It’s so hard to know what to expect each day at school these days. My challenge girl, Mia, was 'off' yesterday - as in she got in big trouble and I have to remember to write up what she did. First of all, she got into trouble at lunch and then, on our way back, she was going to come through Chantelle’s room to open my door from the inside. Summer W. had asked me if she could do it and I said ‘yes’. When Mia was told by Chantelle that it was Summer’s turn, Mia flipped out and ‘ran away’. I could see where she was and asked one of the TAs to watch my class while I went out and talked with her. She finally came inside, but it was so frustrating. She is an aboriginal girl and so, after school, I spoke with a teacher who works with the aboriginal children at the school and told her that, after the break, I would like to speak with her about ways I could possibly work with Mia and her immaturity. Today, both Bailee and Mia were away and I thought it would be an easy day - WRONG! The kids are so ‘off’ and not just mine - the other teachers are feeling the same thing about their kids. They tell me that this happens because it’s the end of the term. I am hopeful that after their two week break, things will get better.
I felt bad for Chantelle today - a parent whose child cannot handle being outside (too aggressive) had spoken to Chantelle last week and had agreed to the different strategies they were using with their son inside and outside of the classroom. However, earlier this week, the parent became frosty and asked for a meeting with a variety of people re: her son. After school today, both parents, Chantelle, and two behaviour specialists met and the mother ‘went off’ and said that she didn’t want any special treatment for her son because she didn’t want him centred out. Once the interview was over, the mother asked to speak privately with Chantelle. She asked Chantelle if she could remember what she said to Billy when the mom took him out of school early for an appointment one day. When Chantelle said ’no’, the mother said that Chantelle had said “well, maybe at the appointment, you (Billy) will find a brain”. When Chantelle told Pam and I this, our mouths dropped open - Chantelle is the sweetest person. I told Pam later (when Chantelle wasn’t there) that I wish it had been one of us who the Mom had taken on - we are both seasoned teachers and older as well and have thicker skins. Poor Chantelle, who is young (23) and in her first year of teaching just teared up as she told us about the meeting. I told her that things would get better as she gained more experience. I also told her that I would be in her classroom tomorrow morning when the parents brought Billy in in case there were any issues. She was appreciative of my offer. Each of the past two days, I just came home and flopped onto my chair and sat there for the night.
Dad has been back at it these past two days - he thinks that the next six weeks will be full-on for him re: the census. He has so much preparation to do - not only with getting ready for his meeting with his collectors, but also trying to connect with the people in the public places where people pay to stay (eg: nursing home, caravan park, hotel, etc.). Someone in those places (someone in charge) has to give out the census forms to people staying there on census night. Dad has to train these people so that they know how to do what they need to do on census day. Dad also did ‘Meals on Wheels’ today - a new guy has started and they have paired him with Dad and Dad says that this guy is really good and they get through the route really quickly. Dad spent some time at the Family History Centre last night with Bill, the first counsellor in the Bishopric - once Bill got to putting in some of his family names into the program, he caught ‘the bug’ and he and Dad spent a couple of hours doing genealogy. Dad gets really excited when people ‘catch the bug’ as it is likely that these people will continue to come back and use the genealogy library. Tonight, at SES, they did another search exercise - they were “looking” for a little girl or signs of a little girl in the area they were searching. They found a rather large rag doll which was the only thing which had been hidden. Once they found the doll, the team stopped to talk about what they would do if they were really in this situation and, as it turned out, they decided that they would send a female in to talk with the little girl as little girls tend to feel more comfortable talking to a woman. Dad was a team leader and he is beginning to feel more comfortable being a leader in these practices.
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
It's been a bit of an interesting week so far. Yesterday (Monday) turned out to be a really good day at school - the kind that brought a smile to my face and reminded me of working at R. J. Lee in Brampton. Then, today (Tuesday) was not a good day -- oh, my, what a rollercoaster I am on! The most challenging boy in my class (Baylee) has been away for two days and the challenge girl (Mia) did really well on Monday as far as behaviour goes - so, that's why that day went well. Today, Mia was totally 'off' - actually, she did really well during the morning, but as soon as she didn't get her way for something, she became defiant and that was it for her. I spoke with her mom after school today and she told me that she is trying her best at home to discipline Mia appropriately. I suggested she try taking away something from Mia that she likes when she misbehaves. She told me that Mia really likes the mp3 player that she got for her birthday (can you imagine......a 5 year old getting an mp3 player!) and the mom's comment was that Mia is just getting used to her mp3 player. Sheesh - I am beginning to agree with the teacher who said the other day that adults should have to take a parenting course before they have children. No wonder this child is defiant when she doesn't get her own way. I know it's easier to give in to a child than to discipline or teach them to make correct choices, but I found that if you work hard at it between the ages of 1 and 3, it's so much easier after that. I am still thinking seriously about trying to get a job (supply, part-time or full-time) at the private school around the corner from here - I can imagine that it would be much easier and similar to teaching at R. J. Lee.
It's great having Chantelle there to talk with and to plan with. She and I see things so similarly and can easily run things by each other and/or moan and groan about kids and/or parents. She is going through a bit of a tough time with one of her parents at the moment and often needs me to bounce her frustrations off. I am only too happy to listen to her and share with her my experiences from teaching. Also, when you talk with someone else about what you are going through, they often can help you look at things in a different manner or they can also help you to validate what you think about the subject. Chantelle is young and so hasn't really developed her sense of knowing how good she is as a teacher. She's not great (I don't even think I am a great teacher), but she has a lot going for her - yesterday I had to remind her of that - she was beginning to doubt herself and I told her that she needs to remember that she is very talented and organized and motivated and puts a lot of effort into what she does.
