Upcoming Weekend & A look Back

Well, I know I still haven't posted about the STW TEC#43 weekend that I led over Martin Luther King Jr. weekend... But I'm actually still trying to process all of the amazing things that happened throughout the weekend. And come to terms with the fact that I won't be participating in the weekends for a while...

I will say this: TEC #43 was amazing. In so many ways.
And, once I can put down what I'm feeling into words, I will post about it, because I feel that I need to get it on here, and I know that some people that actually read this would be interested to hear about it.

Until then, here's my life:

School is insane. I thought 4 classes would be a breeze, but there's so much to do! And oh, so little time! But I'm making it... It is after all ONLY the 3rd week of classes. And not to mention the FIRST FULL WEEK!

Aside from school, everything is pretty much the same... Oh, except I did turn 26 years old last Saturday the 21st! And it wasn't nearly as painful as 25... but talk to me again with the 3-0 comes and I'm positive my reaction will be different. It was a very quiet weekend, spent with friends that I love. And my family.

This coming weekend... I head home to Wilmington tomorrow. Friday afternoon I'll be heading to Kure Beach for BAG Lady Retreat! And before anything is said about the 'bag lady' BAG stands for Blessed And Gifted! I went to my first BAG Lady weekend last year in January and LOVED every minute of it. So I'm VERY excited to be going again this year!

Other than that, I think that's all I've got going on. I'll post soon about TEC... perhaps the Spirit will move me this weekend with words that I can put down on this blog... And I'll be with one wonderful woman who was at the same TEC weekend with me... Maybe she can help me out! :)

Spring Semester: 2012

Classes have started here at UNC Pembroke, and the semester is off and running- FULL SPEED AHEAD.

I am lucky to have only 13 credit hours, which breaks down to 4 classes this semester. I have 3 education classes, and one history. Here's the breakdown...
ELE 2030- Arts Integration for Elementary Schools (involves music, art, drama, dance...etc.)
ELE 4030- Living in a Global Society (this is basically how to teach elementary Social Studies)
EDN 2900- Research and Writing for Education (resumes, grants, research, blogs!, etc)
HST 4300- The History of Nazi Germany (wait for it.... I AM SO EXCITED!)

Okay, yes, my education classes won't be too crazy this semester, and I don't have too heavy of a work load.. but can I just tell you all how genuinely excited I am about that Nazi Germany history class? I LOVE that time period in history. And not even from the American standpoint, but from that of Germany. So many things were going on during that time, and yes, most of the things that happened were terrible, but it's always interested me. Perhaps because my Daddy loved World War II and had hundreds (yes, hundreds) of books about WWII, Hitler, the SS, etc. My teacher today called the History Channel the "Hitler" Channel. (it was a great joke in the class..) and it's true! Half of what comes on the history channel is about Hitler, the war, Holocaust, or the Third Reich.

So, yes, I'm actually excited for this semester. I'm in education classes with people I don't know that well, (except for Mary) because all of my closest friends are doing their internship student teaching this semester. That is going to take sometime to get used to. It's hard to go into the curriculum lab in the education building and not see 10 people you know. Or be able to complain about a teacher or an assignment to someone that actually understands it.

As far as everything else in my life...
This Friday I'll be leaving for Fuquay-Varina for my last TEC weekend until after I graduate and have a job. STW TEC#43 is going to be amazing. There are so many youth on team, as well as adults, that have dedicated the past 4 months to making preparations for this weekend. And I can NOT wait until I get to see this weekend start rolling into action! I'll be sure to post about that once I'm back... I believe I've mentioned TEC on this blog before and how much of my life I've spent doing TEC weekends and all that. But just to reiterate my point, TEC changed my life 11.5 years ago, and I will never really be able to let it go. Which is why I'm calling my absence from the next few team a hiatus... meaning, I will be back. Once a public school system decides to hire me. :)

That's all I've got for now...

