run today

Home stretch...

I am sitting here in the computer lab two weeks away from finishing up all my course work for the first semester of the credential program. I have a whole bunch of stuff due as well including a unit plan for social studies. This is probably the most daunting immediate task facing me as I make my way towards becoming a teacher. I think I can handle it though, I am going to create a unit on Imperialism and Africa. Students will study the experiences of Africans and their interactions with European colonizers. They will learn how Africans were treated and how they lived before and what changed when Europeans arrived. The hard part of all this is addressing content standards for the state of California. I feel like standards are not stressed as hard at Tam where I am observing/subbing as opposed to schools that I am likely to work at in the future. Many schools have to focus solely on the standards and have pacing guides dictating when they should be covering what so that students learn everything that is covered on the STAR tests. I wish that high school history curriculum could be more flexible as to allow for my in depth discovery of history. oh well.
I finished up training for fire crew and will be going on call on 5/18, so hopefully there are some forest fires. I am not sure when I will be going out and I may have some dead time on my hands when school is out. I can still sub and hopefully make a bit of cash. Gotta get back to work...

word up

Hey there I am back from Spring Break and things are pretty crazy. I am super busy with school projects and just trying to keep it together. I still have a couple weeks left of fire crew training, so hopefully I can get er done and do school and work at the same time. Blah blah blah, not sure what to say. I have been checking out blogs for one of my classes. We are all considering a different cultural group and the information out there is pretty intense. Some groups of students have the odds stacked against them to the core. How are we going to help these marginalized groups while serving the entire student population? There is not enough time or resources to reach out to everyone it seems. I have spent a lot of time in the schools in the past year and it is a daily struggle for teachers to get through all the curriculum let alone take time to help out trouble kids. If only we had 36 hours in a day maybe there would be more time. Money is probably one of the largest obstacles for students in tough situations. I don't mean because they don't have money, but there isn't money out there to help them get out of their situations. At some level there has to be some self determination and good things for marginalized students to look up to. I think that I can provide a good example for students and hopefully be real with them so they realize that effort has to be put out on their end for them to ultimately be successful. It seems that teaching is sort of a tight-rope walk where one side is all the bureaucratic bullshit while the other side is the students their needs. Can we walk the line and still be successful on both ends, no idea at this point? I will find out when I get a job and I am going to carry my motivation with me. Everyone tells me that I will become jaded or whatever and that teachers can't keep it up. I think that if you let yourself get bogged down and do not have any outlet to free yourself from frustration then yeah you can get stuck in pessimistic thinking and a negative attitude for teaching. TEachers with a negative attitude about adolescents and the education system should take a seat and let, young motivated teachers take the stage and move society forward in the 21st century. I hate to get down on those who are teaching now, but it is part of the problem. There are so many obstacles to success that we just try to do what we can, but we must always strive to do more. Getting complacent is going to bring everyone down. I think a large portion of society is complacent with the way they live their lives and change seems too difficult. We don't have any options other than to strive for progress on many levels. Obama is out there doing his best and we should as well. People are so critical of him and his policies, but at least he is trying other than the "war president' before. All Bush wanted to do is fight and let the free market run itself. Well the trickle down theory is debunked for the fifty-thousandth time and people are struggling around the US and the world. We all need to do more and step up... the issues facing society today are greater and more complicated than ever before in history. We created global warming, yet folks out there still think it does not exist. Fuck, how can we get everyone on the same page? not likely, but I am going to try with the most effort I can give to do good in this world. Everyone should do this in their daily lives, I am not saying to become consumed with the lives of others as we all have basic needs we have to take care of, but think of those who have it worse and set an example. Teaching is a profession that is highly complicated, so how could we simplify it while addressing everyone's needs, not sure. I am going to set out to become part of the next great generation of teachers and help students of all types succeed as citizens in the 21st century... whew!

almost spring break...

Hey people whats up? I am just about to go to class and I thought I should write some stuff on my blog. I have been super busy lately and it is exhausting. I have been substitute teaching a lot and training for fire crew on the weekends. I am excited for this summer, but still I am stressed to the core. School is going well, but there are big projects looming that I am nervous about. The major source of my stress is financial. I am working my butt off, yet the way my pay schedule works I can not seem to support myself. My financial aid money is gone and subbing is not cutting it. Fire crew will net me a good pay check for training, but not until mid-may at the earliest.
My mom is back in Visalia which is really great. I think things are going really well with her and I wish I could take a more active role in her recovery. It seems that each day is better, I hope she gets more speech therapy so she can gain back what was probably her most valuable asset. I am going to visit Visalia for a week soon, so that should be a nice break.
I got pretty under the weather this last weekend because allergies hit me real hard in Sacramento. The grass and pollen does not agree with me. Hopefully I have this under control and I'll start feeling better. I am tired.

