Reflection

As part of my student teaching seminar, we are asked to write reflections about our experiences. I will have more to share in this space regarding what I have encountered when time and energy permit. For now, I would like to share my most recent reflection, where we were asked to write about a student who has had an impact on us, either good or bad. This is what I had to say:

There is a line at the film “The Devil’s Own” starring Brad Pitt and Harrison Ford, where Brad Pitt’s character is telling his father figure Ford that their story was always going to have bad ending. Pitt, who is Irish and a member of the IRA tells Ford “Don't look for a happy ending. It's not an American story. It's an Irish one.” What Pitt’s character is saying is that we want so desperately for every story to have the miracle ending that we as Americans have come to expect, that we forget that so often in life, there are no happy endings. For people all over the world, they spend their whole lives, and then die, waiting for that miracle ending. In literature it is called Deus ex Machina, or “God from the machine” where no matter how desperate the situation, things will find a way of working out for the protagonist. I have made this mistake when working with my students at Hillside prior to starting my student teaching. Sometimes there are no happy endings. After talking with a student and a parent about the issues that are going on in the home, it is my expectation that from week to week, day to day, things will begin to get better. The harsh truth however is that sometimes things don’t get better. Sometimes a young person who is struggling against all that they are dealing with in their lives, will simply continue to struggle.

Sometimes, even though we are in America, the stories don’t have a happy ending. I would like to sit and write about my student who in three weeks I have turned from an underachieving problem student, into a social studies whiz-kid (it’s not as if I don’t have a few of them) but the harsh and brutal reality is that this is by and large not an American story. The students that I have spent the last month plus working with will go on after they are done with me, and I them. Some of them will succeed in both school and life, and some of them wont. The hardest part is that there is shockingly little that I can do to alter that course. I am not so naïve to think that in seven weeks I could alter the course of all 45 or so student’s lives. But I do also realize the impact I am having, if only for an hour and a half five days a week for a month and a half. Do I have students who have made an impression on me? Do I have students who I will remember long after they have forgotten about me? Of course I do. I far under estimated the impact that student teaching was going to have on me as a professional and as a person. Having worked in my school for two years, I arrogantly believed that I knew more about this than I did. This has been the single greatest learning experience of my life, and I say that knowing full well that I have two weeks left where I am now, and seven weeks at my next placement.

I am sorry for the negative tone to this, the ironic thing is, I write this after having what has been my most successful week here. You asked me to write about a student who has made an impression on me, and I could easily have filled these few short pages with stories about this young person or that, who has surprised me in a good way or a bad. I could talk about the young lady who has shocked me day in and day out with her ability to think at a higher level. Or the young man who is so confident in his abilities in social studies, but is so close every day to exploding on me that I have had to navigate a mine field with him. I could have written 10 pages on each and every one of them. But it would not have been enough. Instead, let me take these pages to talk about the group as a whole. They are wonderful, awful people, just like all of us, who for the most part are doing the best with what they have, and what they have been taught. I cannot move heaven and earth in 7 weeks, but I can alter the course of a young person’s life, even if just slightly. Maybe after all is said and done, it will be an American story after all.

The Ghosts of Presidents Past

Saw this last night and literally laughed out loud (lol as the kids say)

"If the Moon Were Spare Ribs, I'd Have Seconds"

Yesterday was Harry's birthday. Will Ferrell is a classic.

The Pantry

So, we are quickly approaching the three year anniversary of my purchase of the house. In that time I have made a few modest upgrades and gotten the place looking nice enough that I wasn't completely embarrassed to have Danielle move in.

One of the nagging issues however has been the pantry. It is in the hallway that leads from the entry way of the house into the kitchen, so anyone who walks in, sees what's there.

When I first bought the house, there was cheap folding doors there, which I hated and promptly removed. In the ensuing two years, the "pantry" has been little more than an open closet space with white metal wire shelves, which looked, frankly, terrible.

Danielle and I have been talking about upgrading the pantry for a while, and the time finally came this weekend.

With some borrowed antique doors from Jaquie, we got started.

In the above picture you can see what the space looked like without the wire shelves. This is me installing the door frame.

Because there were to studs in the wall here, we had to make good use of about three tubes of liquid nails.



We have to screw in the shelves, caulk and paint. Aside from that, we have a really nice looking pantry.