A whole new year! And lots of Catch-up

Well.. I've got a TON of catching up to do... 
-Fall semester was crazy, stressful, wonderful, stressful, and CRAZY and it's over and I made WONDERFUL grades! :)
-I got to spend A LOT of time with friends and family that I LOVE over the 4 weeks I was home on break. 
-Jeremy came home on leave from Pensacola... He's been in my life for over 10 years and has always been one of the best friends I could ever ask for. Over the course of him being on leave this go around we decided that something had changed with our friendship and we saw each other in a different way... So... We're trying this relationship thing out and see how it goes. :) So far so good... but then again we're 12 hours away from each other.. Me in NC and him in FL. Apparently this has been a long time coming in his eyes, and I just happened to be in the right place and time in my life to welcome this in. I'm happy. He's happy. Hopefully you'll be happy for us. 
-New Year's Eve was a doozy... I had a little too much fun, but it was a great night spent with some lovely people listening to Wilmington's "Machine Gun" Band at Wild Wing Cafe! Machine Gun is an amazing 80's/90's cover band and also writes their own music... and I have the pleasure of knowing 3 out of 4 of their members thanks to Cousin Marcus! 
-I came back to Lumberton this past Thursday night and began to unpack and re-organize everything... that's currently at a standstill because I can't actually get organized until I go purchase my books for school which I'm going to do tomorrow... but all of my clothes are hanging in my closet and my Keruig Coffee Machine is sitting nicely in my kitchen! 
-I got a Beta fish! I've had several Beta's in the past... Duke, Daisy, and Sheldon were wonderful fish. (Duke- named for Duke Blue Devil's- Sheldon was named for former Duke basketball player Sheldon Williams, and Daisy started out as JJ as in JJ Riddick but became Daisy after I realized it was a boy fish..) So following in my Duke Basketball theme kick... This lovely crowntail beta is a purple-ly color and looks like a PLUM... so her/his name is Plumlee! For the Plumlee brothers (Miles, Mason, and Marshall). 
-Last TEC meeting for STW TEC#43 is THIS SATURDAY! and I'm so excited for the upcoming weekend Starting January 13! 


Okay. That's it for now. I'll post again about classes and such once I get that going on Monday! LAST SEMESTER OF CLASSES!!! Next fall semester I'll be at Peterson Elementary in Red Springs doing my internship! 

Post Mid terms

Now that midterms are over and the semester is coming to a close (very quickly, might I add) I thought that I would perhaps update all you lovely people (or 4) that read this. (5, including my mom).

Midterms= almost as terrible as final exam week. Except that this semester midterms for me stretched over 2 weeks and were incredibly hard and tedious.

I just started my field experience for this semester at Pembroke Elementary. It's literally half a mile from campus, so the days that I go to observe/teach I head back over to campus for a few hours and catch up on work or go to class. I was really happy with that placement. And not to mention the teacher that I have is amazing and is making me realize that 1st grade is fun... and very challenging. I'm currently working with a small group of girls that are extremely far behind (that's putting it mildly and nicely). But I can't say how rewarding it was to go into the class today and have those girls practically fighting with the other kids because they couldn't wait to work with me.

Or the accomplishment and smile from one of my girls when they sounded out a word, without my help, and pronounced it the right way and remembered it 5 minutes later. (It's truly the little things in a teacher's life that make the biggest difference).

Tomorrow night is a HUGE night for those of us in Math&Science 2 ... It's Family Math Night at Union Elementary! We're in groups and we've based our night on a trip around the world and the students and parents will get a passport when they arrive and will travel to the 7 continents and the different continents will all focus on a different math skill. Needless to say we're all VERY ready for this to start tomorrow and for it to go well and to be over with!

And... the best news as of today is that I register for my LAST SEMESTER OF CLASSES on Monday!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (Insert huge sigh of relief... HERE).

I'll be taking 13 hours next semester, and NO summer school!!!! Then I'll be starting my internship (student teaching) next August! And then, Graduation HERE I COME. It seems so far in the future in some ways... but in other ways, I feel like it's happening tomorrow.

Anyway, that's all for now. I'm off to bed. I've got a super long and busy day tomorrow!

Okay, so maybe I am old...

Today, I realized that I'm old. I know that I'm not OLD... as in like 85 and all that... but compared to my much younger classmates in the elementary education program... I'm old. 

Let me back this up... I am one of those people that writes everything out by hand, and THEN I type it up on the computer. I've always been like that. Perhaps one day I'll get crazy and actually type something out right... but just the actual thought of doing that, makes me crazy.

So today, a group of lovely ELE-M students were in the curriculum lab in the education building (our home away from home) and I was working on my children's literature annotated bibliographies for literacy and language arts class and my lovely Lauren was working on her management philosophy. Naturally, I had written out the titles, authors, summaries, age levels, Lexile scores, the common core standards and how I would use that particular book ALL by hand and I was simply typing everything into the blog site for the assignment... 

Lauren had asked me once already why I was doing that... so I said "Just because it makes me feel better and it's just something I've always done." 

Later, Lauren asked me again, why in the HELL was I doing double the work. 

So I said... Look... I didn't grow up with a computer in front of me that was always there ready for me to type on. Lauren thought I said I grew up with a type writer. To which I threw my pen at her (I'm not that old). So I continued to explain to her the situation...

