spare time these days to sit down and tackle a new book, I came across this book at the book fair at the school I'm student teaching at. It looked interesting to me and was pretty inexpensive so I decided to buy it. I have only gotten a few chapters read so far but I am really enjoying it. It is a great way to look at and re-evaluate teaching strategies, mainly dealing classroom management. Thought I would post it on here for any fellow future teachers in case interested :) Hope you all have had a wonderful weekend!

Geometry, Light reflection, and Colonies... oh my!

      Hello all :) Happy 3 day weekend to all that have the pleasure of being off work or out of school Monday! I know I am taking full advantage of this little break to try and get all caught up in my 4th grade studies (see title). Student teaching has been going beautifully. I started off teaching Math and English last week, and loved it! I had my first evaluation and got all 3s and 4s from both my mentor teacher and my U of M supervisor, so I can't complain there. Obviously there are areas I need to improve in but I think most of that will simply come with practice just as it does in many other things. This week, however, I will be taking on the rest of the subjects as well... that's right, I will be teaching Math, Science, English, Reading, Spelling, and Social Studies, all day, every day. Needless to say, I am a little rusty on my 4th grade content skills and knowledge, so I had to bring home all of the books to study up in preparation for my first real week as a "teacher". I am really excited, but nervous as well. Luckily, I have an awesome mentor teacher who really is there to support me and help me wherever possible.
     In other news, I received some exciting news this past week! I applied for Teach for America back in November to meet the Dec. 17th deadline, and I found out I made it through to the next phase of the admissions process. I have a phone interview set up for Sunday January 23rd, which will determine whether I make it through to a final interview. I am so excited to have even made it this far and whether I make it all the way through or not, I know at the end of the day I will not regret my decision to at least try, and I won't have any "what if's" lingering in the back of my mind. So with that said, keep me in your thoughts this next week as I prepare for the next step.
       That is about all I have for an update for now, I'll try to blog again soon for anyone who actually reads this :) Happy Sunday, all!

Happy 2011 :)

Greetings all! Been a while since I have updated, but with the start of a new year, I have some new things to update about! I started student teaching last week, I am still at Ellendale with the same teacher and I love it! I start taking full control over Math and English this week, and then will take over the rest of the subjects the following week. I am nervous about the whole thing, but I just keep reminding myself that I am that much closer to graduating! I took and passed the 4th out of 6 Praxis tests over my break so I am almost done with that too, thank goodness!!
I spent a good amount of time at my parents over the break, my brother was in town so it was nice being able to spend some time with him since I only get to see him 2 or 3 times a year. We built a few fires, and ate lots of good food... nothing to complain about there! I got lots of goodies for Christmas too! Some Ray-Bans, a new stereo for my car, and then some other fun things too. David got me an electric skillet (which I have been wanting for about 2 years) and 5 movies!!
With break over, my life consists of school, lesson planning, and working. I have a countdown going until graduation to keep me motivated. Today was a nice little break though since it was a SNOW day! We got about 4 inches of snow, and I definitely got out and played in it with Maddog, Dave, and his brother. Maddie absolutely loved it, she liked trying to attack snow balls. It was a fun, relaxing day with my favorite people and pup. (pictures above)
Other than that my life is about the same. Maddie is still growing, she has finally reached the 15 lb mark! She will probably gain about 5 more lbs and be done, which is fine with me... just the right size! I will update again sooner than later, will hopefully have some good news to blog about but I have to wait and see! Happy New Year to you all, hope it is the best year yet  :)