Welcome!

This began as a blog of my Adventures In Moving & Living. I moved across the country and it was a way to keep in touch with friends and family without sending out massive e-mails. It began at a different blog site, so earlier posts are in a weird order. Often posts with photos will have the photos at the beginning. This makes it easier for you to know when you get to posts that you’ve already read, although most of the posts actually have no photos at all.

This blog format isn’t pretty at all, but it’s the only one that allows the entire photo to show. When I use other versions, people in the right half of the photos are cut off. On wide screen monitors, everything is just right. On narrower monitors, the photos spill over onto the sidebar. That’s still easier than going through and shrinking all the photos.

For those unfamiliar with Weather Pixies, this weather pixie shows the temp/weather where I am.

4th, etc.

Actually, I’m not sure how much “etc.” there is. We’ll see! Donna came down the weekend of the fourth of July. She got here on Friday afternoon, and we went to the folks’ for supper. Saturday we spent a lot of time there as well, swimming and eating. Then we went to Marana to see fireworks. There were supposed to be all these activities and stuff, so we went early. Well, the activities were all spread out and not really where we were exactly. But once the fireworks started, it was great! Then Sunday we went to breakfast with the folks’, went to Bookman’s to look at their used books and turn some in for trade. Then we went home and took a nap!!!!!!! Yes, I was pooped! I’ve gotten to like summer naps!!

Friday (yesterday) morning I took Del to the airport for a trip to Cape Cod. It’s a bit nippy where she is!! Some of the days she’ll be gone, the high is expected to be 62! As I was driving home tonight, the temp was 109. A little difference! While she’s gone, I’m taking care of her cat twice a day, visiting and giving her meds. Then on Sunday (the 19th?) night, I’ll pick her up from the airport. She doesn’t live that far from here — 15-20 minutes, and I don’t have to deal with the dog since he’s at “camp” while they’re gone (Del and Laura).

The state has an approved education budget finally, but it hasn’t been signed yet. The superintendent sent a memo saying that actually around 1000 employees have been affected by this, and they should be done recalling RIFs by the beginning of August. That’s like two weeks before school starts!! Sheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeesh!

9-4

Some of the pictures were taken with my cell phone and others with the camera. One recent Friday, Jim and Deb (the folks’ neighbors) took Dad, Dottie, and I to a Tucson Toros game. As you can see, the hat refers to this as being their inaugural year. That would make more sense to me if I hadn’t gone to Toros games decades ago! But apparently the former Tucson Toros became the Tucson Sidewinders and then they moved to California, so these are the NEW Tucson Toros. Um, yeah.

It was fireworks night, which was fun, even though we lost 9-4 to the Yuma Scorpions. It was military appreciation night or something like that, and they had a military helicopter in center field before the game. When it left, I thought for sure that it was going to hit the lights! There was an interesting guy behind us (Dad is chatting with him in that first picture of him) who’s temporarily stationed here. Dad was surrounded by Red Sox fans. There were plenty of us wearing Cubs hats and shirts, as well as some Yankee fans, a Detroit Tigers fan, and sundry other team lovers.

Minor league games are a hoot. There was the obligatory tossing of tee shirts to lucky fans in the stands, a child racing the mascot around the bases, a mini concert by a choir, and a karaoke competition. I think there was a baseball game, too!

Never Eat Soggy Waffles

If you’ve already seen these, then you’re probably on Facebook. I forgot to post them here. I try to take a photo of my classroom at the very end. It’s a closure sort of thing. For those who haven’t been around for long, my classroom is in a portable, which is really just a trailer that’s my classroom (some are two classrooms, but most aren’t).

***

I don’t generally like putting people in categories, but part of my class last week was showing different styles of learning/doing/interacting, etc. The point was that people are different and so there will be conflicts in groups. Additionally, people with different learning styles and ways of being learn in different ways and so need different things in a classroom. Of course the same thing holds true for groups of adults (including teachers) trying to work together or interact.

Now, the North, South, East, West one was the last one we did. We did Multiple Intelligences which I’d done before. We also did one with clipboards, microscopes, puppies, and beach balls. I came out to be a microscope, but really that one didn’t resonate with me at all. This one, though, was dead on.

First, the categories:

North: actors, let’s do it attitude, like to act, try things, plunge right in, need to get work DONE NOW! (or as quickly as possible), product-driven, success is getting it done.

South: caring group, like to know that everyone’s feelings have been taken into consideration, that their voices have been heard before acting, need to have all members share their thoughts and be sure everyone is supported, brings snacks, success is all feeling good about the work.