I haven't done anything when I have gotten home from school both last night and tonight. I am feeling better each day, but I still don't have a lot of energy, so I decided to just relax and take it easy and get my energy levels built up again. It's really nice having Dad around - he has been taking such good care of me! :-)
Dad is back to spending his time doing census stuff and our moving boxes stuff. He spent Monday going through our boxes bringing in my teaching supply boxes so that I could look through them to find books which could be used to teach in the next term at school. He also got his tool box set up and some of his tools are now in it. He spent some time sorting out the training materials for his collectors - they need to study from them before they do their training from Dad which is in a week and a half. Dad attended a meeting with other census area supervisors and their district manager. It was an opportunity for them all to discuss any problems they were having, how things were going in general and to give hints on how to make things go better. Today he spent the day sorting the actual census materials for the census and began delivering the training materials to his census collectors - some of them have come to our house to pick them up and one Dad has had to drop off at the collector's house.
Dad had a cool thing happen on Monday. He had to put together his collectors' satchels - there were two plastic supports which went in the satchels, but it was hard to figure out where they went in and then when Dad figured it out, it was hard to actually do. So, after putting together his seven collectors' satchels, he took a few pics of how to put them together and wrote up instructions on how to do it. He then sent it to his district manager and suggested that she might want to share it with the other supervisors. One of our friends from church who is a collector, but not one of Dad's collectors, received the email which Dad had sent to his manager who had forwarded it to other area supervisors (with a note which read "Our resident engineer has prepared this for us. Many thanks Mike), one of which who had obviously passed it on to our friend, Christine. Chris sent Dad an email which said "Thanks, Mike. You are a legend. I had a feeling it was you they were talking about (when she read the email about the resident engineer). So, that was nice for Dad to be recognized for his work.
It's great having Chantelle there to talk with and to plan with. She and I see things so similarly and can easily run things by each other and/or moan and groan about kids and/or parents. She is going through a bit of a tough time with one of her parents at the moment and often needs me to bounce her frustrations off. I am only too happy to listen to her and share with her my experiences from teaching. Also, when you talk with someone else about what you are going through, they often can help you look at things in a different manner or they can also help you to validate what you think about the subject. Chantelle is young and so hasn't really developed her sense of knowing how good she is as a teacher. She's not great (I don't even think I am a great teacher), but she has a lot going for her - yesterday I had to remind her of that - she was beginning to doubt herself and I told her that she needs to remember that she is very talented and organized and motivated and puts a lot of effort into what she does.
I haven't done anything when I have gotten home from school both last night and tonight. I am feeling better each day, but I still don't have a lot of energy, so I decided to just relax and take it easy and get my energy levels built up again. It's really nice having Dad around - he has been taking such good care of me! :-)
Dad is back to spending his time doing census stuff and our moving boxes stuff. He spent Monday going through our boxes bringing in my teaching supply boxes so that I could look through them to find books which could be used to teach in the next term at school. He also got his tool box set up and some of his tools are now in it. He spent some time sorting out the training materials for his collectors - they need to study from them before they do their training from Dad which is in a week and a half. Dad attended a meeting with other census area supervisors and their district manager. It was an opportunity for them all to discuss any problems they were having, how things were going in general and to give hints on how to make things go better. Today he spent the day sorting the actual census materials for the census and began delivering the training materials to his census collectors - some of them have come to our house to pick them up and one Dad has had to drop off at the collector's house.
Dad had a cool thing happen on Monday. He had to put together his collectors' satchels - there were two plastic supports which went in the satchels, but it was hard to figure out where they went in and then when Dad figured it out, it was hard to actually do. So, after putting together his seven collectors' satchels, he took a few pics of how to put them together and wrote up instructions on how to do it. He then sent it to his district manager and suggested that she might want to share it with the other supervisors. One of our friends from church who is a collector, but not one of Dad's collectors, received the email which Dad had sent to his manager who had forwarded it to other area supervisors (with a note which read "Our resident engineer has prepared this for us. Many thanks Mike), one of which who had obviously passed it on to our friend, Christine. Chris sent Dad an email which said "Thanks, Mike. You are a legend. I had a feeling it was you they were talking about (when she read the email about the resident engineer). So, that was nice for Dad to be recognized for his work.
Sunday, June 19, 2011
Sorry I haven't written since Tuesday, but unfortunately, I have been sick. A little preamble.....on Wednesday, I had an issue with a young boy who was defiant and that night, I couldn't sleep wondering how I was going to be able to go through all this again like I did with the boy in the grade two class last year. I got about 3 hours sleep that night and I guess my immune system was low and on Thursday, I came down with a fever. That night, I went to bed at 6:30pm and slept through until 6:30am Friday morning. I went to school with a sore throat and sore ears - Dad bought me some lozenges to suck on and I took some Tylenol every few hours. Friday night, I sweated so much that I had to turn the comforter over in the middle of the night and put a towel on the sheets (twice) and change my pillowcase. I went to bed on Friday night at 7pm and slept through until 7am yesterday morning. I spent Saturday sitting on my comfy chair with my comforter up around my neck watching tv. I took a long nap in the afternoon and spent the evening sitting in my chair again. The pain in my throat was so bad yesterday - I was taking a Tylenol every two hours and you know how much I HATE taking pills so you can imagine how painful my throat and ears were. And to top it off, I didn't even have ANY desire to have chocolate - now THAT's sad! Today, I am feeling a little better - my fever is gone, but my glands are still swollen and my throat still hurts. I am taking one Tylenol every four hours and that does help.
