Class went really well tonight

So after work, I headed over to class because A was working late, and he couldn't make it. I got there early, did a few things on the phone, read a library book on my Kindle, that sort of thing. There was a lot of participation this time; this was the class on empathy. I disclosed my own diagnosis tonight, which I've been very careful about so far, but it was at an appropriate time, somewhat ironically about 'coming out' with mental illness. I always think of my co-teacher as the 'main' teacher and myself as the 'supporter', but people are coming up to me with questions during break and after class, and it feels nice that they feel comfortable doing that. It's hard to believe we only have four more sessions to go! Next week involves an interesting communication exercise, and I'm curious to see how people react to that.

After class I went over to my friends' house, to see if they needed anything, as YKWIA had indicated he'd like me to earlier, but the house was dark, they were obviously asleep, and so instead of rousing the dogs by knocking without a porch light on or anything, I called to see if they might be awake at all. There was no answer, so I went on, checking as I went to see that the bedroom light was also dark. I'll catch up with them later.

Tomorrow I'm going in to work early for a birthday breakfast. They have it twice a year, the administrator makes us omelets, and otherwise it's a free breakfast bar served by the directors. Although my birthday was in April, it falls in this particular breakfast. Unfortunately, I have a doctor's appointment (which fortunately isn't fasting) at 8:30 am, so I'm going to go into work, eat breakfast, go to my appointment, and then go back.

I'm feeling good about work lately. Today I sent my boss an interesting article on the use of codes during active shooter situations and using plain language, and she really appreciated it. I'd found it on Facebook last night as a link via The Joint Commission. Also, in my other job in the revenue cycle position, I've found several things lately in reconciliation that translate to quite a bit of money. So I'm feeling like I'm contributing. Despite that, I really need to step up my job search, as my job is not going to the new medical centre and it's going to take awhile to find one, particularly if I want to stay a librarian (which I do, if at all possible).

Okay, I'm home, I'm in comfy clothes, and I've had a couple of peanut butter sandwiches. I spent my last five dollars on menstrual pads, 79 cent marked-down bread, and fruit spread. Sigh. I do wish things would get better financially, but I don't see that happening. I have a quarter of a tank of gas in the car, too, and that's certainly not going to last a week till I get paid. :( Tomorrow I need to call and make arrangements for an extension on my electric bill, or it'll be shut off Friday.

Oh, well. I think it's time to finish getting ready for bed, take my contacts out, snuggle up in front of the fan, and hopefully have pleasant dreams, for the morning comes early. Good night!

T minus five days and counting

Till I start teaching an eleven-week,  one-session-a-week class.  I'm starting to get a little nervous,  but I'm excited,  too.  This will be my first time doing this. Wish me luck!

Listening to Harry Chapin

I've been pretty busy the last few days, hence the barest of blogging

Sorry about that. Here's a synopsis of my week:

1. Monday--I went to my new therapist's office and was told that the psychiatrist's office (up a floor, but the same practice) had apparently not finalised my appointment, and the therapist wasn't in until later that day. Made an appointment for 4 pm, came back then, and then they realised the office upstairs had not sent any paperwork down, so she had to interview me without benefit of the doctor's notes. She went ahead and tested me for ADHD (I have been diagnosed with that before, and was on medicine for awhile, but those medical records were shredded the last time I came to this practice...it's not looking good in terms of efficiency, is it? But the doctor and psychologist seem to know their stuff and both asked very good questions. I've set up two appointments for May and am on standby on the cancellation list for late April--they have a couple of other women going on maternity leave and so she is taking on a bigger caseload and it is difficult to get in until May.
2. Tuesday--I had my allergies re-tested for the first time in about fifteen years. I still have the marks on my arm and back from where I reacted, and the marker even stayed on for about two days. I came out pretty much the same as before, except I didn't react to horses this time. They didn't test for food allergies. I'd been told I was allergic to wheat, eggs, and milk back in the day, but she said that if I didn't have any trouble eating them then I wasn't really allergic. She prescribed a different antihistamine for me, since the Claritin wasn't covering all of my symptoms, and she gave me a sample of an eye drop I can put in five minutes before my contacts that will help with the eye issues from my allergies. And, I am now the proud owner of an Epi-Pen, not because I have severe enough allergies for the things I reacted to, but rather because I'm going to start allergy shots again in about two weeks and they want me to keep one with me on shot days, as well as hanging out for about half an hour at their office after each shot. Last time I took them, I had no Epi-Pen, and after the first shot, I was able to have our employee health nurse give them to me, so they just sent me my vials as needed. My allergist did say I could do that again if it was alright with the hospital, since they have a crash cart, etc., should I have a reaction, but I checked and that's been discontinued, for obvious liability issues, I'm sure. So I will need to go into the office. Fortunately I live nearby. So I may have to adjust my schedule slightly and leave early a couple of days a week and come in a little earlier or stay late to make up for it, but that's okay with me.
3. Wednesday--I went to my last class, and we had a potluck and took a group picture. I'm on Instagram, in one half of a photo posted by the organisation. The second-to-the-last class we filled out evaluation forms and volunteer forms, and I'd said I would be willing to be trained to teach the course. I spoke with one of our co-leaders, who is with the organisation, and she said she would forward the application to me and serve as a reference. If I'm accepted, they'll pay for a hotel room in Louisville for an intensive weekend course on teaching the class. The next class starts June 3rd; the training is June 6th and 7th, but she said that if I was willing, I could start out in this one since the training was so close. So I may be teaching a class in the summer.
4. Thursday--I applied for a job at the Jessamine County Public Library. I so hope I get a call from them. I've been there before; it's a very nice facility and I felt comfortable with the people there the last time I interviewed. Nicholasville is nearby, just south of Fayette County by a few miles, so it would be easy to get to, although I'd be going against traffic. For me, it would be best to go down Man O' War and then onto US 27, thereby bypassing Nicholasville Road in Lexington for the most part. I did manage a small blog post, but never made it back like I'd hoped.
5. Today--I applied to teach the class. They had a very interesting application full of detailed instructions like not putting dashes or periods in the phone number, or checking a box above the text, etc. I think they were checking to see if you could fill it out with attention to detail. There were a few in-depth questions and an introduction to be written and attached. I sent in in and got an acknowledgement that they would be contacting me closer to time. Wish me luck. The only concern I have is that I have to go to Louisville, which means driving on the Interstate, something I haven't done in years and am somewhat anxious about, but I told the co-leader that I would do it, so I will. Afterwards I went over to YKWIA's and we watched this week's 'Grimm'. We still haven't seen last week's, but maybe we can do that tomorrow.

Tomorrow I take A to an appointment and to the grocery, probably twice for the latter, as they are out of bread and milk, and need that before we go to the appointment. So I need to get over there by about 8:30. I'm going to head on to bed now; I just wanted to catch up with my blogging. I'm listening to Loreena McKennitt and have the fan blowing on me. All is quiet otherwise. It's time to turn the fish tank lights off, brush my teeth, and crawl into bed. Good night.

A dedicated teacher using technology off the fly to keep the learning process going

Hun School teacher holds class via tablet as she sits in Pa. Turnpike gridlock

After missing multiple school days because of snow this winter, Hun School history teacher Lynn McNulty wasn’t going to let a series of chain-reaction car crashes and a miles-long traffic jam on the Pennsylvania Turnpike yesterday keep her from school another day.

“I was probably about two miles back from the big, serious pileup, but there were accidents all around,” McNulty said yesterday. “And I was like, ‘Oh this is bad.’”

After sitting in the stand-still for about an hour at the Willow Grove exit on the turnpike and live-streaming a news program on her cell phone, McNulty realized her chances of getting to school in time to teach her advanced placement European history class were not good. So she posted a message to her class through the school’s internal communications system, telling them to contact her via video chat when they got in.

Bridging a distance of miles through technology, McNulty yesterday used the school’s electronic resources and her tablet computer to teach her class from her car that was stopped on the turnpike, which was shut down for hours because of an initial 25-vehicle pileup around 8:30 a.m. in the eastbound lanes between Willow Grove and Bensalem and Willow Grove, according to 6ABC.com.