West: detailers, pay attention to the little things, like to know the who, what, when, where, and why before acting, need to get their questions answered before proceeding with the work, always seeking clarification, success is in the details.

East: speculators, like to look at the big picture, the possibilities before acting, need to express their vision of the project, always looking for another way, BIG IDEA PEOPLE, success is in the vision or how it fits.

After we got the handout and read it, we were supposed to go to the spot in the room with the big piece of butcher paper that matched our style. Each group was to write about their strengths, which groups drive them nuts, etc. There were a couple of other things as well.

The teachers laughed because each group totally went about the assignment in keeping with their style. I’m a North, totally. I am NOT into process and remember having many discussions about that in my Syracuse days. As a teacher, the other groups drive me nuts when they’re spending forever on wondering about all these little details and I want them to JUST START THE ASSIGNMENT FOR PETE’S SAKE!

Needless to say, not only did the Norths just start writing and doing the assignment, they didn’t even wait until the whole group was there! The only East finally had to be extremely nudged so that she’d write SOMETHING on the paper! The other two groups followed their pattern as well. The one teacher said that every time she’s done this, including this time, the Norths say that ALL the other groups drive them nuts! Now you know.

Pooped!

Yeah, you wouldn’t think vacation is all that tiring. You’d be wrong, of course! Monday through Thursday I had class. Friday I picked up Dottie early-ish (between 10 and 10:30) and we went to a ritzy little group of shops on our way to Chinese Buffet for lunch. The shops had clothing, jewelry, etc. I saw a nice tee shirt — for $150 and a nice bracelet for $1525 (no, no decimal in that number!). Yeah, it was great to look and to wonder who actually had that much money!

I needed to get some fabric for the strips between blocks that were already to go, so we drove across town to the fabric store to match the scrap I had. I did originally have enough red, but then I put it on my bulletin board in my classroom instead. Oh, well. So we spent plenty of time wandering around Hancock’s and then Kohl’s and then a stop at the bakery before getting Dottie home around 3:30. Then I managed to get a little swimming in!

I got other fabric to try making a strip quilt. This morning I ironed all that (and a shirt, as long as I actually had the ironing board out!).

Today I’ll go over there for a more relaxing day and more swimming. Tonight is the monthly Haven activity which is actually the May activity. It’s something called Laughter Yoga (but it’s not about laughing at me doing yoga, in spite of the gales of laughter that would actually produce!).

The other computer has a picture of Donna’s new boot on it, so when I get to that one I’ll upload the picture. She has a broken toe! That’s one think I’ve never done — broken a bone — which is surprising considering how uncoordinated I am! So, a moment of silence for Donna’s poor foot…

nice to be here

I’m taking a morning class way across town. It is for four days, and tomorrow is the last day. Today I rode down a busier street than I usually care for. More traffic, but it’s a nice straight line. But more traffic means more waiting at lights. So there I am, southbound, waiting for a light to turn green. I’m very far back though — far enough back that by the time I get near the light it has been yellow for quite a while. The guy in front of me wasn’t that far into the intersection when it turned red, and I didn’t even bother. It’s a very large intersection at Speedway and Campbell. I don’t know what the heck the guy behind me was thinking, but it didn’t include stopping. He must’ve floored it at some point, because when he stopped you probably couldn’t get a piece of paper between our bumpers. On the plus side, there was a cop on a motorcycle right next to him, so there was really no reason for him to assume I’d run a light that was dead red and that we’d had no chance to gear up for going through the intersection anyway. Still, it was scary.

I sent an email to the superintendent of schools today. She talks about transparency and being open and full of information, etc. But she cut off the school emails of all the RIF’d people. (They didn’t do that last year.) So the people who are getting all that information are not the people who are most desperately interested in the budget. So I sent her an email asking her how we’re supposed to be informed about this vital information.

I hate my database class and I’m glad it’s the last week. I’ve learned not to turn in my class evaluation until the last minute because something usually happens after it’s too late. What usually happens is that the lack of information gets caught up. Each team was supposed to have to separate diagrams of use case and something else. Like I understand any of this? Did she say that this was two separate diagrams? So Octavio did the work while I tried to get more information and I thought we had it all. I was going to do the narrative until I found out there was none. The rest of the group — Jack, Akeem, and Corey did nothing. At all. Jack has only contributed once I think. Nothing for weeks four and five. Akeem and Corey didn’t post in our private forum at all this week. So the two of us were responsible for the entire project, Octavio is mad at me, and I can’t wait until this class ends Monday and I can move on to the next one!

