Sometimes, I think that it would be easier to just give in and start the cat collection... of course, I probably wouldn't be able to leave my knitting or yarn out???

I found this on the Internet.   I'm amazed that they are all 'still in the box' much less facing the same direction for a photo. 

I lost my voice on Sunday.  I kept teaching and it was very difficult to do with a voice that barely made a sound... most of the time.   I woke up on Wednesday with fever.   So, even though I am totally out of sick days-- I decided that I was finally "SICK ENOUGH" to stay home today with no pay for the day (Thursday) and rest my voice and try not to get more ill.   I don't want to get pneumonia like I used to get every winter.


Hope my voice works better tomorrow. 

Furlough deadline is looming

 Wonder if it will be resolved at the last minute or????

The work week... we all know it well...

 You hope your work week goes like the first sculpture... serene, peaceful, plenty of time to get everything done...  however, as we all know... it usually goes more like the last photo.   Counting the days/hours/and thinking... Another MEETING?

Feeling the need to recycle some newspaper?

Make a mummy!

I started my Elementary art students on this project when we returned from Spring Break in April. It took them 6 weeks+ to complete the project. I think that they did a great job. However, it would have also been nice to have had the student's hard work acknowledged by someone at the school.

It's been one of those days...

Sigh.. sigh... sigh... Last day of school is June 12 and I can't wait.

I teach art to 700 students per week. We have a full schedule; as a matter of fact we have 31 classes that we teach each week in a 30 class schedule. How do we do have this ability to teach an extra class where no extra period is available? One class doesn't come to our classes at all- instead 4-6 of her students are divided each day to go to different specials. Art, Music, PE, and Host Nation. So, as a result.. we teach much larger class sizes for that particular grade level.

Yesterday, I got an email from one of the classroom teachers.. informing me that she was going to come to art at a different time.. (in a morning 2nd grade time slot instead of her own scheduled time slot in the late afternoon ) because she was going to be gone on a 1/2 day field trip and as a result would miss getting a planning period. Not a big problem, but.. wouldn't it have been nice to ask me if it was this change was OK with me.. instead of just telling me that you are doing it? I know for a fact that she wouldn't like her schedule changed around without her permission. I mean common sense tells you to ask about it, right?

I sent an email to both principals today... explaining that this is going on and to please put a stop to it- before other grades start doing this in the future. At all of the other schools that I've been to- if you miss because of an activity or whatever.. you MISS. There is no changing around of the schedule. Sigh

Soon, the 'schedule changing teacher' emails me.. and tries to make it that "I'M THE ONE WITH THE PROBLEM.. that she didn't know that this would cause me such STRESS and be SUCH A BURDEN for me. (please) Double sigh.. I again stated.. that it would have been nice to clear it with me- instead of 'just changing my schedule' and then tell me about it after the fact. On and on... I got a few emails from her.. about this.. on and on... Never once understanding that it is not OK to change someone's schedule to suit your needs and then just tell them about it. *There's more to this story- but, I won't go into it here.

I really like the location where I am... but, there are many factors like this that make the job not so good. I have never seen such petty 'minute counting' and division. We large group specialists just seem to be at the bottom of the list of importance too. It's sad really- since, it was a brand new formed school in a brand new building... such hope and promise. I have very little art materials to work with- the least that I've ever had at any school. My supplies came from a school that closed and I'm not sure what happened- but, apparently most didn't make it to me or maybe some of it was thrown away? I've done the best that I can with limited supplies.


Anyway, I know that my readers... must be ready for one of my lighthearted stories instead? I know that I am.

Today, I was on my daily 20 minute playground duty (all large group specialists have to do this- don't get me started on why this isn't fair for us only to do- when small group specialists don't have to help do this or even rotate into this schedule)

anyway... this little girl (2nd grade) comes up to me sobbing... "See those boys running away?" I nod yes. She then proceeds to tell me that they are trying to crush her snail. I said, "A toy snail?" She sobbed.. "No..." I then asked what kind of snail it was. She continued to sob, face all scrunched... "I found it on the ground at my house and I had it in my pocket."

Yes.. eeeooow.. she had one of those nasty garden snails that eat my flowers in her pocket! I suggested that she keep the snail in her pocket until she got home, so no one would know that she had a snail. ... so, it would be safe. At least they are loved by someone.

