keep on keepin' on

It's officially starting to scare me how fast time is flying by. I was working on our itinerary for Barcelona earlier and when I looked up at the clock I realize an entire hour had gone by in what felt like no more than 5 minutes.

Jeesh!

Yesterday one of the new teachers who will be joining the staff at the international school where I used to work came over and bought a ton of our stuff as she recently moved to Germany for the new job. I sent a list of the items we wanted to sell to HR at the school to send out to new teachers and it worked out really well because this teacher needed a whole lot of stuff. She bought our guest bed, two cabinets, one set of bathroom drawers, the vacuum, hand mixer, iron, and ironing board. We are still trying to get rid of sell some more stuff, but aside from new teachers who just moved here, I don't know a lot of people who are in need of furniture. We get a 40 foot container to move our belongings back to the US, but we are shipping our car in that, so we only really want to bring back the furniture we originally brought with us in order for the car to fit. We are willing to part with most of the IKEA stuff we bought here, but it always sucks to sell stuff for a fraction of the price we paid...

The apartment is starting to look like a disaster zone because in order to sell cabinets, I had to empty them which makes for a lot of piles and bags of stuff sitting around not having a home. I can't stand the clutter and it's starting to stress me out. Not to mention, I can't even vacuum because I sold it. haha. The movers come next week on the 10th, so I only have to endure the clutter for a few more days (since we'll be away this weekend enjoying the sun in Spain). Once our stuff is moved out, we are moving into a different place for our last week here. One of Mr. Sneaker's friends is out of town working for the time being, so we are going to stay at his place.

I just got a new 10 punch card for the gym (which was easier than restarting my membership for just two months). I pay €50 for 10 visits to the gym which isn't awful, but since I got a brand new card on Sunday, I now have to hit the gym daily until we move to the next place because once we are there the gym is too far and I don't have a car. I am really not feeling up for a workout today, but I feel like I should go and make use of my daily punch! Hubs and I are supposed to meet up with a couple from the states who are considering making the move to Germany, so hubs will actually be home early from work today. That gives me about three hours until he is home in which time ideally I would like to workout, shower, and work on my paper. That's not gonna happen.

Ever since we got back I have been off the one a day bandwagon and haven't worked on my paper at all. Major fail! I have been reading a lot and some good ideas are floating around, but I  have just been off and haven't gotten it done. I am going through a phase with the mindset--it will get done when it gets done and I want to enjoy my last few weeks in Europe. But, I know once I get back to OR I have to hit the ground running in order to get ready for school, so I am hoping that I don't fall really far behind. Right now I have six pages, so I feel like I need to at least double that before I go back. Maybe once I get back from Spain I will change my MO to 2 a day....that way I could get 22 pages before I leave in addition to the 6 or so that I already wrote--not bad. There was something really serene about only feeling obligated to write one page a day and that was helpful. Now that I am behind I feel pressured and that makes me feel stuck in a rut.

Anyway, it's time to do something because I can't be lazy all day.

Have you been to Barcelona? Any tips on fun things to see or do would be greatly appreciated!

Vay-cay

Mr. Sneaker and I got back from our trip to Austria and Italy on Friday evening and we have been enjoying a very lazy weekend. I spent the day yesterday doing a lot of laundry after being away for about 10 days and I finally got in a workout after carb loading and indulging in daily gelato. It is so nice to be home and there is nothing better than falling asleep in my own bed, despite the charm of all the cute little hotels we stayed in.

We had such an amazing time touring some new cities and it was wonderful to have so much uninterrupted time with Mr. Sneaker. We are moving back to the states on August 20th, so life is about to get pretty crazy. I am so glad we had time to just have fun together. And, we'll do the same in Barcelona this weekend! 

Best. Summer. Ever. 

The only problem is that it is flying by way too fast. I can't believe it is almost August and school is just around the corner! I am really excited to embark on my second year as a Kindergarten teacher, but with organizing, packing, moving, paper writing, and settling in a temporary place in Portland once we return--there is just a lot on my mind! 

So vacations are nice for some happy denial time.

Here's a short recap of our trip...

Destination 1: Salzburg, Austria

What we did/saw:

Eagle's Nest

Sound of Music Tour

Hohensalzburg Fortress

After enjoying the Sound of Music Tour in Salzburg, Austria, we posed for a picture with Tuc Watkins who plays Bob on Desperate Housewives. My eagle eye spotted him as soon as I got on the tour bus and hubs and I had fun sneaking peaks as we visited all the famous spots from the movie. The tour was great, but meeting Tuc was really fun. Mr. Sneaker was super cool and chatty and I was a little starstruck. 

Have you ever met a celebrity? What did you say?

 I am sixteen going on seventeen...

 Von Trapp house

Church where Captain Von Trapp and Maria got married.

 I don't actually remember the children dancing in the garden with these guys in the movie, but we had some fun posing with them and imitating their actions.