And to top it off, the boy who was defiant on Wednesday that I worried about dealing with for the rest of the year, was fine on both Thursday and Friday - sheesh! :-) Thursday and Friday teaching days were okay - there's another defiant child, a girl, who had a hissy fit and I took outside of the science room and told her I was going to take her back to the classroom and she started saying 'no, no' and settled back down. I have to say that the experience of teaching here in Hervey Bay has made me appreciate teaching at R. J. Lee so much!!! There are so many issues with these kids and it makes it much harder to teach them. I seem to have lost my love of teaching here which makes me so sad as I absolutely LOVED teaching in Canada - every day, I loved going in and helping the children learn. But, there, I was actually teaching, not managing the classroom. Both Chantelle and Sam said that they think I have to be more tough which I don't like to be, but I am going to have to be, I think. But, it makes me sad to not enjoy teaching - it's all I have ever wanted to do and it was such an amazing experience living my dream in Canada. It's not a dream doing it here - the other night I even thought of getting a job outside of the teaching field - that really surprised me when I thought about that - made me sad, but I can understand why those thoughts came into my mind. We shall have to see how the next week goes.
Dad spent Wednesday doing work around here: mowing the grass, trimming around the edges of the lawn, weeding, spraying for insects, clearing the outside wall vents and filling them with powder so that wasps and ants won't build their homes in them and spraying the attic for spiders. On Thursday, he couldn't do 'Meals on Wheels' because he had to be home for the guys who delivered our stuff - yep, it's finally here - all our lovely stuff which has gone around the world practically finally arrived - and it all fit into the garage with just enough room to fit the car in. We have been able to live here without any of this stuff so far and so we will go through the boxes/containers a little at a time. I do know that I want to get into my school books boxes as we are starting a unit on fairy tales after the school holidays and I know I have a couple of books which can help with our planning of that unit. Dad is also anxious to get his tool box out of its wrapper and get his tools into it. Dad spent Friday at the Family History Centre - it was a very quiet day so Dad was able to get a lot of computer updating done. Yesterday, he mostly just hung around the house doing stuff on the computer and waiting on me. :-) His census forms were delivered - 42 boxes of them! Luckily for us, we have no furniture in our living room and so all the boxes went in there.
So, that has been our very (un)exciting week here. I am sure that this coming week will be a much better one! :-)
And to top it off, the boy who was defiant on Wednesday that I worried about dealing with for the rest of the year, was fine on both Thursday and Friday - sheesh! :-) Thursday and Friday teaching days were okay - there's another defiant child, a girl, who had a hissy fit and I took outside of the science room and told her I was going to take her back to the classroom and she started saying 'no, no' and settled back down. I have to say that the experience of teaching here in Hervey Bay has made me appreciate teaching at R. J. Lee so much!!! There are so many issues with these kids and it makes it much harder to teach them. I seem to have lost my love of teaching here which makes me so sad as I absolutely LOVED teaching in Canada - every day, I loved going in and helping the children learn. But, there, I was actually teaching, not managing the classroom. Both Chantelle and Sam said that they think I have to be more tough which I don't like to be, but I am going to have to be, I think. But, it makes me sad to not enjoy teaching - it's all I have ever wanted to do and it was such an amazing experience living my dream in Canada. It's not a dream doing it here - the other night I even thought of getting a job outside of the teaching field - that really surprised me when I thought about that - made me sad, but I can understand why those thoughts came into my mind. We shall have to see how the next week goes.
Dad spent Wednesday doing work around here: mowing the grass, trimming around the edges of the lawn, weeding, spraying for insects, clearing the outside wall vents and filling them with powder so that wasps and ants won't build their homes in them and spraying the attic for spiders. On Thursday, he couldn't do 'Meals on Wheels' because he had to be home for the guys who delivered our stuff - yep, it's finally here - all our lovely stuff which has gone around the world practically finally arrived - and it all fit into the garage with just enough room to fit the car in. We have been able to live here without any of this stuff so far and so we will go through the boxes/containers a little at a time. I do know that I want to get into my school books boxes as we are starting a unit on fairy tales after the school holidays and I know I have a couple of books which can help with our planning of that unit. Dad is also anxious to get his tool box out of its wrapper and get his tools into it. Dad spent Friday at the Family History Centre - it was a very quiet day so Dad was able to get a lot of computer updating done. Yesterday, he mostly just hung around the house doing stuff on the computer and waiting on me. :-) His census forms were delivered - 42 boxes of them! Luckily for us, we have no furniture in our living room and so all the boxes went in there.
So, that has been our very (un)exciting week here. I am sure that this coming week will be a much better one! :-)
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Yesterday, winter was over - today, it was back! :-) Yesterday was the Queen's birthday and so we had the day off school. We started our holiday off by having brunch with our friends Robyn, Geoff, Rob and Rosalea. We were going to meet at the beach and have brunch there, but decided that since we weren't sure what the weather was going to be like, that we would meet at Robyn and Geoff's. We all brought something 'to the party' - our brunch was so sumptuous! We had eggs, bacon, fried mushrooms, tomatoes and onions, and pancakes with frozen berries and ice-cream and freshly squeezed orange juice - YUM, YUM!!! :-) Most of the food was cooked on the barbecue and one of the things they make here is called 'Toad in the Hole'. First, you use a glass to 'cut' a hole out of a slice of bread, then you put the leftover part of the slice of bread on the barbecue, then you crack the egg into the hole and put the cut off part of the bread on top. Once the egg is cooked long enough, you flip the whole thing - they taste really good - take a look at the photo below to see what they look like on the barbecue.
