No Sympathy.

I remember several times during my student career where a teacher would tell the class things like:

• "I'm behind on grading."
  
• "I'm going to have to spend the whole weekend reading your papers."
  
• "I looked all around town to find (x object) for you."
  
• "Do you know how long this took me??"
  

Do you remember teachers telling you things like this? I don't know about your reactions, but when I heard comments like this, I would think things like the following:

• It's your job. Get over it.
  
• After saying up until 2 am writing that paper, I don't really care if you loose some sleep over it, too.
• You can't complain about grading homework that I didn't want to do anyway considering you were the one who assigned it.

I was scrambling this week to get grades caught up. Yes, I was behind in grading. And yes, I actually told this to a couple of classes--but in my defense, it was more to explain why their grades weren't all current when they looked them up, and NOT to ask for their sympathy.

Having been a student myself, I can understand that I won't ever get sympathy from the students. But thinking about the teacher-student relationship, it's no wonder. I mean, teachers are to students...what would be a good analogy? God? We don't just tell students what they have to do, but we pass jugement on how well they do it, too. No wonder it's strange to see your teacher at the grocery store.

Now living life on the teacher side, though, I'm starting to realize that teachers really aren't that scary. We're just people, actually. And it seems to be that it's the ones who care the most who will get involved enough that they take papers home on the weekend or to spend their precious spare time on their students.

Not that that will change anything. Or that it should.

Meditations on eavesdropping and French

So, at the end of April, I was offered a job at a charter school about 25 minutes south of my house. When I first went in to interview for the position, one of the three conducting it made a comment (as she pulled out my resume) about how, "this is the one who does Spanish and French." When the junior high principal called, she said that I would be teaching both.

She also explained that they are on a block schedule, and that I would be teaching A days at the junior high, and B days at the high school (which were not in fact on the same campus--the high school is a 10 minute drive away, and is also not yet completely built). Since she's the junior high principal, it was from her that I eventually found out what my schedule was going to be there: Two classes of French I, one class of French II, and one class of "Study Skills."

It wasn't until I finally emailed the high school vice principal this week that I got to find out my remaining two classes. Since I wasn't signed up for any Spanish at the junior high, I had assumed the high school load would probably be Spanish I classes. But, actually, I will be doing a combined French I and II class, and then a combined French III and IV class.

I was surprised. I'm going to be a French teacher. Somehow, I didn't think I'd ever end up as a French teacher. I started college as a French major, but at some point switched to Spanish Teaching with a minor in French Teaching. I don't remember my reasoning, exactly, but I'm pretty sure that part of it was that I thought Spanish was going to be more marketable. Towards graduation, I actually had a few sad moments where I thought about all the work I've put into French, and how I wouldn't get to use it anywhere.

But it turns out, I'm going to teach French. Huh.

Thinking about Spanish, though, I've had a few moments I'd like to share. I hear a lot more Spanish around me from day to day than I do French. And one of the serious benefits of studying another language is being able to eavesdrop. (That, and being able to have your own secret conversations.) I've heard three interesting comments lately:

1. At the grocery store one day, there was a mom and a couple of kids who I started to notice. A girl was riding on that under-part of the cart, and she was saying, "Para, Mom! ¡Para!" After a few rounds of this, the frustrated mom finally said to her daughter, "I don't know what that means!" to which the girl responded, "Para means stop."

I don't know for sure, of course, but it looked like the girl was enrolled in a dual immersion program and was acquiring Spanish, but her mom didn't know any Spanish. It was an interesting exchange--it made me think of immigrant families, where the kids get English super fast, where they start to grow up as Americans. I imagine their childhood and experiences can be so different from their parents', to the point where their parents might sometimes have to stop and say, "I don't know what that means!"

2. Since graduation in April, I've been on a few trips with my family. We've been out to Sacramento and to San Diego visiting my sisters, as well as to St. Louis. Especially in California, I had my eyes peeled for materials I could use for Spanish classes. I figured places the gift shops of Cabrillo National Monument (commemorating the landing of Spanish explores in 1542) and Sutter's Fort would be great places--the history of some of these places is intertwined with Spanish-speaking people, but also so many Spanish-speaking people live around these places! There's such a huge presence of Latinos in our country, I figured places like these would be considering that by doing things like having materials in Spanish. I could hardly find anything, though.

In the gift shop at the Gateway Arch in St. Louis, I found out I wasn't the only one thinking this way. A native Spanish-speaking couple was there, looking around, browsing the huge selection of books. They were looking for something specific. The wife showed a book to her husband, and he said, "Pero lo quiero en español." But I want it in Spanish.

