Senora Assah's First Two Weeks

Hello, my long lost family!  Sorry I haven't been on here much lately.  I have two things to blame:

 

1.  Windows Vista.  Ever since we got it, it doesn't like to let us post or comment or check e-mail.  Basically, Vista said that we couldn't be friends with you.  But don't worry! Mykl downloaded Google Chrome, which is Google's new FREE browser.  Now all is right in the world!

2. During the first two weeks of school, I haven't had much of a life outside of school.  Depressing, I know.  I got some good advice though - Seek excellence, not perfection.  I can't be perfect because I'm new at this.  Does being a perfectionist run in the family?  I think yes!  Maybe that will give me more time to do things like blog!

Things are going great in the classroom!  People always said not to smile until Christmas, but I broke the rule and smiled on the first day.  I think you can smile and be sorta-kinda-yourself (yourself + professional distance), but you just have to be firm, consistant, and fair at the same time.

I love my Spanish III class - we're doing a massive review of everything they learned in Spanish I and II, and we've been able to do a lot of fun stuff to review.  A teacher friend found this video on youtube (and teachertube) called Conjugationback, where they change the words to the Justin Timberlake song Sexyback (which I don't really like, but my students do). 

I actually had my students singing along with the song - in two different parts!  They got into it, which I've never really seen students get into conjugating AR verbs. 

I haven't been able to do as many fun things with my Spanish I students because they can be immature about a lot of things.  I think it's because they are mostly freshman and mostly guys that like to show off.  Oh well, we'll see what happens the rest of the semester.  I'm doing something a little different with them this semester.  Instead of having big tests, I'm having a lot of small quizzes.  For each "skill" that they learn how to do (i.e. introducing themselves and others, etc...) we only learn the vocab. for that skill and practice that skill for 2-3 days, then take a quiz on it.  They've done really well with that so far.

I've been doing a lot of relaxation-type stuff the last two weeks.  I've been going to a yoga/tai chi/pilates class on Wednesdays, and I've been doing some breathing exercises that are supposed to help with relaxing.  I am hoping that this will be the key to my survival.  That and weekends.