Blah

I have been pretty blah for the last couple days. My mom is back in the hospital and once again I can not be there to help her through this. I hate being so far away and that she is stuck in Memphis. Why does this shit have to happen to my mom? When is it going to end? What has caused all of this? These are only some of the questions I have been pondering in my mind. Keeping faith with myself that she is going to get better so far has not worked because she keeps ending up in the damn hospital. I hope that she can come home to California soon and she can start to work on getting better with her mind. She is the smartest woman I know, if she could just get healthy enough she could start making new connections in her brain and maybe I would get my mom back for real. No, no, shes back in the hospital. I am pretty upset if you can't tell, I got my hopes up too high and was wishing that she would just start getting better and she would be home in a couple weeks. Having an end in sight for when she would come home probably got me too comfortable with this whole situation. Maybe I should have gone to Memphis for a third time because I hate being so far away and she is not coming home as of now. Just sitting and waiting is what we are supposed to do, not very reassuring if you ask me. They don't know what the hell is happening, aaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh!
On a brighter note, I reached the quarter-century mark last week and had a good time in San Francisco on my birthday. The weekend was ho-hum and I mostly just took it easy. Oh I ran a race on Sunday, Emerald Across the Bay 12k(7.2mi). It was a really rainy day and I was soaked head to toe, but it only took me 49:54, not bad huh? I really want to start running more races, but I am not going to be able to for a while. I am starting training for fire crew in April and will be gone every weekend and just to keep things interesting I am poor again and couldn't afford entry fees into any races anyways. I guess my goal of running a marathon will have to wait another year, but we will see. If I am around for the SF Marathon I may try it, training beforehand of course. I hope I am not around because that would mean I would be fighting fires and making money! It is really weird to hope for forest fires, but I just keep in mind that they are natural... doesn't hurt that we are in a drought. So I'm going to be a teacher and a firefighter, quite a combo if you ask me.
As I prepare to be a teacher, I have to do a lot of work. I am going to have to do this thing called PACT(Performance Assessment for California Teachers) to get my credential. I will probably do about 50 pages of typing throughout the whole process of PACT, not to mention all the typing I am doing this semester. I am actually feeling ok with the idea of PACT right now because it will include a lot of reflection and ways to consider how I can be a better teacher. I think I will always strive to get better at what I am doing. Teaching can become so mundane and boring, but really it should be an exciting thing. Each year I will teach students new things, why should I not learn new things as well? I think having a positive mindset about teaching is very important because being negative just brings you down. When dealing with teenagers I can see how teachers wall up and shutter themselves in their classrooms. Teenagers are not easy to deal with. No one ever said it was going to be easy. I want to reach into kids minds and make them really think about what life is all about. Learning about history is a starting point to understanding the progression of humans on Earth. At such a critical time, students must be prepared in a different way than ever before. Awareness is key, they should be aware of their surroundings and what is going on with them, such that good decisions can be made to make their lives better. I am not sure how all this is going to be accomplished, call me idealistic or whatever, I don't care. I am going to keep pushing on with relentless spirit and determination... I know my mom would want me to.

in a rush

So I am actually in the middle of writing a paper about learning.... woohoo! Procrastinating... Actually I have been honing my skills and working to become the best teacher possible. I have learned many new things and approaches to teaching that I believe will help me in the future. I hope that these things that I have learned are easily applicable to the classroom and that I am able to use some of these strategies when I student teach. My experience has been good so far, observing and subbing at Tamalpais High School. I have been getting to know some of the students which is always a plus. I am going to spend about 6 days at the end of the month subbing for one teacher, so more experience is a plus.
Mom should be out of the hospital today which is the biggest relief ever... I feel strongly that she is on an upward path and is going to progress greatly from here on out.
My birthday is this week, but I can't think about it too much right now because I have to do so much damn school work. After I finish this current paper I get to work on critiquing the California Social Studies Standards... fun. Anyways, it is much easier to type here on a computer than my iphone, but I will update the blog as much as possible.
I think I am going to use my blog as the story of my quest to become a teacher... peace out.

Iphoning

Hey people I just got a new app for my iPhone that let's me update my blog mobilly.