3. This week I was leaving the gym as a family of Spanish-speakers was coming in. The kids were young. The older sister (who was only maybe seven years old) was directing her younger brother to open the doors for their mom pushing a stroller. "¡Los puertas!" she directed her brother. "¡Los dos puertas!" The doors! she was saying. Both the doors!

I was walking past and I thought, she should be saying "las puertas." Spanish has masculine and feminine nouns, and while the little girl was calling the doors masculine, they're actually feminine. I've been intimidated by the prospect of heritage speakers who might be in my classes. There were a few when I was student teaching, and they made me so nervous. Walking past the little girl, I actually (very) briefly considered turning to her and correcting her: "Las puertas, mija." I didn't, but I walked away thinking, maybe--just maybe--I do have something to offer to those heritage speakers in my classes.

Soneto I

I was going through some papers yesterday and found a sonnet I wrote for a Spanish literature class a few years ago. I had totally forgotten about it, but after I read it I thought it wasn't half bad. So I'm putting it up here. Just as a disclaimer, though: I started learning Spanish in 2005, and wrote this in 2007. There are a couple lines where I'm not even sure what I was saying.

Also, for some context: For about two years, I lived just down the street from Rock Canyon trail head. I would go up there pretty regularly, and got to see the canyon year-round.

Soneto I, o, Hoy fui a caminar en las montañas y vi que las hojas han comenzado a cambiar

17 de septiembre 2007

Cada semana a las montañas he ido

Verano, otoño, inverno, primavera

Buscando el cielo y olor de madera

Las caminatas y el tiempo han fluido.

Hace veinte años ya que yo he vivido—

Este número no cupo cuando era

nuevo en mi boca aunque una cifra es huera.

Mientras las estaciones he subido.

Es el viento que, como un cumpleaños,

cambia; viene otra estación bellida.

Me saciaría tener ochenta años;

Veinte cuatro veces hace una vida.

Sol, nieve blanca, y tiempos extraños

Cada estación es mi preferida.

And because I still think it's clever, here's the same assignment from the equivalent French literature class Well, nearly. Apparently we were assigned to write a poem in a different form and not a sonnet. (Does anyone know what it is? I don't.) Also, this time we were given a topic: food.

I've posted this before--if you've already read it, please ignore.

L’anthropophagie

Le mâle d’araignée survive pas la veuve

Et un têtard (parfois) mangerait son voisin

La version animale ce n’est pas le preuve—

Le cannibalisme, c’est aussi pour l’humain.

En Nouvelle-Guinée, ils ont la pratique

L’expédition Donner, ils l’ont fait dans le froid

Quoiqu’on préfère un cœur, le cerveau, j’explique :

C’est anthropophagie—c’est dangereux, parfois.

If it's not the best job ever, it might come close

One week into French Camp, and here are some of the things I've been paid to do:

• Get lots of practice speaking French

• Go to the opera Béatrice et Bénédict

• Spend a Saturday at 7 Peaks water park going down water slides, synchronized swimming, and listening to girls say how cool it was that all of a sudden they were the exotic foreign language speakers that you run into from time to time. I haven't had that much fun swimming since I was 9.

• Eat camembert, brie, and gruyère

• Spend lots of time with the two friends who happened to be the other counselors

• Live in an apartment where professionals come and clean our bathroom, people drop clean towels off at our door, and where I have a key that opens every door in the building

• Eat ice cream cones

• Pretend to be a snobby art critic at the Museum of Art and then end up discussing the deep meanings of this (which was actually really neat).

• Watch À la folie...pas de tout, Sabrina, TinTin

• Dance along with Claude Francois and les Claudettes (yes, this video is that amazing)

Late-night posting

I feel like it's the last day of summer.

After a month of doing nothing, I'm going off to Provo tomorrow for three weeks to be a counselor for a French camp that the university's putting on for high school students. I'll be teaching a cooking class, as well. When I get back, I'll start working for a day camp at our local rec center.

I've been trying to get things together and going to meetings the last couple of days, and while I'm excited for both jobs, I am also realizing that my retirement vacation is definitely coming to an end. Oh well.

It's probably a good thing, though. Despite ambitious plans and my best intentions, I really didn't get much done when I had all the time in the world. Maybe a little more structure will be good for that.

Also, my Korean melons are doing miserably. Even with my mom's magic green thumb touch, they have hardly grown an inch in the last six weeks or so. They're living, at least. We transplanted them this weekend--hopefully they will grow.

Grow, plants. Grow.