We had a great time eating, talking and laughing together. Once we were finished eating and washing up, we drove down to the beach and took a walk along it. It was a beautiful sunny day with a clear blue sky. The tide was really low - I don't think we've ever seen it so low. As we walked along, we saw these star shapes in the sand. Rosalea picked at one and it was a starfish (a small one) under the sand. When she turned one over, the little legs started to move feverishly. It looked so cool - we checked out a couple more as we walked along the beach. Rosalea threw a few back in the water. One of them that we put back down on the sand started to walk a ways and then just dug into the sand. I was so enthralled with all of this - I have never seen anything like it.
Today was my first day in the Prep class at Torquay State School. There are 24 children in the class, although there were about six away today. There were a few 'challenge' children today - a couple of boys and a girl. The rest seem fine - a little chatty, but pretty good at listening and they love listening to me read stories which is always good since I love to read books to them. I am trying to keep things pretty much the same for the next two weeks - time for them to get used to me and for me to work out how things have been done in the classroom. Our TA, Sam, is awesome and she helped me to settle in a bit today and I'm suure that things will get easier as the time goes on. I am very tired, but at least the day went okay. I spent some time with Chantelle after school and was able to do some more planning.
Dad had the missionaries in the car when he picked me up from school today. We had a quick supper and then took them to the chapel, then to the grocery store to pick up stuff for our 'cooking class' tomorrow, and then back to the chapel so Dad could go to his PEC meeting. While he did that, I went into one of the rooms there and worked on my school stuff. Dad is back to helping me do school stuff already - stuff on the computer - luckily for me, he loves doing that - it makes such a big difference to me having Dad being so handy. :-) Also luckily for me, Dad had time to clean the house today - I am one lucky woman. :-)
Sunday, June 12, 2011
Teaching in the Prep class on Friday was a dream - especially after the class I had had on Thursday. There were 24 students in this class, but only 16 showed up - and to boot, the teacher's aide told me that the 'challenge children' were absent that day. She couldn't believe how much work we were able to get done with the children. I really enjoyed my day - Colleen, the teacher's aide, was really nice and very helpful. Each Prep class gets a teacher's aide for most of each day, and it makes such a big difference. I was so relaxed during the day, and Pam, the teacher who I was replacing, who was being the principal for the day, was likely not impressed that she didn't get the nice numbers in her class that I had that day. :-)
I talked with Yvonne, the teacher I am taking over for, at the end of the day, just to get a few more pointers for Tuesday. I had some thoughts going through my mind all throughout the day - z, q, and l are our letters for next week and I picked out zebra and quilt for the crafts for the coming week and decided that the lion that Chantelle's teacher's aide had chosen, was a great idea. There I was - feeling great about being in charge of a classroom again. I know it will be busy and I will likely be stressed for a bit, but I am really looking forward to it. Sam, my teacher's aide, is great and she even helps do some of the teaching (as opposed to some TAs who just do all the prepping) and I know it will be easier for the students to make the transition from Yvonne to me with Sam in the room.
That evening, we were invited to Robyn and Geoff's for dinner - originally it was going to be us and Rob and Rosalea, but Rob and Rosalea went to the Temple this weekend. Robyn and Geoff then invited Neville Pearce to join us as well - Neville is in his 80s and just lost his wife, who was the love of his life, and so he is now on his own. We had a lovely roast chicken dinner which was delicious and the conversation was really nice, as well. I asked Brother Pearce how he and his wife met and that led to him telling us quite a lot of his life history. It was really nice to get to know him a little and of course, it is always nice to hang out with Robyn and Geoff.
We got to sleep in on Saturday morning and I made it to a respectable almost 9am - I was very pleased! :-) Dad slept until about a half hour before I woke up which was pretty good as well. We lazed around for a while which was really nice as it's been full-on for the past three weeks and it will be full-on for the next two weeks until school holidays. We had a few errands to run before we went to our friend (and my Primary secretary) Denise's to pick her up. It was her birthday and I had told her that I wanted to take her out for lunch to celebrate. When I had told her that, she was overcome a little bit - she told me that no-one had ever done that for her before. I was surprised to learn that and happy to be the one to do this for her as she is such a nice person, a great secretary and a lovely friend.
We dropped Dad off at home and then I drove us to the restaurant. The one we wanted to go to was closed for lunch as it turned out, so we went to a cafe next door. After looking over the menu, we both chose the same thing: chicken with mango in a filo pastry rolled in macademias with fries and a salad. It was $15. which in Australia isn't a bad price. We thoroughly enjoyed the meal and took our time eating it. I told Denise that we HAD to have dessert and we both chose a raspberry cheesecake. It was wonderfully yummy and I ate it very slowly. :-) The slice was VERY small - the smallest that I have ever seen. I thought that maybe it would mean that the cost of them was cheaper (the prices for the desserts were not on the menu and as it was Denise's birthday, I didn't want to ask what they cost). WELL, I was shocked when I got the bill - the cheesecake slices were $9. EACH!!! Wow, I thought, that was over the top pricing for what we got! But, what can you do - at least there was no tax and tip on top of the final bill as taxes are included in everything you buy in Australia, and you don't tip in Australia (the wages are very good here in Australia, so I guess that's why they don't tip). Even though it ended up being an expensive bill, Denise loved the meal and the company and came away with a smile on her face, so that pleased me.
