Tuesday, August 9, 2011

Well, a busy two days when usually I have little to write about.  First of all, we FINALLY got our living room furniture and it looks GREAT!  The set is a plum colour so it looks really nice against the grey of the carpet and the blinds in the living room.  I thought that the furniture might get lost in the room since it's quite a good sized room, but it fits beautifully.  So, now we can finally start having people over for dinner and have somewhere to sit with them after dinner rather than sitting at the kitchen table.  Both Dad and I sat in the chairs and on the couch and they are so comfortable.

Dad had his second collectors' training meeting last night (6 - 8pm) and it went really well - in fact, it went quicker than expected - he had asked everyone to be there for three hours, but they were finished in less than 2 hours.  Dad brought in the patio table and some chairs and set those up along with the kitchen table and chairs (and made one long table going  lengthwise in the dining and family rooms).  The main purpose was to review what they had to do when they went to pick up the census forms beginning tomorrow. 

It's been a rough two days at school, but what else is new.  It's becoming a job to me - something that I have to do until I finish up in 15 1/2 weeks.  It's not fun to feel I have a job rather than a career which I love - however, it does help me to understand how Dad felt during his last two years of work at Air Canada.  I asked him yesterday if he would have retired if I had stayed teaching at R.J. Lee and he said 'yes' - he was not enjoying his job at all and didn't want to stay in it any longer than necessary - I understand  what that was like for him now.  I didn't understand it back when I was teaching in Canada because I loved what I did back then - I used to say to Catherine, my principal, that I was so happy to come in to work every day and felt bad that I couldn't understand what Dad was going through - I get it now.

Today is 'Census' Day in Australia and Dad was really busy today.  He received tons of emails and texts today from various people.  All the collectors were calling Dad as they were getting messages to go and do things (like give out extra forms) and they didn't know where to go and do these things as Dad had their collector record books.  He got them from his collectors yesterday as he had to review them and make sure everything was in order (eg: to ensure that the books has been filled out correctly).  He also spent some time today returning the books to the collectors. 

Sunday, August 7, 2011

What a lovely weekend - but first, let's talk about Friday (ugh).  Every morning, I try to get positive - that the school day will go well - but, one hour after it starts, I am 'down' again.  Anyway, at least Friday came finally.  And it started with a two hour meeting (the behaviour teacher took over my class during that time).  I hate meetings!  It was all the grade one and Prep teachers and the principal and deputy principal.  Each of the teachers took turns talking about how their class was doing re: the goals which were set last meeting (a month ago).   Then, we each showed one thing we were using in our classrooms which had been successful and showed differentiation (teaching to all skill levels).  I showed two things: my CVC (consonant/vowel/consonant) cards: a pic and then three blanks below it where they use clay to form the letters of the word (my high kids) and ones with pics and words on them for the low kids.  I also showed my matching cards for math: match the number of stars to the number on the astronaut cards (numbers from 1 - 20).  The principal asked me where I got these ideas and when I told him, he wrote it down so I think that he's going to pass the internet site on to other teachers which made me feel good.  I don't feel that the meeting was worth two hours of my time, but then I had two hours out of the classroom so I guess I can't complain. :-)

I spent more time on Friday helping the children practice how to line up and walk without talking - I stood there and waited for them to be quiet and every time someone talked on the way to where we were going, I stopped them from walking and we waited 'til that person was quiet.  They ended up missing their 15 minutes of play time because it took so long for us to get back from music - we talked about it when we got back to to the classroom, but they will likely have forgotten it by Monday.  Oh well - at least we only have six weeks left of this term - unfortunately, we also have ten MORE weeks next term before the year finishes. 

Dad spent the day mostly doing stuff at home.  He vacuumed the house, put out the laundry, prepared his priesthood lesson, and worked on his census training which will be this coming Monday.  There's so much on his plate right now, it's a good thing that he doesn't have a full-time job. :-)

We slept in on Saturday (until 7am) and then relaxed for the next few hours.  We had a treat in the middle of our resting when we Skyped with Terri-Ann and James.  The boys had already gone to bed, but it was nice to catch up with Terri-Ann and James. :-)  Hopefully, we can catch up with the boys next weekend.  Anyone else out there wanna Skype?