Retirement

When I finished student teaching, it felt like what I imagine retirement to be like: gloriously open days, nowhere to be at seven in the morning, no frantic late nights...

So here's some of what I've been doing with my retirement:

Family
My grandparents, an uncle, and my oldest sister (Emmy) and her family came out for graduation. It was wonderful to see all of them. There was a joint birthday party for my mom, niece, and nephew.
My nephew was really excited about the page of biology notes my dad found at Costco.

A couple weeks later, my parents and I went out to Sacramento for what we thought was going to be my nephew's baby blessing. Instead, it turned out that my sister ended up in the hospital, and I got some bonding time with my sweet 20-month-old niece and newborn nephew. (You can read the whole story and see some battle wounds on Dagny's blog.)

We did have a fun day before the adventures started.

My dad can fly kites! I've never really been successful--even when he got it up and flying like this and handed me the line. I still couldn't keep it up.

Here my niece and I are playing hide-behind-the-door-then-run-out-and-get-tickled. She was sad when we left, which actually made me feel really good.

My mom and I are going out to San Diego tomorrow to get some more time with Emmy, Brad, and their cute kids.

Books
I've had time to read, which has been so nice. A good book makes the gym ten times better, too. Here are some that I've finished since retiring:

When You Are Engulfed in Flames by David Sedaris

I was proud of myself for finally buying David Sedaris' new book. But then I realized the copyright is 2008, and that he's already on tour for his next project. Oh well.

Waiting for the Light to Change by Annette Haws

Our neighbour, Annette Haws, wrote this book. And it's addictive.

El Diario de Greg 3: ¡Esto es el colmo! by Jeff Kinney

Our local library has a tiny Spanish section, but this was fun and quick to read (more satisfying than slogging through Unamuno...). I felt like I was getting a peek inside the head of a 12-ish-year-old. Junior high, here we come.

Surprised by Joy by CS Lewis

This book made me grateful to Civilization 201 for explaining the traditional classical education--CS Lewis got the same schooling that little Roman boys did.

Please Look After Mom by Kyung-sook Kim

I haven't finished this one yet. But I love it.

TV
A friend who also went to Korea on a mission introduced me to the Korean TV show Secret Garden. Again, addictive.

Garden

The other day, I was thinking about how I missed Korean fruit: mandarin oranges, giant pears and huge apples, sweet strawberries, huge chewy grapes that need to be peeled. And this Korean melon, which was one of my favorites.

This lead me to an internet search for Asian seeds. Come August, I should have some lovely melons (hopefully!) along with some Asian-style cucumbers and carrots.

Gradumacation

The alchemy majors all wanted to know how much money they'd be making after graduation. "Just give us an approximate figure," they'd say, and the professor would shake her head and cover her crystal ball with a little cozy given to her by one of her previous classes. When it came to our futures, she drew the line, no matter how hard we begged--and, I mean, we really tried. I was as let down as the next guy, but, in retrospect, I can see that she acted in our best interest. Look at yourself on the day that you graduated from college, then look at yourself today. I did that recently, and it was like, "Yikes! What happened?"

The answer, of course, is life. What the hag chose not to foretell--and what we, in our certainty, could not have fathomed--is that stuff comes up. Weird doors open. People fall into things. Maybe the engineering whiz will wind up brewing cider, not because he has to, but because he finds it challenging. Who knows? Maybe the athlete will bring peace to all nations, or the class moron will go on to become the president of the United States.

--David Sedaris
When You Are Engulfed in Flames
Back Bay Books (2008), p. 78

Before and After (and the return of photos!)

After various technical difficulties and constraints on time, I am once again capable of posting photos on the blog. And what better photos than some before-and-after's. I always loved these--maybe for the same reason that I preferred the Mr. Rogers' episodes where he visited somewhere outside his house and explained how something worked. When he went to the crayon factory, for example. I think behind-the-scenes is endlessly fascinating, and that includes finding out what's under your carpet.

Which leads to the pictures. After a few months of "funky smell" in the basement, my parents pursued it. Long story short, it turns out a heating duct installed under the house had rusted through. A pool of water had collected and grown things, and those things were blowing into the basement.

This precipitated filling in the heater vents with cement, and while they were at it, an update on the basement. So this is what we started with:
And here's the same view without the kitchen cabinets, carpet (I remember tap dancing on that floor when I was little), ceiling:
Drywall and paint:

And at the other side of the basement:

Observing the lives of over-achievers

So the classes I'm teaching for this student-teaching business are all "Honors." I had never heard of Honors Spanish--that kind of thing certainly wasn't around when I was in high school (though I recently saw that my alma mater is in fact now offering Honors language classes). Aside from giving me what is likely poor preparation for classroom management in the real world, I have learned some other things from these classes: namely, what it is to be a high-achiever.

