8:30pm - Trying to Keep My Eyes Open
What a weekend! I did get more sleep on Saturday, but I could have slept more. Anyways, before I get to all that, I should talk about how school has been going.I started my teaching on a day that we had a supply teacher. It wasn't that he was a bad teacher, in fact, I think the kids like him very much - but as a mentor.. it wasn't a pretty class. Anyways, on Tuesday, things got a bit better as my mentor teacher came back to school. He gave me some pointers which proceeded to make me feel overwhelmed with things I needed to be cautious about. On Wednesday, my mentor teacher was gone again (field trip - I stayed back to teach) so I was supervised by two teachers from the school. The first teacher kept pretty quiet and just did his own thing which was good because it didn't make me feel like I was under the microscope. The 2nd teacher that supervised me sat in the middle of the classroom and watched - YIKES! She's a nice person and I really like her and all, but boy, it was really distracting and intimidating. Anyhow, I realized that day that despite blank and zombish looks from the class, I still needed to get through my stuff and should just plow on through at a more understandable pace (I sped through a couple of lessons). By the end of the week though, things started to get better. I think I started to calm down, plus, I started to get to know the students better.
On Friday, I went to MEC to hunt for a warmer coat. If it's going to be -40C here, I don't know if I'm going to survive walking to and from the bus station with my current coat. ARGH. I am thinking of buying a Gortex shell but since it's so pricey, I'm very hesitant. I did buy a fleece coat though on Friday (and proceeded to wear it immediately - I was really cold on Friday night!!!). We shall see.
After jacket shopping, I went out with my friends to "2nd Floor" Restaurant in China town. It was a send off dinner from one of our Japanese friends Taka.
Saturday was a day that was suppose to be spent sleeping, reading, eating and other general vegging activities. Late in the afternoon, I went on another jacket hunting expedition because some of my friends really enjoy going through outdoor/sports shops and convinced me to go look some more. Anyhow, we ended up at the St. Laurant mall because I wanted to find some more sweaters (notice a pattern in my current shopping expeditions? It's as if I'm preparing to live in the Artic). NO LUCK. Bummer.
To make a long story short, the group of us stayed over night at one friend's place and proceeded to accomplish next to nothing for the following 24 hours. The guys played games (they have a projector at their house), we girls chatted and read books, we all ate and all watched War of the Worlds (Interesting movie). It was really strange though. It was weird waking up that morning and walking downstairs and greeting one another as if 7 of us lived together. It was also very surreal when we went out to dinner. Stepping outside in the fresh air was bizarre because it felt like I hadn't been outside for days on end. It was as if we'd stepped into another universe for 24 hours...
Anyways, today was a pretty good day. Some students said some things to make me believe that they like me! (They like me! They like me!!). One student asked me to go to a certain high school to teach next year because he is going to be attending there.. another students said I was better than the other student teachers. OOO.. I felt so happy. Actually, I'm just happy that they think I can teach and that they like me :) It made my day.
This week should fly by pretty quickly. Tomorrow, I'll be going on a field trip to see Guys and Dolls with some of the classes, on Wednesday, the afternoon will be spent preparing for student led conferences (sort of like parent-teacher interviews except the students present their parents with a portfolio of the work they've been doing), half the day on Thursday will be student led conferences, and there's just a few hours on Friday morning for Professional development! YAY!!!
I'm counting the minutes so that I can go to bed. How pathetic is that?
posted by jaryee @ 5:19 p.m.
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