Hello!

Yeah, it’s been a week or so since I’ve posted, and I can’t blame school since my teaching part is done! I’ll blame something else as soon as I think of something!

This week I’m taking a course for four days that should help improve student participation and attention, and therefore achievement. Some of what they talked about is stuff that is mandatory at my school, such as posting and talking about objectives, the I Do-We Do-You Do format for lesson plans, etc. It was a lot of fun, and not an excess of just sitting there.

It was hard to figure out where the class was, though. At one point it was supposed to be at a school near me. Well of course, that’s too good to be true! So they moved it to about as far away as you can get and still be in Tucson.

In the meantime, my first week of summer vacation (last week) was spent reading and hanging out. Well, except Friday. Friday was spent hanging out at PEP Boys. My car was leaking radiator fluid, so I went there Friday morning and got there a couple minutes before 9. Early is good — they actually take care of you right away. In theory. I left at 1:30, and in the meantime my guy also installed four new tires on another vehicle and did something else with someone else’s car as well.

Anyway, they found out that the hose was leaking, but then they didn’t have the right replacement hose. They called around and discovered they could order one from a dealer, and it would arrive in a week! Plus it would cost $200, just for the hose! So we bought time instead by taping the thing. My car is very happy now. No more overheating. It’s especially nice to have the coolant work when it’s over a hundred degrees!

I also went to my father’s on Friday and Saturday, and of course went swimming. When the air is that warm, the hot tub doesn’t actually feel all that hot!

My father has been working on a project, and wanted to pull out the photos of the six boys from his 8th grade class photo (see above). I did a great job with cut and paste after scanning the original! I put it into a document with a title on the top, which worked out nicely. It was a nice little project.

Tomorrow starts Week 6 of my Database class for the U of Phoenix. Really, I can’t wait for this one to finish! Only one other person on the team is pulling his share of the load, and one guy totally abdicated. Group work is one of the seven circles of hell. Honest.

Last Day of School

Yesterday was the last day for students! Today I go in to finish up paper work, finish cleaning the room, have it inspected, then go to the gathering at 2:00 that I’m not that sure where it is. But then that’s it! At one point I had 27 kids, but one new one came and some left. Overall (with exceptions!) they were a great group. The leaving fifth graders were all dressed up for their promotion ceremony, and some of those stopped by as well. One of my students is leaving and going to another school next year when she’ll be in full-time GATE instead of just a once a week (at the most) pull-out. Part of that, too, is due to the stupid reading program.

They get a separate SFA report card, but they also have a report card grade. The SFA report card doesn’t go in their cumulative folder, which is a great disservice. Their entire report card grade is based on one test — the quarterly 4-Sight test. Everything else they did during the quarter is irrelevant. And — there’s something wrong with the test. For example, my GATE child above is in the 5.2 reading class and was for most of the year. But she keeps getting 4.1 on the 4-Sight test, which is why her report card grade makes her look average or below average and why mom has to fight with the office every quarter to get her kid put in the right reading class. Finally, I decided to put a note in the comments section so mom can take that to the next school and show them, and it’ll be on her permanent record. It states that the report card grade is just that one test, and that she was in 5.2 for three quarters and scored Meets and Exceeds on her class tests. A child who gets 98% on 5.2 reading tests in class isn’t at a 4.1 level. Sorry.

I did comments for a second child as well. I had her this term in reading, and she’s also in my homeroom. I taught 4.2, and it was obvious that she should have been in at least 5.1. At the end of the quarter, she tested as passing 4.1 and was put in 4.2 again for next year! I had written them a note saying that she should be in 5.2, but again, they went by the bubble test. If a kid gets 100% on tests in which they have to write the answers themselves, that’s much more valid than a bubble test!! So I made a comment on her report card too, about the grade not reflecting her actual reading level. I also told her that if she comes to me at the beginning of the school year, I’ll fight for her to help her get in an appropriate reading class!

Of course, we don’t actually know where I’ll be in the fall. The budget isn’t out yet, so technically I’m still RIF’d.

Tanque Verde Guest Ranch

Last weekend Angela (another 4th grade teacher) and I went to the union’s annual day at the Tanque Verde Guest Ranch. We went last year, but there were some changes this year. This year going for a walk was optional and alone, so it took us a while to figure out where we walked last year! We kept finding roads and paths that led to where people lived — caretakers probably.