Just another day on the playground.

IS running into a detour and not knowing how to get to work

any other way... an valid excuse to miss work?

Ring, ring... (pretending that I have my cell phone charged, with me, and have put in my work phone number)

"Hello work?" "Yes, this is: iwouldratherbeknitting.... and I was on my way to work and saw this sign in German... you do remember that I can't read German, right?"

"Well, I finally figured out that the word must have meant DETOUR." "Oh, no.. I'm a pretty quick study.. the road lane barrier was a dead give away." "Ok, the second road lane barrier was the dead give away."

"ANYWAY, this UNEXPECTED detour in the early morning darkness... on a major road- blocked off the ONLY TWO ways that I know how to get to work."

"I just wanted you to know that I don't know where I am... but, I hope that I'm not on the CEZCH border." "No, I don't think that I've gone as far as Northern Italy- I don't see the Italian Alps anywhere." "Yes, if I get as far as Italy.. I will buy a wheel of real parmesan cheese and we'll split it."

"Oh, wait.. my cell phone is dying... I hope that I'll be at work tomorrow... if I can make it home that is. And, my sub plans are........."

First Day of School

Teaching the students that is... I'd already been working in my room the past month- my newly formed school in a brand new building-- was sent supplies from a couple of schools that closed in June.

This is the way that my classroom looked:




I opened up over 150 boxes... all full of a variety of supplies... including some items that did not belong in my classroom and it took several all day long days of unpacking items-- which wasn't easy w/ torn tendons in my hand.

SHHHh, don't tell my hand surgeon that I was unpacking boxes full of school supplies- and picking up items from the boxes and then finally to the shelves and cabinets once everything was unpacked.

I told him that I'd very careful with my hand and I will be more in the future... of course, my hand let me know when I over-did it too..

AND.. my movers will bring my household goods to my new house soon... and they'll need to be unpacked too. Oh well... it has to be done.

Eventually, it looked like a classroom. *I'll try to remember to take a photo and post it here.


Today was very busy and went pretty well. However, I'm sure that by Friday-- we'll all be tired... teachers and the students. lol

Sigh... some days it doesn't pay to get out of bed.. or go to bed??

My 1973 VW Karmann Ghia has been sick... sputtering, dying at traffic lights, and backfiring. So, either my car needed some sort of mechanical adjustment or I needed to contact the National Enquirer to report the first recorded case of a car getting bronchitis.

So, the plan was to get up super early, 5:00am and drive to work in the 'less traffic-y' time of *o'dark 30.. or 5:45am I usually get up at 5:50 and depart for work at 6:50am. The less cars in traffic = the less 'danger' to me and my car, if my car did decide to die or sputter on the way to work.

So, despite not getting enough sleep for the past 3 nights, I set my battery operated timer for 5:00am, instead of changing the electrical alarm clock for the earlier wake-up time. I went to bed about 11:30pm.

Well, as you can imagine, when the alarm jarred me awake, it was just way too early for my body. I managed to crawl out of bed, wash my face, and before hitting the shower, I went into the living room to check my email messages. To stay on schedule, I set my kitchen timer for 8 minutes of computer time. I couldn't believe how sleepy I was and as I wandered towards the kitchen, I decided to get some cold water to drink.

I went back into the bedroom to get my morning meds to take with my water and I noticed that my actual alarm clock was doing the 'repeating flashing numbers' announcement to let me know that the time had gone off during the night. I was really glad that I had decided to use my battery timer instead of relying on my alarm clock.

With the timer set, I went back into the living room and looked out my apartment window onto the building closest to my apartment building and saw that only 3 people were up early like I was.

After using the computer for a few minutes and just as the timer rang, I decided to go into the control panel on my computer to change the time back to "SEOUL, KOREA" time instead of the central standard time zone that was currently on my computer- that I'd changed it to when I did the 'knitting bag' contest last week on my blog.

Imagine my surprise when the computer clock told me that it was 1:08 AM!

YES, I had set my alarm clock wrong. So, I re-set it for 4 hours later on my kitchen timer so that it would now ring at 5:08am. And, I groggily and gratefully crawled back into bed.