After lunch, I went out for a girls' day out with my friend, Denise.  She is my Primary secretary and we get along really well.  She picked me up and we went for a walk down on the beach first of all.  We both love the water and it was lovely to just yak and walk - Dad and I haven't been getting down there as often as we would like - I said when I moved here that I wanted to make sure that we didn't take the beach for granted - it seems like we have been too busy lately to appreciate it.  The sun wasn't shining (wouldn't you know it - the only day this week when it didn't shine), but the temperature was nice and so we really enjoyed our walk.  Next, we went visiting teaching.  Denise's VTing companion is sick right now and so Denise asked me if I would mind accompanying her. Of course I was happy to do it since I love to meet up with the sisters and have a good yak.  Our first visit was with Leanne who is our Primary chorister - she is also a teacher and so we talked some about my not-so-positive experience with the Prep class.  She suggested I go and apply at the private school near where we live and I told her that I was definitely going to do that, and soon.  Our second visit was with Judy - she is about 80 years old and she took a shine to me when we moved in.  Four months ago, she had a stroke and we thought we had actually lost her, but she is bounding back and it was good to go and spend some time with her.'

After our visiting teaching, we went to 'Hungry Jack's' (Burger King) and had a lovely dessert and drink for afternoon tea.  They had a good deal ($5) for some sticky date pudding and hot chocolate - the sticky date pudding was topped with caramel syrup and soft ice-cream.  It was sooooooooooo yummy!  And it also gave us some more time to talk which is always good.  We are going to try and do this on a regular basis.

While I was gone, Dad spent time doing census stuff (are you sensing a pattern here :-)  Finally, all his collectors fnished their routes (even Peter!) so Dad was smiling big Saturday night.  Plus, he got to watch two episodes of 'Air Crash Investigation' - what could be better than that? :-)

Dad drove me to the emerg today before church - we have found that going on Sundays usually means a quick turn-around there and today was no exception - I was in and out within an hour.  This blocked ear is driving me crazy and I haven't been able to get in to see my doctor (and I hate the idea of having to pay to go and see my doctor - most doctors charge a fee over and above the Medicare rate - I think it's about $24 a visit).  Anyway, a doctor there looked at my ears and said that he believes that my Eustachian tube is inflamed and that fluid is filling my middle ear - probably from when my ear and throat were sore a few weeks ago.  He drew me a picture of my ear and showed me what was happening inside.  He told me to take some anti-inflammatory medicine - like Advil (the brand name here is Nurofen) - for three days and to lay on my left side at night since it's my right ear which is affected.  He also gave me a script (prescription) for Amoxycillin which he said he hopes I don't have to take, but to do it if the Nurofen doesn't fix the  problem within the next three days.

We were late getting to church today and so missed some of the testimonies - our meeting actually went late because so many people wanted to get up and bear their testimonies and our Bishop doesn't like to cut anyone short who wants to bear their testimony.  He told us in our Ward Council meeting after church that our Stake President wants to know how many people mention their faith/belief in Jesus Christ in their testimonies and the Bishop said that all 21 people who bore their testimony today spoke about Jesus Christ. 

We spent the rest of our Sunday resting and relaxing - we were going to have a nap, but by the time we got home after church and the Ward Council meeting and driving the missionaries home, it was about 2:30pm, so we figured that was too late to start napping.  I love Sundays - going to church and then relaxing for the rest of the day is such a nice change from the rest of our hectic week. 

