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...