As you can imagine, the buzzer sounded in what seemed like minutes.. I pressed the STOP BUTTON to stop the 'buzzing' of the timer
and once again, I crawled out of bed. Went to the bathroom to wash my face, and gathered up my clothes. I was so tired and I was really regretting staying up until almost 1am for the past 3 nights.


I decided that since, I don't drink coffee-- but, since I was so exhausted and groggy, I clearly needed some caffeine- I decided that I needed to do something to help me stay awake and went into the kitchen to pour myself a Dr. Pepper on ice. It was either that or set the alarm for another 50 minutes and forget the plan of getting up at 5am to get the car on base before the traffic got heavy.

Since, I was still so tired and one tends to move a little slower when you get up much earlier than usual, I decided to set my timer so that I'd depart my apartment on time and I noticed that the timer STILL HAD 2 hours and 8 minutes left on the timer!!! . and that the BUZZER had NOT buzzed yet. I still had 2 more hours to sleep! Yes, I had 'DREAMED' that the buzzer had rang alerting me to get up and it was actually only 3am. Sigh..

I did the only thing that I could do.. I went back to bed.. for a nap until it was finally time to really, really wake up in less than 2 hours.

Visit Egypt w/out leaving your home...

Here are some photos of the Egyptian art project that my 6th, 7th, and 8th grade art students recently completed.
*click on the photos for a larger view..


http://s226.photobucket.com/albums/dd224/artteacher2007/

AND, don't forget to read and enter the Thanksgiving contest!! *Info in the post below.

Please people, when you depart a job.. clean out your old desk before the new person takes the job....

This is 'exactly' how the desk drawers were left for me. I had to do so much 'organizing/sorting' of the art supplies in my new classroom-- that I didn't have time to do anything about the junky 'tornado destruction looking' messy drawers until just now. Ok, the truth is- the mess in the drawers gave me the 'heebie jeebies'...
The first two photos are actual photos of the drawers as they were found.

In the first photo are the keys to the storage cabinets- I didn't know that they were there for a week, because I couldn't SEE THEM! It's almost like one of those children's books where you have to find the 'items' on the page.


This is the entire contents of 2 small desk drawers and that 'thin flat' center drawer- that is too small to store much of anything:




This is how it looked after working on the sorting for almost 3 hours.



After all the sorting there was some TRASH....


My way of organizing my classrooms is simple: just putting like things together so- I'd know what I had for art materials/etc. I'm not a type A personality by any means-- but, I do know it's best to keep all the painting, printing, etc. materials in the same area/etc.

Interesting facts:
I found 128 ink pens, 18 pairs of scissors, an expired student ID, 2 combs, mystery keys and two padlocks, too many markers to count, (I just put them in the student marker box), and an endless array of duplicated office and art supplies. Of course, if you don't keep 'similiar' things together--- it would make it difficult to realize that you have already have plenty of scissors in the desk drawer.


I also found a wide assortment of 'art supplies' in the three desk drawers and I put them in the appropriate locations where other similiar art materials were stored.

Ahh.. the mysteries of life...

As you might know, (if you've been reading the blog for it's entire 3 weeks of existance) that I'm an art teacher. I teach middle school art. Do I hear any 'sighs' of sympathy? Do I hear rustling of paper to get a petition together to get me an immmediate pay raise? Offers of monetary donations for a plane ticket for winter break?

Well, here's what happened today... you will either laugh or cry. Or maybe send your child's teacher a thank you note- especially the art teachers- please. :D

This one particular boy is often a little tardy to my afternoon class. Let's just say that our buildings are all close enough together that there isn't a reason to be tardy. However, this 7th grade boy.. is often 'tardy.' So, today when I asked him why he was tardy he said.. (Ok, I'd suggest that you go and get a snack, grab a pillow, something to drink.. ok, all comfy now?)

He said, that he was late because he was OUTSIDE talking to a teacher. Ok, now.. this sure seems like a 'valid' reason doesn't it? However, this particular student always has an excuse, or it's someone else's fault.. (about anything) and if he was talking to a teacher.. (which was possible- but, he's been in my class since August 28 and I've learned not to take what he says at face value) AND if he was talking to a teacher- why didn't the teacher send the child with a note to give to the next teacher to 'explain why the student was late?' Or even send an email? Like all the other teachers do for any other child who was late arriving to art class?