Thursday, August 4, 2011

It's been two full-on days at school as usual.  The days pretty much flow into each other and sometimes it just is hard to remember all that happened.  It seems that lately it's been more about setting up routines and spending so much time disciplining - I almost feel like I'm a mother having to teach these children how to sit still and be quiet and listen and  focus and get their work done, blah blah blah. :-)  I feel like I am (mostly) able to handle my four challenge children a little better each day.  James has not had a meltdown in ages - I seem to be able to talk with him and help him to do what he needs to do.  Mia sometimes still has crying fits when her mother brings her to school (I wish she would bring her on time - she is late almost every day), but Mia is having less meltdowns in the classroom.  Baylee is still driving me crazy as is Brayden - those two I am working on.  Baylee just keeps pushing it (I asked his mother to come and talk with me - via Baylee's older brother - and the message I got back was that she was in the car and didn't have time to come and talk with me, so that tells you something, eh?) and so he loses stars and then his playtime - I think with him it's just going to be a matter of staying on top of him and not letting up.  Brayden has so many issues, but I do like him, so that's a plus.  Because he has trouble focusing and tends to talk (and bother) whoever he chooses to sit beside, I have now put down a little mat on the carpet for him to sit on all the time (and it's right in front of me) and he has to sit next to Kayla W. who is the sweetest girl in my class. 

I am reviewing and changing my class schedule again - it always seems that I need to add something and now it's science.  I don't know how I am supposed to fit in language, math, science, P.E., music, etc. etc. - and all in kindergarten.  I wonder if Australia has ever checked out the education system in Canada - with children only going half a day to kindergarten (although I did hear before we left Canada that there was talk of it becoming full days which I think is crazy).  Terri-Ann, now that I have taught children in full-day kindergarten, I totally understand why you kept Colin home every Wednesday for a while - for some children, it's so tiring.  So, tonight, I changed my class schedule to include Science - of course, something else has to go, but hey, what do the higher ups care about consistency for little five year olds.

Census stuff has been keeping Dad very busy in the past two days.  He has been in constant contact with his collectors as well as with his supervisor.  This is the busiest week to date for his collectors - and today he found out that all but two of his collectors are completely done their routes which really pleased Dad.  His other two collectors are still working hard and should be done in time (by Sunday night).  Dad is finding this working stuff tiring - he finds by Thursday, he's very weary.  He also was back to Meals on Wheels today (it  went fine) and then went to SES tonight.  Tonight's training was divided into two:  the first half was about parking and traffic control which the SES is doing for the Whale Festival this Saturday.  Dad will not be able to help out with this task, though, as he will be still busy with making sure his final two collectors complete their routes - he said that he might have to go and 'help' them move along.  The second half of the night was spent doing an exercise on briefing - getting and giving them as in a search exercise.  The idea was to be able to get the important info from a briefing and also to be able to give a briefing that gives pertinent info.

Tuesday, August 2, 2011

There really isn't much to write about today - basically things have been going the same at school with me - still trying to get used to all the extra stuff expected of teachers here (paperwork) on top of meetings (2 hour long ones every other week) and the principal checks up on us to make sure we are having them.  And all that is on top of having to deal with the behaviour issues and large classes (23 five year olds) which is actually a lot of work - and then put it together with all day school for five year olds (they really need to nap :-)  and it's even harder and more wearying work.  Chantelle and I were saying just yesterday that we think that school should end at 1:30pm here (that's the time of their second break here - we start school at 8:50am here and have our first break at 10:50am which goes for 40 minutes, our second break from 1:30pm - 2:00pm and school ends at 3pm). 

Dad's been busy with census stuff - it's basically taking up most of his time now.  He has been visiting with his collectors when they have needed help, helping them over the phone when there are problems, and checking in with them via texting to see how many homes they have managed to do.  One of his collectors is almost finished and she has the largest number of houses to go to - almost 600.  There have been some people who have refused to do the census (which is against the law and punishable by large fines) or have made complaints against the collectors (totally unfounded).  Dad's collectors are doing really well in the delivering except for one man, but he told Dad that he will be out every day this week and assured Dad that he will get it done in time - they have until Sunday night to complete their workload.

We have new missionaries in our ward now - Elder Paki went home (his two years was over and so he headed home to Melbourne today) and Elder Richardson got transferred - so we have two new young men.   We met Elder Johnson on Sunday - he is from Calgary and is a Flames fan - YAY! :-)  The other Elder, Dad has met, but he can't remember his name.  Dad took Elders Paki and Richardson to Maryborough to catch a train to Brisbane yesterday and picked up the new missionary.  We will have them to dinner next week and start to get to know them.