That evening (yesterday), we had guests for dinner - the missionaries and our Bishop and his wife, Diana. Elder Richardson has become close to both us and them and, as he is likely being transferred next week and the Bishop and Diana are leaving for a month, it was the last time we could all get together, so he asked me if we could do that at our house and I said 'yes'. We knew that I was going to be taking Denise to lunch and wouldn't have a lot of time to make the dinner before 5pm when our guests would be arriving, so we 'cheated' and bought roast chickens, gravy in a packet, buns and a mud cake from the grocery store and added mashed potatoes and microwaved carrots. The Bishop and Diana brought a salad to round out our dinner. The food was great and we had such a good time talking with everyone. Both the Bishop and Diana are really funny and we laughed tons over the night - we had such a fun time with them and will definitely be having them back for dinner when they come back from overseas (they are going to Utah to see their daughter and her family).
Today was another busy day at church. We started our day with a ward missionary meeting, then I got things ready for Primary, then Sacrament meeting (which was about keeping your testimony strong - Fiona, Audrey and Rob, the second counsellor in the Bishopric, all spoke. The most important point I got from the meeting was that it was so important to be doing things which will continually strenthen my testimony: saying my prayers, reading my scriptures, attending my meetings, etc. - someone even mentioned that you are never too old to stop building up your testimony). Primary went very smoothly - we were down two teachers, but Maureen, my first counsellor, taught the Valiants (8 - 11 year olds) and the missionaries taught the Sunbeams (3 year olds). Debbie, my second counsellor was away, so Denise and I met during the class time to get caught up on some Primary business. I was in charge of 'Sharing Time' - we were talking about how important it was to keep the covenants you made with Heavenly Father - the children were doing some 'fill-in-the-blanks' which they seemed to enjoy - we didn't have enough time to finish the task, though - I am hoping that their parents will work with them at home to complete it. After church was finished, I had a Primary Presidency meeting - our first since Maureen returned after being away for six weeks and, even though Debbie was away, I wanted to start our twice monthly meetings and hold this one when it was supposed to be held. Our first meeting took over an hour, but we covered a lot in that time, and hopefully our future meetings will be shorter. We received a very nice compliment today - one set of parents, who came into our meeting to listen to their son give a talk, told me afterwards that they were so impressed at how organized our Primary was and how much their children enjoyed coming to Primary. We were all so pleased about that because we have been working hard to make that happen. :-)
Dad went to choir after our meetings today - it's High Council Sunday next week and so we will be having a special guest speaker and the choir will be performing then. They are going to be singing a hymn called 'Jesus Saviour, Pilot Me'. The choir is made up of about 15 members and I am looking forward to hearing them sing next Sunday. Leanne, who leads our music in Primary, is the choir director and she is really really good at what she does. Dad finds it a bit challenging the way she teaches, though - he needs to be able to look at the words and the music and the choir director all at the same time, but Leanne wants the choir members to only watch her.
I talked with Yvonne, the teacher I am taking over for, at the end of the day, just to get a few more pointers for Tuesday. I had some thoughts going through my mind all throughout the day - z, q, and l are our letters for next week and I picked out zebra and quilt for the crafts for the coming week and decided that the lion that Chantelle's teacher's aide had chosen, was a great idea. There I was - feeling great about being in charge of a classroom again. I know it will be busy and I will likely be stressed for a bit, but I am really looking forward to it. Sam, my teacher's aide, is great and she even helps do some of the teaching (as opposed to some TAs who just do all the prepping) and I know it will be easier for the students to make the transition from Yvonne to me with Sam in the room.
That evening, we were invited to Robyn and Geoff's for dinner - originally it was going to be us and Rob and Rosalea, but Rob and Rosalea went to the Temple this weekend. Robyn and Geoff then invited Neville Pearce to join us as well - Neville is in his 80s and just lost his wife, who was the love of his life, and so he is now on his own. We had a lovely roast chicken dinner which was delicious and the conversation was really nice, as well. I asked Brother Pearce how he and his wife met and that led to him telling us quite a lot of his life history. It was really nice to get to know him a little and of course, it is always nice to hang out with Robyn and Geoff.
We got to sleep in on Saturday morning and I made it to a respectable almost 9am - I was very pleased! :-) Dad slept until about a half hour before I woke up which was pretty good as well. We lazed around for a while which was really nice as it's been full-on for the past three weeks and it will be full-on for the next two weeks until school holidays. We had a few errands to run before we went to our friend (and my Primary secretary) Denise's to pick her up. It was her birthday and I had told her that I wanted to take her out for lunch to celebrate. When I had told her that, she was overcome a little bit - she told me that no-one had ever done that for her before. I was surprised to learn that and happy to be the one to do this for her as she is such a nice person, a great secretary and a lovely friend.