First of all, I need to let you know that this is a child that will deny doing things AS HE IS DOING THEM. For some reason, he thinks that if he does this.. it didn't happen. Maybe he thinks he can suspend time? He is disrespectful, talks all the time, doesn't listen to instructions and then when you try to help him.. he says, "I DID that already." *Which he clearly did not do-- because I do have eyes to see with and I can tell if 'something has or hasn't been done.'

So, I said, "What was the teacher's name that you were talking to?" He said, "I don't know." I said, "What does this teacher teach?" He said, "I don't know." I then, (sensing a LIE) asked him what they were talking about. He couldn't remember. Then, I asked him if this 'mystery teacher' was a male or a female teacher? His response? "He couldn't remember." My oh my.. should I have sent him to the nurse? I mean after all- this had only happened just minutes before. Man, that must have been some conservation.. to make him have 'name, teacher sex, and conservtion amnessia.'

So, then when I told him that I just didn't understand how he was OUTSIDE talking to a teacher and that he couldn't remember who the teacher was, what they taught, what the teacher's name was or what they talked about- much less if it was a male or a female teacher!

THEN, he back-peddled and said that he NEVER said that he was OUTSIDE talking to another teacher. The other kids even started laughing at this-- because even though there are several other 'behavior challenges' that are in the same class.. they know that this student has been caught 'in a lie'... that is so ridiclous that even they have to admit that this 'lie' isn't working for him.

Well, he finally remembers that it was his MATH TEACHER and that he wasn't outside 'when he was talking to her' at all. I wrote that particular teacher an email- to ask if this had happened. I had not heard back from the teacher before the day was over.


So, my question is.. DO YOU THINK HE WAS LYING? I mean does it sound possible that all the various verisions of the 'tardy excuse' weren't true?

I just think that 'personal accountablity' is so important. When I would teach on the elementary level as a classroom teacher- I would always tell my students that two things were very true and that they would help them in life to remember them:

1. That all we have that belongs forever to us.. that can't be taken away... is
our own character. Our character defines us,
it's how we treat others, how we treat ourselves, it's our word, our honesty,
and it is up to us-as to what we decide our character is going to be.


2. I also always told them- if you do not want to stand up and say, "YES, I DID IT."
then.. that is your clue to NOT DO WHATEVER IT IS THAT YOU DON'T want to admit
to doing.

Clearly, this boy did not learn this .. didn't want to learn it.. wasn't re-enforced at home.. or something..

UPDATE: I got an email from the 'teacher' that the student said 'kept him late' and that was why he was tardy-- and she did not talk to him after class ended and had NOTHING to do with it.


WHEN I asked him about it today- he actually 'dared' to say that he had not said it was his math teacher he had been talking to that had made him tardy. I told him- that he had said this and the whole point was that HE HAD BEEN CAUGHT IN AT least 6 different excuses.. as to why he was tardy and NONE OF THEM WERE THE TRUTH! sigh.. sigh.. sigh..


I love teaching school- but, sometimes.. sometimes.. I dream of being on a beach knitting, reading, making shell necklaces, and sipping on fruity drinks with umbrellas in them. And, let's not forget the hunky towel boy (uh, man) who not only brings fluffy clean towels, drinks, but.. also gives foot massages and paints your toenails.

Ok, here's a photo.. can't have a blog posting without a photo can I?

This is a photo from when I lived in Italy 2 years ago- it's a stray kitty-- (she was about to have some kitties) and I was walking to work one morning and I just happened to have my camera and I snapped this adorable photo.



Have you ever wondered what ITALIAN KITTIES EAT?


Why spaghetti, of course!

Witty Wednesday...

Today was the last day of art for today's 6th grade art class- they change specials every quarter. So, I let them do a fun 'group project' today. They created scenes from the claymatics video: A GRAND DAY OUT... (We didn't have a variety of clay colors- so, use your imagination) I think that they did a great job!

Brain drain.. is caused by... attending 'all day long' meetings..

So.. enjoy this nature photo of some flowers that I saw recently.

*In case you're wondering- they aren't mine- I don't have a place to grow flowers.
:-(