During one class, I asked them to pass in a paper that went with a class activity--just designed to keep them on task, really. If they had something on there, they were going to get full credit. I was hurrying them to hand it in so we could move on, and took the paper of one boy who hadn't finished a couple of questions. "If you didn't finish, don't worry," I was saying. But as I took the paper away from him, he reached out after it, moaning in the Spanish he could muster: "No!!" he said--obviously distressed, reaching towards me the way you see people in movies reach out to a child who is being torn away from them. "Lost points!!" That was the moment I realized the students I was going to be working with were a little different.

I am not one of this crowd--I never was a 4.0er. So I've been learning from these students. Here are two patterns I've noticed about being a school-super-achiever.

1. Every point counts

These students will come to me the next class after I post the grades to an assignment (or, like in one case, send messenger with a note about the grade). Sometimes I post the assignment but don't get to filling in all the grades. This makes them freak out. Anything that could be construed as an error? It get asked about it immediately (like I said, the next class period at the latest). The mentor teacher I'm working with has a policy that they can re-do any assignment, making corrections. How many points would students need to miss to be motivated to keep working on the assignment, you may ask. Well, for some, the difference of one point is enough to go back over it. One point.

2. They advocate for themselves

This is related to the "every-point-counts" policy. A characteristic of these high-achieving students is that they ask. They ask about grades (as noted above). They come in before they miss a class (for, you know, things like out-of-state snowboard and skiing competitions, DECA competitions, debate tournaments, family trips to Germany, etc.) or right after. They raise their hands and ask me to explain again the things they don't understand (and correct the mistakes I make while teaching). They ask to go over the homework if it was particularly difficult. In short, they know how to advocate for themselves in class.

3. They're involved

As noted above, these students are busy and generally stressed out. They are involved in other advanced classes, in clubs, and so on. The Advanced Placement/International Baccalaureate class (which I'm not allowed to teach) has two Sterling Scholars in it. In that and another class, there are a couple of students who have helped organize a rally against climate change. In Spanish 4, one day a girl was carrying an application to Harvard when she came into class. This kind of stuff isn't exactly a secret their success like the other points are. Still, a fair observation about the characteristics of this group.

4. They have family support

One night for homework, students wrote sentences using some grammar form about stuff their parents tell them, I think. I don't remember exactly. One of the students wrote something like: "Get good grades, or your parents will be mad." Another student came in after school briefly. Talking to him, it turns out his parents wanted him to go to this school for the International Baccalaureate program. A couple of students have Spanish language tutors. The parents of these high-achievers obviously have high expectations. I think that really does help them achieve like they do--but that it ads pressure at the same time, of course.

Things that Make Me Happy

So, the last month or so has been stressful. I had no idea it would take up pretty much all my time to come up with lesson plans. It's taxing to be constantly examined as well, constantly getting "feedback." I've had some other odds and ends to work on at BYU, too, and then my computer crashed. It is fixed but still not back to normal...

I was feeling pretty negative about life but decided I need to try to be more positive. So I'm including a few things that have made me happy recently. 

• "Shampoo" by Elvis Perkins. I listen to a lot of music lately. Sometimes loud, and at wee hours of the morning to keep me awake. This song came up on Pandora the other day, and I have been obsessed with it since then. I don't know why. And don't ask me what it means. I don't think that's the point. (Hope it isn't!)

 

• Mates of State. Along the music theme, I discovered this last night from the band. Mates of State is a husband and wife team, they quit their jobs as a cancer researcher and elementary school teacher to be independent rock stars full time. I also took a look at this group's blog last night--I read it every few months or so. It just delights me that one post will be about finishing an album or a big tour, and then the next is about what to do with kids all day when everyone's snowed in or making Halloween costumes. They're a family, and just happen to be rock musicians, too. 

• Reading the good word. Honestly, sometimes it's harder to stay consistent with scripture and gospel study than it is at other times. Lately, it's just been a pleasure to read. Something that's been especially beneficial lately is Richard G. Scott's October 2010 talk "The Transforming Power of Faith and Character."

• Doctor Who. Should I admit this? During last Summer term, one of my roommates convinced me to sit down and watch an episode with her. It took convincing, too--I remember the older version coming on late at night on PBS and it really freaking me out. The newer series have just been fun to watch--though if I do alone late at night with all the lights turned off, I find myself looking over my shoulder when the episode finishes and I walk down the dark hall to bed...