I didn't have a computer in my house until I was in the  6th grade. And, even then, my FATHER was the ONLY ONE who used it. I went to Wrightsboro Elementary School where ALL the computers in 2nd grade were funny looking boxes and had a black screen with green writing and to do ANYTHING you had to type in the codes for it. (i.e., a://whateveryouwanttodo). After the green screens, they upgraded to the lovely Apple. So I spent the rest of my years at Wrightsboro Leaning the basic computer functions on a Mac and playing more games of Number Munchers than anyone probably should have..... When I went to middle school, we had Macs. My Dad finally let me learn how to use the computer at our house, with his supervision. I went to high school and discovered the world of Microsoft Word, and Excel. Excel being my one true enemy in life... I didn't do a power point presentation until I was a FRESHMAN in COLLEGE at UNC Greensboro. 

So. Needless to say, when I wanted to write something for school. I WROTE IT OUT ON PAPER USING A PENCIL OR A PEN. 

AND... 9 times out of 10, it was in cursive handwriting and not print. Which explains why I constantly slip into cursive while I'm trying to write in print. 

So today, I realized that I was old. Even the 5 year difference between my friends and I at school is a HUGE almost 50 year gap in the world of technology. So I'm going to continue writing things out by hand... 

Interestingly enough, this blog is the only thing I type right when I want to. Mainly because this is all about my life and my feelings... and all that.. :) 

Explanation

That last post is going to sound weird to some of you without an explanation. To my mom and Dora Potts, it won't be weird. Because they're teachers, and they'll understand. (Yes, I said teachers. As in present tense, because Dora, you are still a teacher, and mom- you'll ALWAYS be a teacher).

So, I joined the NCAEE (North Carolina Association of Elementary Educators) a while ago and then found out that their annual conference was going to be in Raleigh the same weekend that I was going to be in Raleigh for some TEC stuff. So, I asked my wonderful mother if I could go (aka, will you pay for it, and the hotel?) and she said yes. Although I did have to say, "Mom, Ron Clark is going to be speaking there. I have to go. I HAVE TO." But I didn't throw a fit, so at least I spared her from that :)

Anyway, I ended up at this conference. At 1pm today (Sunday) Ron Clark bounded through the conference hall and lept onto the stage and proceeded to talk to us for the next hour and a half. And he didn't just stand that. He bounced around, practically flew through the audience and kept us laughing and sometimes almost crying the entire time.

So the previous post was a thank you of sorts to Ron Clark for what I learned today, and what I saw in his movie. Another day at the conference tomorrow, then back to Lumberton for my recent american history midterm... Classes Tuesday, and then home for fall break.

Although... I'm not sure that my professors realized that it IS actually Fall break because I seem to have more work than a break should really require. :)

Dear Ron Clark...

Dear Ron Clark,
Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for being the absolutely amazing and inspiring educator that you are. Your keynote speech today was by far the most inspiring, intense, high energy, and slightly crazy (which I loved) talks that I have ever, ever heard. I'll admit that I didn't know much about you until this semester. I knew that you were a great educator, and that you had won many awards, but I was totally unaware of your story. For my Classroom Management class, I was assigned the movie "The Ron Clark Story" at random for a video critique that was part of an assignment. We had to watch the movie and answer questions and share our opinion on how it related to education, what aspects of classroom management we would like to one day implement, and what about the movie (story) made us (the students at UNCP) want to be better educators. I have to admit that I was more excited about the movie because of the star that portrayed you, than I was about hearing your story. You see, I have a huge obsession with FRIENDS... and adore Matthew Perry. However, it only took the first 30 seconds for the words "Aurora, North Carolina" to appear on the screen before I knew that I was going to like this movie. I, am also from North Carolina. Wilmington, to be specific. You're story is very inspiring, and while I'm sure that you hear this quite often, it really struck a chord within my teacher's heart. I've known that I wanted to be a teacher since I was little. I loved playing "teacher" with friends and family. And, I'm the daughter of a teacher. My mom taught 4th grade for 31 years (and if I end up half the teacher that she was, I'll be blessed). I have a soft spot for children in my heart. I want to help them. I want to love them. I want to teach and instill in them knowledge and common respect that will prepare them for the rest of their lives. What got to me most about your story, was the fact that you never gave up on those students. Ever. No matter how hard it seemed... You were always there for them. They knew that you loved them and that is why they began to trust you.
Today at the NCAEE conference, my eyes were opened even farther by the way you spoke of the Ron Clark Academy. I left that conference room wanting to become a teacher even more...wanting to have the chance to come to your school and be trained with your teacher educator program.
What I'm trying to say, Mr. Clark, is that  you are amazing. You have inspired so many teachers and not just in North Carolina (but let's be honest, NC teacher's are the best) but also all over the world. Kids WANT to come to school because of your rules and the way you conduct your class.
I only hope that one day, more schools will be filled with children wanting to learn and teacher's dancing on tables and rapping with their students. And that one day, there will be a Smithfield's BBQ and Bojangles next to each other in Atlanta.

Sincerely,
Kara Greer
Aspiring Educator, wanting to one day make a difference