We dropped Dad off at home and then I drove us to the restaurant. The one we wanted to go to was closed for lunch as it turned out, so we went to a cafe next door. After looking over the menu, we both chose the same thing: chicken with mango in a filo pastry rolled in macademias with fries and a salad. It was $15. which in Australia isn't a bad price. We thoroughly enjoyed the meal and took our time eating it. I told Denise that we HAD to have dessert and we both chose a raspberry cheesecake. It was wonderfully yummy and I ate it very slowly. :-) The slice was VERY small - the smallest that I have ever seen. I thought that maybe it would mean that the cost of them was cheaper (the prices for the desserts were not on the menu and as it was Denise's birthday, I didn't want to ask what they cost). WELL, I was shocked when I got the bill - the cheesecake slices were $9. EACH!!! Wow, I thought, that was over the top pricing for what we got! But, what can you do - at least there was no tax and tip on top of the final bill as taxes are included in everything you buy in Australia, and you don't tip in Australia (the wages are very good here in Australia, so I guess that's why they don't tip). Even though it ended up being an expensive bill, Denise loved the meal and the company and came away with a smile on her face, so that pleased me.
That evening (yesterday), we had guests for dinner - the missionaries and our Bishop and his wife, Diana. Elder Richardson has become close to both us and them and, as he is likely being transferred next week and the Bishop and Diana are leaving for a month, it was the last time we could all get together, so he asked me if we could do that at our house and I said 'yes'. We knew that I was going to be taking Denise to lunch and wouldn't have a lot of time to make the dinner before 5pm when our guests would be arriving, so we 'cheated' and bought roast chickens, gravy in a packet, buns and a mud cake from the grocery store and added mashed potatoes and microwaved carrots. The Bishop and Diana brought a salad to round out our dinner. The food was great and we had such a good time talking with everyone. Both the Bishop and Diana are really funny and we laughed tons over the night - we had such a fun time with them and will definitely be having them back for dinner when they come back from overseas (they are going to Utah to see their daughter and her family).
Bishop Brown, Diana, Elder Richardson, me, Dad, Elder Paki (pronounced Pah - key)
Today was another busy day at church. We started our day with a ward missionary meeting, then I got things ready for Primary, then Sacrament meeting (which was about keeping your testimony strong - Fiona, Audrey and Rob, the second counsellor in the Bishopric, all spoke. The most important point I got from the meeting was that it was so important to be doing things which will continually strenthen my testimony: saying my prayers, reading my scriptures, attending my meetings, etc. - someone even mentioned that you are never too old to stop building up your testimony). Primary went very smoothly - we were down two teachers, but Maureen, my first counsellor, taught the Valiants (8 - 11 year olds) and the missionaries taught the Sunbeams (3 year olds). Debbie, my second counsellor was away, so Denise and I met during the class time to get caught up on some Primary business. I was in charge of 'Sharing Time' - we were talking about how important it was to keep the covenants you made with Heavenly Father - the children were doing some 'fill-in-the-blanks' which they seemed to enjoy - we didn't have enough time to finish the task, though - I am hoping that their parents will work with them at home to complete it. After church was finished, I had a Primary Presidency meeting - our first since Maureen returned after being away for six weeks and, even though Debbie was away, I wanted to start our twice monthly meetings and hold this one when it was supposed to be held. Our first meeting took over an hour, but we covered a lot in that time, and hopefully our future meetings will be shorter. We received a very nice compliment today - one set of parents, who came into our meeting to listen to their son give a talk, told me afterwards that they were so impressed at how organized our Primary was and how much their children enjoyed coming to Primary. We were all so pleased about that because we have been working hard to make that happen. :-)
Dad went to choir after our meetings today - it's High Council Sunday next week and so we will be having a special guest speaker and the choir will be performing then. They are going to be singing a hymn called 'Jesus Saviour, Pilot Me'. The choir is made up of about 15 members and I am looking forward to hearing them sing next Sunday. Leanne, who leads our music in Primary, is the choir director and she is really really good at what she does. Dad finds it a bit challenging the way she teaches, though - he needs to be able to look at the words and the music and the choir director all at the same time, but Leanne wants the choir members to only watch her.
Thursday, June 9, 2011
What a difference a couple of days make! I was joking around with Dad a couple of days ago saying that I was going to get the missionaries to take a pic of us on Sunday (short sleeves and sandals) with a caption that said 'winter in Australia'. :-) I guess I shouldn't joke around about that - cuz today the high was 19C and tomorrow it will be 17C - eeeeeek!!! I even had to put my sweater on when I went outside today - man, what is the world coming to when you have to wear a sweater in winter! :-)
Yesterday, I had a really good day teaching at Kawungan - Fiona's grade one class again, with no 'challenge child' in attendance - it doesn't get much better than that for supply teaching. After having such a nice day with the kids, I said 'good-bye' to the grade one teachers and the office staff. I did tell them that I hoped to be back next year if there was a position available. I thought about taking today off school since I am already booked for tomorrow and then I start full-time next week. I was still thinking about it when I got a call yesterday afternoon asking me if I would be available to supply teach in a grade one class at Torquay - I thought, why not, a nice grade one class. Well, they were the class from H - E - Double Hockeysticks!!! I spoke to the behaviour support teacher who told me that seven of them have issues and she was so right. Two of them were major issues and the other five were enough of an issue that it was hard to get anything done. Let me tell you, when I got to the school and I saw two teachers who asked me who I was supplying for and they said 'good luck', I should have turned and run the other way. This is one day when I REALLY earned my money! And I would never go back to that class - no wonder the teacher has taken two days off. And to boot, she didn't even leave a plan for me - thank goodness the teacher next door, who was also off, had left a really good plan and so I photocopied it and carried it out. Then, today I spoke with the teacher who I am supplying for tomorrow and she said that I can do whatever I want for the day - she was keeping the photocopies for herself for Tuesday - greaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat! Sheesh! I have no idea what I will do, but there is a teacher's aide for almost all day, so I am sure she will help me out. I saw a couple of girls who will be in my class starting on Tuesday and they seemed really happy about me teaching them. Yesterday, after school, I met with Yvonne, the teacher who I am replacing for the rest of the year, and we went over her basic day to day plan. It was a good meeting and I think that I am ready for the first day next week. Chantelle and I met today after school and went over next week as well - I feel much better about starting up a new class now.