“Literally no one was moving, and I sat through a total of four-and-a-half hours,” McNulty said.

Kudos to her! In related news, In pileup on eastbound Pa. Turnpike, at least 25 injuries reported, I'm glad no deaths were reported--hopefully the injuries were minor and people will soon recuperate. What a scary situation.

It's all about touching lives

Dying teacher's quest: Did I make difference?

As careers go, it's been a short one, only 15 years. But David Menasche has spent every minute of it teaching English at Coral Reef Senior High School in Miami, where his former students number nearly 3,000.

Now 40, he's battling stage-four brain cancer. After three surgeries, 21/2 years of chemotherapy and 30 rounds of radiation, he is losing his battle against cancer. So in his final months, Menasche is doing what most teachers only dream of: He's traveling the country, visiting his former students and asking: Did I make a difference?

"I am at the end of my life," he said recently. "I don't know how much longer I have left, and I just wanted that sense of satisfaction that the time I did have I used well."

Because of course humiliation is the ticket to getting kids to read, right?

Or so seems to think this so-called "teacher".

Fourth-Graders Who Flunk Reading Have Faces Marked

A fourth-grade teacher in southern Idaho is being criticized after having her students use permanent markers to draw on the faces of classmates who failed to meet reading goals.

Some parents and administrators say the punishments given to nine students in Summer Larsen's class were inappropriate and left the children feeling shamed.

Cindy Hurst said recently her 10-year-old son came home from school Nov. 5 with his entire face - including his eyelids - scribbled on with green, red and purple markers.

"He was humiliated, he hung his head and wanted to go wash his face," Hurst told The Times-News of Twin Falls. "He knows he's a slow reader. Now he thinks he should be punished for it."

Reading should be fun. It should be something that people love to do. These children are not learning that. They're learning that if they're slow readers, it's a reason to feel shame. I can't think of a better way to get a child to hate reading, especially out loud in front of class. Kids have enough trouble with bullying in schools and the like. They don't need teachers who are bullies, too, or who model this sort of behaviour to other children, who no doubt will continue the shaming.

If I were a parent, I'd be calling for Ms. Larsen's dismissal, plain and simple, and not because I was being oversensitive, but because because Ms. Larsen apparently has no sensitivity when it comes to her students, and that's something the people we entrust our children to cannot be without.

I think one adjunct is going to find the pen is mightier than the sword

Thanks to the New York Times. :)

A Stutterer Faces Resistance, From the Front of the Class

As his history class at the County College of Morris here discussed exploration of the New World, Philip Garber Jr. raised his hand, hoping to ask why China’s 15th-century explorers, who traveled as far as Africa, had not also reached North America.

He kept his hand aloft for much of the 75-minute session, but the professor did not call on him. She had already told him not to speak in class.

The comments have many differing opinions, mostly in the young man's favour, however. I can see the adjunct's point, but I think she missed something important by refusing to call upon him in class and telling him to not speak during it. Let's face it. Adjuncts don't get paid much, and they have almost no real training in teaching (for that matter, full professors don't either; graduate school is all about research, and if you're a teaching assistant, you learn as you go). Of course, she did avail herself to him outside class, which is good, but expected. However, in silencing him, keeping the class running smoothly seems to be an excuse, at least from what I got from the article, which was admittedly one-sided. It seemed more that she simply didn't want to make the effort to understand and answer him. How would she deal with someone with an extremely thick accent, or someone with Tourette's? What about know-it-alls who monopolise class time? They are truly disruptive. A part of one's grade is often class participation, not just to demonstrate knowledge (which writing down the answers and giving them to her might have done) or to gather knowledge (by communicating to her outside of class), but also so that other students can learn from those interactions. He was essentially shoved aside in favour of getting through the material quickly, rather than encouraging learning, including respect for others with differences that can sometimes seem inconvenient.

I do agree with one commenter in particular: maybe, as a teacher of history, she should consider reading or watching The King's Speech.