I still have my raspy throat and blocked ear - it's driving me crazy now - I told Dad that if things haven't changed by Sunday, I am heading into the emerg to see what they can find out.  We have tried to get an appointment with our doctor, but it's just about impossible and both times I have been to emerg on a Sunday afternoon, it's been very quiet  and I have been able to get in pretty quickly, so we'll see what happens.  It sure is hard to read many books to the children, though, with this raspy voice - today I had to ask my TA, Sam, to read a story to the kids during their fruit break.  They are not allowed to eat inside like I used to do with my students in Canada, so we go outside and sit on the pavement and we read a book or two to the kids while they eat their snack.

That's it for the past two days - not much going on - probably not much for the rest of the week, either, but I will be sure to write anyway - I sure don't want Krystal to be able to call me a 'slacker' again. :-)

Sunday, July 31, 2011

What a busy three days, but not bad overall. :-)  Friday went better at school - well, sort of.  The students lost more stars than I would have liked, but it was not a bad day overall.  At least, I didn't come out stressed at the end of  the day and wanting to gorge myself silly with chocolate. :-)  I hope that I am getting through to these students - I would really like to 'want' to go into school each day rather than sighing as I go in. 

I took a break on Saturday morning and watched some tv.  I happened to be watching an episode of the 'Love Boat' and who should be a guest on it but Donny Osmond.  I was so sure I was going to see/hear him sing, but wouldn't you know my luck - it was a part one and today (Sunday) it was the second part.  Sheesh.  Where is a pvr when you need it! :-)

Dad spent Friday 'tracking down' his collectors - he had to meet up with all of them since it was their first day of collecting and make sure that they were doing the collecting correctly.  He was able to find five out of the seven - he wasn't able to connect with the two teachers he had hired - one was sick and he just couldn't find where the other one was doing her collecting.  He was able to find both of them on Saturday.  They were all doing a good job - he did well in the hiring, that's for sure.  There is one collector who is very slow at getting around, but hopefully he will just spend more time doing the collecting and get it all done in time.  He has another week to finish the collecting.  We had a woman stop by our place on Saturday afternoon who was a census collector - when I  told her that Dad was an area supervisor, she asked me if he had spent a lot of time doing his job - I told her that he had spent many hours doing the job.  Dad completed our census information on the internet (e-census), but his collectors have been  telling him that most people are asking for a paper form to fill out rather than doing via the net.  I guess if you live in a town with many retirees, that is to be expected.

I spent the afternoon doing school stuff - right now, there is a ton to do - but, I made quite a dent in it, so that's good.  I drove the car to the chapel at around 3:15pm only to find everyone packing up.  I asked Dad was what happening and he said it was over.  I told him that he had said that it was going until 4pm and he said he said that the Open Day only went to 3pm and that he was going to be done by 4pm (cleaning up, etc. afterwards).  Anyway, it appeared that some miscommunication had gone on and I didn't get to see the displays or his presentation so I was quite disappointed.  Everyone involved in the day was very pleased with the turnout. They had 96 people come to the Open Day of which at least 70 were non-members. In the chapel, they had three demonstrations:  how to index names (converting old records into internet searchable databases), how to order and use microfilms and microfiches, and the free family history resources available at the FHC.  In another room, there was a demonstration about the free on-line research training courses people can watch and Dad did his demonstration in a fifth classroom.  His demonstration was on the new family search which is a global family datasbase which is now open to the general public.  The Bishop even mentioned more than once today how impressed he was with everything that had happened on the Open Day.  So, after all of Dad's and Denise's work, it was all worth it! :-) 

We had another lovely winter's nap outside today. :-)  It was 25C today, although it was a bit windy.  But when I checked out the wind on the patio, it was very slight and the sun was shining down - it was a perfect way to spend a couple of hours on a wintry Sunday afternoon. :-)

