Little Thingies

Well, I didn’t take a nap and I didn’t wash clothes. Nor did I put up the Christmas tree. Instead, Fred took me to Barnes and Nobles to pick out my Christmas present, a lovely new Italian dictionary with print in a size I can read! {Note to self: Take the dictionary off the Amazon wish list!} The other gift which came from MargUK’s suggestion was a desk calendar with an Italian phrase per day!
I am very achy. I think it can only be that I have done no walking this week until this morning when my walking friend, Leslie came to walk with me. I need, I really NEED to walk for a short time every day or I get really sore.

I am listening to Janis Ian singing "In the Winter" –such a sad song…
I am thinking about my reflection on my project with the 4th grade… What did I learn from it? Well, first of all, I DO know enough to teach some Italian! When we were putting our ideas out, la prof asked me what I would like to do and I told her something to do with teaching but that I didn’t think I knew enough Italian to teach anyone else! She told me I was mistaken, and she was correct!

This project also made me think about going back to teaching. Oh, not full time! I no longer am interested in putting up with the nonsense from the admin people who purport to tell experienced teachers how and what to teach even though said admins have never taught in their lives! I would like to be a resource person for teachers. But in what area? "Ay, there’s the rub!" I did a bit of this after I quit teaching full time by coming in and teaching English country dances to the 6th and 7th graders as part of the music curriculum at the school I retired from. I enjoyed that, but I don’t think there is any need for that here and I do not have the interest in English country dances that I once had…

One thing I use writing for is to work out thoughts floating through my head so it will be interesting to see what -if anything– comes out of this..
Now I am singing along with the Beatles "Let it Be."

"There will be an answer
Let it be…"

Until later….

Mezzo

November 30, 2006

Amen. You’ve planted the seed, now just wait to see what grows. You’ll find the right answer for you, I just know it!!!!! Love to you! ~M

Violet

I frequently work things out on paper…the cyber paper of OD. “There will be an answer” is a perfect ending to this entry!

Pat

Do you have a gifted and talented program in your local school system? They may very well be interested in someone to teach some Italian or writing skills to those students. I know it’s not exactly what you are looking for, but it may get you into the school system again and you could have your foot in the door!

🙂

Let us know when inspiration hits.

=) M

Telynor

You’re not the only one who’s achy tonight. I think that storm in the midwest is pounding our way. I find your insights fascinating to read, and a real pleasure to boot.

Desert Sage

You know, i get achey too if i don’t do something physical every day!

TheWoodsprite

How neat that you are thinking of going back to teaching in some way! I hope your achiness is gone today, and I wish you a lovely day also. hugs, Weesprite

VeronicaCorningstone

December 1, 2006

ryn: It all depends. Sometimes he’s very reliable and other times not. He’s moving to NC on Monday. I have no clue if he’ll be settled enough to commit to it, although he said “That should be no problem.” *sigh* I just don’t know. Sometimes he’s very reliable and other times not.

MargUK

Is a Resource Teacher someone who provides teaching in subjects other than the main curriculum? Glad you got the calendar – I ordered one from there too – it’s a Deborah Dewit Marchant one on books & literature – I love the way she draws and the scenes she draws.

🙂 well… I know that in England they are always looking for people who can bring modern languages into primary schools. Just small activities with the children having fun but learning some basic vocabulary. You could perhaps do that with small groups of children at the primarly – you wouldn’t even need to take the whole class, but you could just enjoy smaller groups. Or…this iswhere your pc skills would come in…as an mfl teacher, I always need resources for teaching. Games like snakes and ladders where they have to say past tense sentences or vocab. Or flashcards for vocab learning. Or ideas for speaking activities. I would also appreciate having an extra adult in the room when I play those games. for example – when they learn clothes vocab it is fun to get them to dress up and model the clothes and then describe what they are wearing. If I had a second adult we could even run races or competitions. Its just easier when you are two, and you wouldn’t need to do that every week if you ddn’t want to. Does a secondary school near you teach Italian? Or history? I don’t know why, but that one just sprang into my mind. They like to do court cases or

They use a lot of acting and that too would be great if you had another pair of hands. Most lessons set the scene, give the children the background info, and then once every so often they have the enacted scene. Just some ideas – and I’m sure you already know enough Italian to be able to assist in a secondary school. It takes the children so long to learn the simplest of things … but then they have many different classes a day so perhaps that’s normal.