 We also took in some amazing views at the Eagle's Nest.

Destination 2: Venice

What we did/saw:

St. Mark's Square

St. Mark's Basilica

Correr Museum

Doge's Palace

Gondola Ride

Murano Island

 

We took a water taxi to another island called Murano where they make amazing blown glass. They had tons of little shops selling all kinds of glass creations. I got two rings and a necklace (which I am wearing in the picture). I think I have one of the rings on too, but you can't really see it. 

 Riding the gondola was so fun and romantic. It wasn't cheap, but well worth it and a must do when visiting Venice.

Destination 3: Verona

What we did/saw:

Teatro Romano (from the outside)

Nutella gelato (am. a. zing!)

On the way to Bellagio, we stopped in Verona, which is the city that inspired Romeo and Juliet. We had lunch while we were there, had the best gelato of the trip and walked around a little bit. Juliet's house is one of the big tourist attractions there, but we really didn't stay long and didn't see much.

a rose by any other name...

Destination 4: Bellagio, Italy (Lake Como)

What we did:

ate 

slept

ate

slept

read

Once we got to Bellagio, we pretty much did a whole lot of nothing--unless of course you count eating, sleeping, and relaxing. It was the perfect way to end our trip. The view from the room was supreme and the food was yummy!

 Quality resting and reading time.

I slept a lot on the way home, but we did see some beautiful sights when we drove through Switzerland. 

Now, it's time to kick my butt into gear and make up a lot of missed time on paper writing! Tomorrow is going to be intense!

Pure Bliss

Hello bloggy friends! I am posting from the very beautiful Hotel Bellagio in Bellagio, Italy and I couldn't be happier or more relaxed. Mr. Sneaker and I spent a few days in Venice but we didn't have Internet in the room and for some reason my iPad wouldn't connect to the wifi in the lounge, so I wasn't able to post from there. We had a lovely time seeing the sights, eating delicious food, and riding water taxis and a gondola. I have tons of pics, but I will have to wait and post them when we get back this weekend.

So far we have been pretty lazy in Bellagio, but that's what vacations are for, right? I enjoy sightseeing and learning about new cultures and places, but I also like to just chill and hang out sometimes. And relaxing is good for me because I had some good classroom ideas and ideas for my paper.

I was thinking about what to do with the kiddos during ELD time this year which is when some of the kiddos are pulled out for English Language Development. We have strict rules about what we are not allowed to do during that time--basically we are not allowed to teach anything new that those children will miss, which I completely understand and agree with, but at the same time with our very short day, we want to use all the minutes we have, so that time of day is always difficult. Anything I do with the remaining kids, I wish I could do with all the kids...we are allowed to practice skills, review, etc., so last year I did a mixture of things. I had high hopes of activity stations, which started out as choice time, but then I felt like I wanted more structure during that time.

This year, I know I want to be more organized with the use of this 30 minute chunk of time. So I came up with what seems like a reasonable routine.

Math Mondays-I will have the kiddos work on the great Marcy Cook math tile games that I have. They are individualized and awesome. The kids love them and they are great for math practice.

Travel Tuesdays-going with my love of travel on this theme, I want to make each child a little passport to use as they circulate three table activities. Upon completion of each station, they will get a stamp on their weekly passport page. I am hoping to put together some activity boxes that will be easy to just set out each week. I will train the kiddos on what to do, so I will be free to circulate around. I was thinking of a reading station where I would include the leveled readers that go with out reading program and additional books as the kids get more proficient in reading. I will include some stuffed animals, whisper phones, and fun glasses, and silly fingers/pointers so the kids can practice reading to themselves, whisper read, read to a stuffed friend, and then read to me. I was thinking of having another station be the sight word station where the kiddos will make the sight word with wikki sticks, write the words in sand or salt, form the word with stamps, and maybe even some fun art supplies like pom poms or colored tiles. I am not sure what the final station will be, but probably something more art related or science related.

Words on Wednesdays-On this day I will have the kids work on picture and word sorts from Words Their Way. I will start the year with picture sorts and then move on to the initial sound sorts. I think I will start by precutting the pictures, but eventually I'd like the kids to cut, sort, and glue their sort. When they get really good, I would love to see them write how they sorted or at least tell me so I can write it.

Thoughtful Thursdays- I think this will be my favorite day of the week. We are allowed to do our Second Steps lessons during ELD, as if certain kids don't need to learn social skills, so on these days I would like to read some stories that make us think. I don't want the other kiddos to miss out, so possibly this will be a time to re-read and extend certain stories. Also, I want to focus some energy on doing kind things for others during this time. Maybe we will write letters or draw pictures for loved ones, make coupons for nice things we can do for friends or family, or brainstorm helpful things we can do around school. I would love to do some service learning with the kids this year, but I haven't thought that throuh yet.

Flexible Friday- This day will be for catching up, finishing other projects from the week, assessing, etc.