Thursday, July 28, 2011

Well, Krystal might call me a 'slacker' again for not writing on Tuesday (), but I have a legitimate reason this time - I am sick again - can you believe it?  My throat is so raspy and it's hard to talk - and then on Tuesday night, the pain in my ear started shooting through - it was so painful I went and took two extra strength Tylenol that night.  Even with that, though, I couldn't get to sleep until 1:30pm and the night before I only got about three hours sleep.  Those sleepless nights were due to the stress I feel about teaching at this school.  I have talked to other teachers at the school and they are feeling the same thing.  We are doing too much disciplining and not enough teaching.  I also hate it that they want to push these kids beyond what they are ready for.  It really ticks me off that the 'powers that be' make these decisions when they really have no idea what they are doing - and they have no idea what it's like to be teaching 24 five year olds in this classroom in this area.  I can see how children like Colin (who's five and has such amazing support at home) could be doing what they want a Prep child to do, but these children (in general) do not come from homes like you girls have and so many of them come with issues which need to be addressed before teaching them to read at the age of five.  We are not supposed to have a play-based program anymore in Prep, but I said to heck with it and I actually let them play for fifteen minutes each day!  So sad, eh?

My program is starting to come together.  I have my language program at a place I am happy with and my theme program (where they do a lot of arts/crafts/language) sorted out to a place I am happy with.  I am also teaching them to 'read to themselves' during D.E.A.R. (drop everything and read) time.  The only area I am not happy with is my math program and so I am going to work on that this Saturday.  So, it's only taken me five weeks to get to this point.  Needless to say, because of the fact that I am not enjoying working, I am counting down the days - we have seven weeks left in this term and ten weeks left in the next term.  I am pleased that it's Friday tomorrow.

I had this mom of one of my kids come to me a couple of days ago to ask me if I could open up the classroom doors earlier (both Chantelle and Pam open their doors at 8:30am, but I didn't want to open them up early, even though Yvonne, the teacher I took over from, used to open them early).  The mom said that some parents want to come in earlier so they can look around and say good-bye to their children and put their child's stuff where it needs to go and go to the library.  I asked her if she couldn't go to the library before she came to the classroom and she said that really wasn't the point.  I felt that ten minutes was enough time for the children to prepare for the day.  Anyway, she also said that some parents were having to leave their children outside the room so they could go to work (am I their babysitter, I thought) and that rather than complaining about it, she thought she would say something.  I was quite annoyed at this (things sure are better at RJ Lee with no parents being allowed in the classroom and teachers not being expected to open the doors before the bell).  So, against my own feelings, I opened the door yesterday and today at 8:30am and guess what time that mother showed up both days: 8:42 - yeah, that's right - past the time I was opening up before.  Sheesh! :-(

Dad has been really busy this week between doing census stuff and family history stuff.  He has been making his final preparations and training his final people and visiting the last few places (like the fire station) because delivery of the census forms begins tomorrow morning at 8:30am.  He will be out on the streets beginning tomorrow morning at 8:30am tracking down each collector and walking with them to a few houses until he is comfortable that they are comfortable with what they have to say and do and the information they have to get from each house. 

He has also been busy making preparations for the mall display which took place today - the mall display is part of National Family History Week which is this week in Australia.  He had a large poster/sign made up advertizing the Family History Centre Open Day which will take place at our church on Saturday.  He also had little cards printed which had the information about the National Family History Week on it and an invitation to the Family History Open Day.  He was given a reprieve from Meals on Wheels  today (they had extra people on this week) which gave him the opportunity to man the display at the mall this morning.  He said that a number of people stopped by the display and said that they would be interested in coming to the Open Day.  He has also been busy making preparations for the Open Day on Saturday.   They are planning five different displays/activities: 1) live demonstration of the New Family Search global database; 2) demonstration of New Family Search indexing; 3) demonstration on the available online research courses re: family history; 4) demonstration of microfilm and microfiche reading ; and 5) demonstration of the available free premium family history websites that one normally has to pay for, but is free at our chapel. 