Dad and I went to the Family History Centre last night and met up with Rob and Rosalea there. I was hoping to get some more work done as I have received some emails from Uncle Rick with some more info about Grandpa Terry's family. I picked up the wrong bag, though, so I didn't have my family history bag with me. I was able to access Uncle Rick's email there and he had sent me a link about a UK census with Grandpa's grandfather on it, but when I tried to find the same info online, I couldn't find it. That was frustrating so I emailed Uncle Rick asking him how he found it - waiting for him to get back to me about it.
Dad has been working so hard around the house these past two days - he is in a lull with the census stuff right now and so he's been trying to get caught up with stuff around the house - inside and out. Since I have been working almost every day for three weeks, it's been great to come home and have the house clean inside and the outside taken care of, too. I really am appreciative of Dad's efforts since I am so tired by the time I get home.
At SES tonight, Dad did a review of tying down tarps and also a review of knots. Dad's group was very small tonight (only 4 of them) as everyone else was off doing different training. They also had to clean out four of their trailers. Sand from sand bags had spilled into the trailers and so they had to sweep out the sand and then reload the trailers with tarp kits, ropes, etc. (emergency kits to take out to clean up the damage after storms).
Yesterday, I had a really good day teaching at Kawungan - Fiona's grade one class again, with no 'challenge child' in attendance - it doesn't get much better than that for supply teaching. After having such a nice day with the kids, I said 'good-bye' to the grade one teachers and the office staff. I did tell them that I hoped to be back next year if there was a position available. I thought about taking today off school since I am already booked for tomorrow and then I start full-time next week. I was still thinking about it when I got a call yesterday afternoon asking me if I would be available to supply teach in a grade one class at Torquay - I thought, why not, a nice grade one class. Well, they were the class from H - E - Double Hockeysticks!!! I spoke to the behaviour support teacher who told me that seven of them have issues and she was so right. Two of them were major issues and the other five were enough of an issue that it was hard to get anything done. Let me tell you, when I got to the school and I saw two teachers who asked me who I was supplying for and they said 'good luck', I should have turned and run the other way. This is one day when I REALLY earned my money! And I would never go back to that class - no wonder the teacher has taken two days off. And to boot, she didn't even leave a plan for me - thank goodness the teacher next door, who was also off, had left a really good plan and so I photocopied it and carried it out. Then, today I spoke with the teacher who I am supplying for tomorrow and she said that I can do whatever I want for the day - she was keeping the photocopies for herself for Tuesday - greaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat! Sheesh! I have no idea what I will do, but there is a teacher's aide for almost all day, so I am sure she will help me out. I saw a couple of girls who will be in my class starting on Tuesday and they seemed really happy about me teaching them. Yesterday, after school, I met with Yvonne, the teacher who I am replacing for the rest of the year, and we went over her basic day to day plan. It was a good meeting and I think that I am ready for the first day next week. Chantelle and I met today after school and went over next week as well - I feel much better about starting up a new class now.
Dad and I went to the Family History Centre last night and met up with Rob and Rosalea there. I was hoping to get some more work done as I have received some emails from Uncle Rick with some more info about Grandpa Terry's family. I picked up the wrong bag, though, so I didn't have my family history bag with me. I was able to access Uncle Rick's email there and he had sent me a link about a UK census with Grandpa's grandfather on it, but when I tried to find the same info online, I couldn't find it. That was frustrating so I emailed Uncle Rick asking him how he found it - waiting for him to get back to me about it.
Dad has been working so hard around the house these past two days - he is in a lull with the census stuff right now and so he's been trying to get caught up with stuff around the house - inside and out. Since I have been working almost every day for three weeks, it's been great to come home and have the house clean inside and the outside taken care of, too. I really am appreciative of Dad's efforts since I am so tired by the time I get home.
At SES tonight, Dad did a review of tying down tarps and also a review of knots. Dad's group was very small tonight (only 4 of them) as everyone else was off doing different training. They also had to clean out four of their trailers. Sand from sand bags had spilled into the trailers and so they had to sweep out the sand and then reload the trailers with tarp kits, ropes, etc. (emergency kits to take out to clean up the damage after storms).
Tuesday, June 7, 2011
Wow, working full-time sure is tiring, but I guess it's preparing me for what I am in for during the next six months. Yesterday, I was in Rachael's class again - it was like the kids had forgotten all about their listening skills after the weekend and the girls were more annoying than usual. Yep, I said it - the GIRLS were the most annoying. I managed to get done almost everything that Rachael had asked me which was good - it made her feel less stressed to have so much testing completed. Luise gave me a beautiful bouquet of flowers to say thankyou for all the volunteering I have done in her class. The flowers are so lovely and it was such a nice thing for her to do for me. I have attached a photo of the flowers at the bottom of this blog. The grade one team are starting to make me feel like one of them - just in time for me to leave. :-)
Today I worked for Fiona (grade one teacher) and I was happy to get the call this morning to supply in that class - she has 22 beautiful children and one challenge child who isn't too too bad for me. Although, with the other 22 being so lovely, the one challenge child really stands out. I had a good day with this class and it was nice to be asked to go in there again tomorrow (and the challenge child is going on holidays tomorrow - is it wrong for me to say 'yippee' :-) I brought in three mud cakes today - that sounds yucky, but it's basically a moist chocolate cake with chocolate icing to die for - they are so yummy. I brought in one for the office staff, one for the grade one team and one for the grade two team - I just wanted to say thank you to them all for making me feel like part of their school family. It's been great working at Kawungan and I have told Leanne (the Deputy Principal) to keep me in mind for next year if she needs a teacher. A couple of the teachers said we need to get together for 'coffee' and I was pleased about that.