More Machines...

More about technology.

I was hurrying to school this Friday morning. I had stayed up late again but still not quite managed to get everything totally ready. There were still a couple of handouts on my computer. We were going to be reading part of 100 Years of Solitude in Spanish 4 (but the English translation, since I didn't have a copy in Spanish--lucky students), and I had some handouts about background information for them to look at in groups. Apparently my teaching is too teacher-centered. This is frustrating, because I feel like I try to get them to do stuff. Like printing out little bits on the United Fruit Company, magical realism, and the environmental impact of banana plantations in South America for them to read one of these and report to their group about.

This didn't happen, though. I got to school and while they were doing some exercise in partners, I opened up my computer to transfer and print the handouts. The screen looked like a stone, but lit up. I restarted it--same results. My computer...had died.

I took it down to the Apple store when school got out. I pulled out of my bag for the "genius" at the "Genius Bar" at the back of the jam-packed store. The "genius" said, "I haven't seen one of these in awhile." He scanned something and pulled up the purchase date: July 2005. He explained that Apple doesn't service computers that have been discontinued for five years or more, and that I just barely snuck in under the wire.

It's getting shipped off to Kansas or something and should be back in a couple of days with a new graphics card and something else and hard drive. Suck as much life out of it as possible...

Extraordinary Machine

Before I left Korea, I wanted to get a flash drive. Korea has such beautiful electronics--I have pictures of a refrigerator displayed in front of an appliance store, and of the rice cookers from our apartments. I would tell people how beautiful their cell phones were as a way to start a conversation. "There isn't anything like that in the US," I would tell them, and it's true. I came back and found we have smart phones that can do amazing things. But with surprising colors, sparkles and lights, graphics and flower designs, their phones (like their refrigerators and rice cookers) are beautiful.

So I wanted to get a flash drive. These were also cheaper in Korea, and had huge capacities (at least compared to what I had seen...). So when my parents came to get me, we spent some time at Kyobo Book Store, and there, I found a flash drive.

And it is beautiful. It has an 8GB capacity. It is the size of the tip of my thumb, brushed red metal. It came attached to a little string so I could hook it to my cell phone, and a little chain to add it to a keyring. When I hold it, it makes me think of a rosary.

(Is that sacrilegious? Or just geeky?)

I never really had a need for a flash drive until I started student teaching. Going back and forth between my computer and the one in the classroom, I use one now pretty much every day. And at the end of the day, I take it out and stick it in my pocket.

Or, that's what I did until I washed the pants with the Korea flash drive in the pocket this last week. I don't put flash drives in my pocket anymore.

I was sad. Tonight, though, I thought I would just stick it in the computer and see what happens.

And it worked.

So, a lot has happened since my last post. I've been thinking about my blog, and trying to think of significant/interesting/poetic things to write about. I'm just going to summarize what I've been up to since I last wrote.

--I left Provo. This included the following events:
+Finals
+The Provo Tabernacle burning up the day before I left. I kept waking up to helicopters and wondering what on earth was going on.
+Moving furniture six inches out from the wall to check out of the apartment. This was apparently a new part of the check-out process. Items found behind said furniture included used tissues, a necklace, a pocket-sized hymn book, and a framed picture of Joseph Smith. This was BYU, after all.

--Christmas. It was lovely. My sisters and their families were in town, which was the best part. That, and the tee shirt my dad gave me. It has Che Guevara wearing a Che Guevara tee shirt.

--New Years. At this point, it was just me and my parents. We hiked Ensign Peak (I should really include photos...) in the snow, and it was a beautiful way to start the New Year. After this Korean New Years tradition, we proceeded to a family New Years tradition, and went to a movie. We saw The King's Speech. It was excellent.

--I have a new ward.

--I started student teaching.
+For the first two weeks I just observed. This actually wasn't that pleasant. To be honest, I got bored. Plus I didn't know what to do with myself.
+I did some bits of lessons. I lead the reading for my first go at something in front of the class. After, I was convinced they hated me, were bored, and that I probably actually didn't know anything.
+I've started teaching whole classes. Up until this point, I was thinking things like, "So, what is my plan B? I know I've been fixated on becoming a teacher for a few years now, but..." Since I've been teaching more, though, things are better. I really do enjoy it when I'm doing it. I was surprised at how much I care for the students. I was also surprised at how exhausted I was after I taught the whole day today.

--I'm trying to finish the thesis for the Honors program. Mostly, the last little while of working on it has been me wishing I knew more math.