Sunday, July 24, 2011

Well, I HAD to make sure that I didn't forget to write tonight since Krystal called me a 'SLACKER' for not writing 3 times last week. :-) 

I was very happy to have Friday come - Fridays at school are fairly easy.  Literacy rotations (already set up) and gym, then it was activity rotations (already set up) and show and tell, music, learning about the worm farm, science (with Mr. Keatley) and computers.  After a very hectic and exhausting week, it was a nice way to end the week at school.  One of my 'challenge' children was not there on Friday, but one of the ones who has been pretty good in the past while was totally off, so I was quite tired by the end of the day.  I was able to get a ton of photocopying done on Friday which I was really pleased about.  The regular photocopier which counts how many copies we make has been on the blink and they have a loaner which does not count the number of copies, so I have been trying to use it as much as I can. :-)

Dad met with our friend, Rob, from church on Friday morning - they needed to plan the lesson for today for the Relief Society/Priesthood combined class.  The lesson was called 'Missionary Media Presentation".  The Pacific Area presidency is putting together a media awareness campaign for Australia about the members of the church in Queensland.  They have asked the members to create a written profile about themselves on mormon.org.  They are also asking members to create a video profile as well to be put on mormon.org and to be part of a television/media campaign.  So, on Friday, Dad showed Rob the presentation that  the area presidency had put together and several sample profiles which are already on mormon.org as examples of what the area presidency are looking for members to do.

Friday night we rented two movies - one of which Jennifer suggested we watch and another since we had a coupon to rent two movies for $6.50.  We watched the movie Jennifer recommended on Friday night which was called "The Next Three Days" and we thought it was a good movie - we rated it about a 7.0.  It was a long time setting everything up, but the exciting part kept our attention. 

We didn't have any special plans for yesterday (Saturday) so we just puttered around in the morning and then did some errands - I needed to pick up some things for school - we are doing a fairy tale unit at school and I needed to pick up some paper crowns so that the children can decorate them to be either Cinderella or the prince in that story (that's our fairy tale of the week this coming week) and also supplies to make Cinderella cupcakes as we have a cooking class each week.

In the afternoon, we watched the second movie we had rented - it was called 'Sanctum'.  It was basically about a group of people who go caving (exploring caves underground) and what happens to them when they get trapped in one.  It was a good movie - we rated it about a 7.0 - worth a rent if you might be interested in that type of movie.  There were quite a few surprises along the way which kept it interesting.

Saturday evening was spent doing school and church stuff - more prepping for my literacy centres and Primary Sunbeam class lesson and Dad reviewing his talk for today and also working on the two Family History events which will occur this coming week.  It kept us going until about 10:30pm.  I was thinking as I was doing all of this how nice it would be to have a job where it just went from 9am to 5pm and when I got home, there was nothing to do that was job related.  Oh well - that's never going to happen if I stay teaching. :-)

Today, Dad gave his talk in Sacrament meeting about Family History and he did a great job!  I was sitting in between two friends and both turned to me after the meeting and said what a great job Dad had done.  He was really prepared and the talk was really organized and he made it personal which always keeps people's attention.  One of our friends even told me that her husband said that Dad's talk was so good that he ALMOST convinced him (our friend's husband) to do his family history. :-)

During the Relief Society/Priesthood combined meeting today, Dad and Rob showed the presentation from the area presidency along with samples of written profiles and samples of video profiles of members of the church.  Four of these profiles were well-known Australian Latter-Day Saints and the fifth profile was Terri-Ann's (that was really cool!). 

After church, Dad and I started watching a movie, but both of us were so tired that we were falling asleep, so I suggested we have a nap.  It was a wintry day and so of course we napped outside. :-)  It is the middle of our winter and the temperature (according to our outside thermometer) was 26C, the sky was blue and the sun was shining. :-)  So, Dad and I took our pillows outside and laid down on our chaise loungers and fell asleep for 2 1/2 hours - I think that we are going to have to do this every Sunday. :-)  We spent the rest of the day relaxing - I love Sundays! :-)