I feel like I have a lot to do in order to make this plan work, but I am so excited for it...especially the passports.

It's almost time for a yummy pizza dinner, but stay tuned for pictures later in the week!

Sneaker Teacher Loves Shoes!

Quick post from Austria as I am enjoying The Sound of Music in our hotel room. Mrs. Tabb from Just Another Day in First Grade is doing a giveaway on a unit all about shoes! At the Sneaker household we are all about fun shoes, so I was in love when I saw Mrs. Tabb's cute work. She is giving the unit away for free to anyone who posts about it. Check it out! I am not able to link up directly to her site since I am on my iPad and it's giving me some issues when I try to cut and paste the link, but if you look in my blog roll you will find her! This unit looks like it will be great for working on sorting and comparing and contrasting with my kiddos.

Road Trip!

Hubs and I are leaving tomorrow for a little road trip and I am super excited. I never travel without my iPad so hopefully I will put up some posts while we are away. Most likely they won't be too teachery, but I think you'll forgive me for that. I should change the name of this blog to Travel Teacher because I talk about teaching and traveling a lot more than I talk about teaching and fitness these days. Oh well, travel talk is fun!

Maybe I will post a nice darling video of myself singing a little do re mi during the Sound of Music Tour. Not really, since I do want you to come back!

I am happy to share that I have stuck to my one page per day writing goal and I actually have moved onto my sixth page in just three days. Once I start writing, it's a lot easier to fill the pages and get it done, but for some reason, it is SO hard start when I am facing a completely blank page. I sent my work so far off to a few friends from class for their feedback and it was hard to share my work when it is still so rough. The ultimate challenge would be to post it here, but that is a lot scarier than sharing it with a few people from class. I really struggled with organizing my ideas into an outline and I know at some point that will bite me, but for now I am just freely writing and letting it all spill out. When it comes time to edit, I will be more critical, but for now, I am just getting it out.

If we have internet, I will stay in the bloggy loop, but if not, I'll check ya later!

Discuss

You all know Pioneer Woman, right? If you don't, I highly recommend checking out her very multifaceted blog and I highly recommend her recipe for sangria! She is pretty much a Jack Jane of all trades and has mad cooking skills as evidenced here. Today her blog featured a guest post from a woman by the name of Kristen Chase called Does School Help or Hurt Intellectual Growth referencing this article...

 

which starts off with this quote...

Here are some excerpts:

I tried to pull out some of the really catching ideas presented in the article, but if you are interested to read the whole thing (please do!) you can find the entire text here. 

Thoughts?

I have mixed feelings when it comes to people who criticize the education that takes place in schools. On the one hand, as a teacher, I definitely recognize areas of our current educational system that need improvement. I am focusing my doctoral work and my current specialty paper on culturally responsive instruction and what we can do to meet the needs of culturally and linguistic learners, especially in the context of being given a scripted program as if the preselected stories and images can possibly apply to all children and their unique experiences. I frequently wish that I could simply close my door and teach my students in the manner that I know is more appropriate, yet there is another side to the coin. 

When I read or hear remarks from people who speak negatively of what happens in schools, I start feeling very defensive because I know that teachers work incredibly hard to do the very best we can for our students, working with the day in and day out to help them succeed and often feeling like they belong to us and we are solely responsible for their very well being. We bust out butts in our work and we are skilled at what we do. 

We do the best we can with what we have.

Yes, I want my students to be creative.

Yes, I want my students to be critical thinkers and problem solvers.

Yes, I want my students to be kind people with strong character and work ethic.

Yes, I want my students to navigate different situations and interact with each other.

And guess what... those things happen in my classroom.

Despite the mandates to use a teacher manual to teach Phonics and Math, my students are not simply robots. Sure, I would love to have more freedom to teach in different ways and yes, I do feel restrained by the requirements for a particular number of minutes on each subject and the very tightly packed schedule that we have in half day Kindergarten, but I definitely think that my students benefit my being in my classroom. They grow as people and as learners and I hate that despite who we are as individuals we have a bad rap for stifling creativity and squashing dreams.

This whole topic is exactly what fuels me in my dissertation work because I agree that we have to change and we have to do more to navigate American education in a new direction. I very much agree with the article's author about types of activities and thinking kids should be doing and I try my darndest to include those things in what we do and what I teach so that children experience education in my classroom in a way that opens them up to a world of learning and experiences. 

I want more of those experiences for my students so perhaps a little of my own creative disobedience is in order, but it's difficult because it feels like going with my beliefs results in being a rule breaker....kind of like Kristen says in her post. This article was really interesting to me and I hope you read both Kristen's post on Pioneer Woman and the article. Here are the links one more time...

Kristen's Post

The Educational Value of Creative Disobedience

What are your thoughts on the article or the bits I pulled out?

What do you do with your students to encourage creativity and critical thinking?

How much freedom do you have to teach how/what you want?

Discuss!