We have yet to decide what we want to do with the color on the doors. There is cracked and chipping white paint on them now, which as far as I am concerned looks great, the problem is, will the next buyers of the house think it looks so "rustic".




The garbage can and recycling bin go under the newly built cabinet, and I am planning on building a roll-out drawer for them to fit into. This won't be done this weekend however.

All in all, for less than $100, we ended up with a really nice upgrade and something the two of us are proud of.

Is That All?

We took Avi and Lilah to the zoo Sunday to see the new polar bear, Zero. Although he was awesome, and HUGE (Compared to Aurora)they did not fight like this. Which was of course, unfortunate.

The Health Care Debate

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Danielle worked at New York Presbyterian, on the floor where Mr. Olbermann's father is receiving treatment. Living with a a health care professional, I know how hard the people with their boots on the ground in this fight are working.

My frustration with the politics of Changing this system has boiled over. I am guessing I feel a lot like this guy:



That is Congressmen Anthony Weiner of NY. And at 6:19 this morning I am at least reassured that someone out there is saying something that I agree with.

I think I may show this clip to my 11th grade U.S. History class this morning, we are starting to cover the Constitution today. How do I honestly teach about how our Government is supposed to work, when it has shown an utter inability to do anything for months.

We are no closer today to comprehensive healthcare reform than we were in the fall when I was frustrated. Mr. Obama, you are losing me. There are precious few issues that will get me angry enough to vote against you or not vote at all in 2012. Health Care, equal rights for all citizens regardless of sexual orientation, education, that's pretty much it. In over a year, you and your administration have done shockingly little on each front.

The Snow Leopard

This is Awesome

Seeing as I live with a woman of Ghanaian decent, I find this to be very compelling.

I am not an Olympic freak, but I do enjoy the games, particularly the Snow Board half-pipe, where Shawn White proved that he is head and shoulders the best athlete in his sport in the world.

Crappy Historical Movies, Good Historical Movies

It has been a weird weekend for movies on TV. I have spent most of the weekend inside, playing with Avi and preparing for next week, which means I have found my butt firnly planted on the couch.

I watched "Revolution", which was an excellent historical film, followed by "The Patriot" which is a terrible historical film.

Then today, I turned on the Disney channel while Avi ate her lunch after an awesome sledding trip, only to find the most awful of awful historical films, "Pocahantas" on. In an amazing turn of events, there is an awesome historical film that deals with the same subject matter on right now, I love "Dances with Wolves" and am even able to forgive the historical inaccuracies and perpetuation of the "Nobel Savage" myth.


I just thought it was interesting.

Is it just me, or does Disney's Pochahantas look strikingly like Kim Kardashian?

What I Am Reading

Last week I finished the Mistborn Trilogy for the second time.

I am very boring in that I continue to read and re-read the same books over and over when I find something I like, I think this must be genetic.

Anyways, I loved this series even more this time. I have Drew to thank, again, for getting me to read this. I am dedicating myself to reading all 12 books in The Wheel of Time series. I have finally come to grips with the fact that Drew knows what he is talking about when it comes to fantasy books.

Having just watched the utter crap-fest that was Percy Jackson and the Olympians I have little faith in Books to Movies adaptations right now, but the talk of a potential "Mistborn" movie gets me very excited. The way the action in this series is written would translate beautifully to film, it is sort of Harry Potter, meets LORT, meets the Matrix meets Awesome.

One of my favorite things about reading fantasy books is checking out other people's interpretations of the characters in Fan Art sites. My favorite Harry Potter site is Acciobrain!

Some of the best stuff I have ever drawn/painted has been the Wheel of Time stuff I did for Drew (which I should have him take pictures of so I can post it...Drew, are you reading this?)

The Mistborn artwork that is out there is limited at this point. I have sketched out some Inquisitors, but haven't had the time to really work on them. I will post a few of my favorites that Google Images was able to pull up.







Sweet Koloss transition




















Vin doing her Misborn thing





















And finally, my favorite of Vin, hauling around a way-too-big-but-still-bad-ass Koloss sword.

These Folks Are Real

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As usual, Rachel uses her witty, sarcastic style to disarm even the craziest of crazies. What she said at the end is what is so telling to me, "These folks are real"