Angela signed us up for massages at 9:30, but only one of the massage people came. The guy who was also supposed to come called her at like 11 claiming he’d just woken up. I didn’t hear anything in the news about her killing him, but no doubt she was tempted, since she had to do all of the massages alone! So she was running late, which actually worked out well for Angela and I.

Our massage ended up being an hour into yoga. So let me tell you about my yoga experience. When I think of yoga I think of someone sitting in the lotus position with their hands together. Where the heck did I get that idea??? When describing it to my sister, it turns out that yoga is actually much more like Twister without the spinny thing! OK — here was the worst part. Put this picture in your head: I am on my pink mat, black yoga pants on and Poupon U (Mustard Museum) tee shirt. Both of my hands are flat on the pink mat, and both of my feet, and my back is arched. And then — no lie — the teacher says “Now take your left hand and put it on the outside of your right ankle.” I actually said out loud “WHAT???” Honestly, I was sore for two days!

Angela and I ended up skipping the jazzercise, but we ate from the incredible buffet when it was our turn and we went swimming. Last year we went to the outdoor pool, but this year we were inside. The water wasn’t moving and it was so clear that when we first saw it, it was freaky! We were above it (as in you go in the room and down the stairs to the pool) and looking at it from the window into that room. The water reflected the windows on the other side, so instead of looking like a pool full of water it looked like a hole in the ground with more windows on that level. A deep pit with no way out, since the metal ladder didn’t go very far in! But no, it was a normal pool, and we soaked in the spa as well.

Afterwards I went over to see Dad and Dottie and went swimming! In fact, I didn’t bother to take my bathing suit off when I left the ranch, since I knew I’d be swimming again.

Behind? Me?

So today I uploaded a bunch of photos, going all the way back to when Donna came down last! While she was here, we went to a folk music festival downtown. Parking was not pretty! A parking garage was closed, and an entire empty parking lot was closed. We had quite a hike from where the car was parked, and we only found that after driving around for 20 minutes!

Otherwise, it was a great time, of course! We listened to all kinds of music, saw the eclectic kinds of music/food/culture/things to buy that Tucson is noted for (think 4th Avenue Street Fair).

Tucson Women’s Chorus

a bluegrass band

The pedestrian bridge downtown. Scary. Leads from the twin government office buildings to a colorful plaza area with cute shops.

The building that I watched them build when I’d wait to transfer buses on my way to Pima College. It always fascinates me. It’s also unusual just not in its architecture but height, as most buildings here are not tall at all.

Sick Piggies and Plinko

So far we have no confirmed cases of Swine Flu in our school district or county, but there is a backlog of samples that were sent to the CDC. In the meantime, because of our proximity to the border and the huge number of people in our school district who regularly cross it, the current district viewpoint is that it is inevitable that it will hit at least one school, so they have a plan. The plan includes that school closing for 7-10 days (depending on whether the infected person was an adult or a child). If the person rode a school bus to school, that bus will be taken out of commission for that same time. They haven’t decided if the other schools whose children are also on that bus will be closed, or if we’ll have to make up the time at the end of the year. The school district has set up a Twitter account to keep us informed (just one method). They are following the Twitter account of the county health department. So now I have one to keep updated, as information tends to travel slowly at my school — at least accurate information. The school district email with the protocol also says we should take all of our personal stuff home, as should the students (perhaps since school is nearly over — 13 more student days!). Of course the idea is that if our school is closed, we aren’t wandering about and breathing on the public.

We just finished our annual Family Life Curriculum. Trust me — this is not the highlight of my year. We have videos (we saw 3 this time instead of 2) which seem to create more questions than they answer. It’s a five or six day program. The boys with permission went to another teacher. I kept my girls with permission and five students from other teachers. My students without permission went to another class to work on long division.

The school carnival was last night. (Yes, other schools are cancelling gatherings, whilst we invite the whole neighborhood to cobreathe.) It was a lot of fun once it finally started. It starts at 4:30, but there’s really not a lot of options other than just hanging out from the time we’re allowed to leave school at 3 and the carnival start. Plus toward the end I had to set up, which included hiring kids to help me carry the plinko board. Plinko photo Our board wasn’t quite this cool, but you get the idea.

One of the Kindergarten teachers and I “manned” the booth. Our board was numbered 1-6, and if they got a one or a six they didn’t get a prize, but they did for the rest. They were mostly things like from Oriental Trading Company, and a lot were remarkably annoying and noisy, so quite popular. We also got some fresh fruit for ourselves, which was nice!