Dad spent yesterday morning at the Family History Centre - he went in to help Denise (the family history director) with some computer stuff. He ended up helping two patrons with their family history as well (you're never off when you are at the FHC. :-) He came home and spent the rest of the day doing 'househusband' stuff - I love coming home to a clean house and clean laundry hanging in my closet. :-)
After school yesterday, we went down to the beach. We are determined to get back on an exercise schedule and so we drove straight from school to the beach and took a fast walk along it for about half an hour. It sure is a nice way to get our exercise. :-) After supper, we drove over to a store called 'Harvey Norman's' and bought a freezer. Dad's been wanting to get one for ages - and they had a really good sale on. We have been wanting to buy more food which is on sale, but we haven't had the room in the fridge freezer. We talked with a lady at the store and she gave us some info about the different freezers. Originally we were going to buy a 164L freezer, but the more Dad looked at that one and the 216L one, the more he thought buying the bigger one was a better idea. As you know, when it comes to electrical/electronic stuff, I bow to Dad's opinion. :-) Dad went over to our friend, Rob's house today and borrowed his trailer - then he drove over to the store and picked up the freezer. It's sitting in our garage - Dad washed it out and plugged it in. We had to let it cool down for a couple of hours before we put anything in it. We are now looking forward to buying more specials and building up a little freezer food storage.
Dad made the BEST roast beef tonight - we had the missionaries over and one of them wanted a roast (I thought he meant roast beef - turns out he meant roast chicken - I will have to ask my friends at church/school if that is a typical Aussie meaning for roast :-) Anyway, Dad put the roast in a slow cooker and cooked it for eight hours. When he took it out and carved it, it just fell apart - it was sooooooo tender and soooooooooo delicious! The missionaries don't get meals like this too often, I'm thinking - they took a huge portion to start with and then both went back for seconds! Poor dad only has a measly portion for his lunch tomorrow. I told Dad that next time, he should take some off the plate first before he serves it up. :-)
Today I worked for Fiona (grade one teacher) and I was happy to get the call this morning to supply in that class - she has 22 beautiful children and one challenge child who isn't too too bad for me. Although, with the other 22 being so lovely, the one challenge child really stands out. I had a good day with this class and it was nice to be asked to go in there again tomorrow (and the challenge child is going on holidays tomorrow - is it wrong for me to say 'yippee' :-) I brought in three mud cakes today - that sounds yucky, but it's basically a moist chocolate cake with chocolate icing to die for - they are so yummy. I brought in one for the office staff, one for the grade one team and one for the grade two team - I just wanted to say thank you to them all for making me feel like part of their school family. It's been great working at Kawungan and I have told Leanne (the Deputy Principal) to keep me in mind for next year if she needs a teacher. A couple of the teachers said we need to get together for 'coffee' and I was pleased about that.
Dad spent yesterday morning at the Family History Centre - he went in to help Denise (the family history director) with some computer stuff. He ended up helping two patrons with their family history as well (you're never off when you are at the FHC. :-) He came home and spent the rest of the day doing 'househusband' stuff - I love coming home to a clean house and clean laundry hanging in my closet. :-)
After school yesterday, we went down to the beach. We are determined to get back on an exercise schedule and so we drove straight from school to the beach and took a fast walk along it for about half an hour. It sure is a nice way to get our exercise. :-) After supper, we drove over to a store called 'Harvey Norman's' and bought a freezer. Dad's been wanting to get one for ages - and they had a really good sale on. We have been wanting to buy more food which is on sale, but we haven't had the room in the fridge freezer. We talked with a lady at the store and she gave us some info about the different freezers. Originally we were going to buy a 164L freezer, but the more Dad looked at that one and the 216L one, the more he thought buying the bigger one was a better idea. As you know, when it comes to electrical/electronic stuff, I bow to Dad's opinion. :-) Dad went over to our friend, Rob's house today and borrowed his trailer - then he drove over to the store and picked up the freezer. It's sitting in our garage - Dad washed it out and plugged it in. We had to let it cool down for a couple of hours before we put anything in it. We are now looking forward to buying more specials and building up a little freezer food storage.
Dad made the BEST roast beef tonight - we had the missionaries over and one of them wanted a roast (I thought he meant roast beef - turns out he meant roast chicken - I will have to ask my friends at church/school if that is a typical Aussie meaning for roast :-) Anyway, Dad put the roast in a slow cooker and cooked it for eight hours. When he took it out and carved it, it just fell apart - it was sooooooo tender and soooooooooo delicious! The missionaries don't get meals like this too often, I'm thinking - they took a huge portion to start with and then both went back for seconds! Poor dad only has a measly portion for his lunch tomorrow. I told Dad that next time, he should take some off the plate first before he serves it up. :-)
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