This blog has gone untended for many many moons(as my father would say). So what's been happening? Long story short:
-I left for summer break on July 16 and spent 3 weeks in the US.
-I left for summer break on July 16 and spent 3 weeks in the US.
-US overview: fire at house, survived 18 hour road trip with my Mom(awesome) 4 & 3year old(never again I say NEVER AGAIN) to visit my old man(big brother), niece battled the coffeetable and ended up with 6 stitches, the love of my life is talking like none other(key phrase: I can't like it) and needs 3 year old military school(lol), my brother needs&deserves a long vacation(if I had the resources I'd ship him somewhere to relax), st. paul was as good as I remember, delayed flight out of DC resulted in being stuck in NYC overnight, business class upgrade (sweeeet), almost all my books I brought back got wet(epic fail)
-Spent my birthday in CapeTown
-CapeTown: Left me feeling rather disturbed. The vast disparity between the natural beauty of the land and the utter poverty of many of it's residents. The entire trip was an emotional rollercoaster and not at all as I had imagined but it was overall very good.
-Back in the UAE getting ready for the start of a new school year. Before the start of every school year for the past 7 years my mind goes blank. It's like I'm back in undergrad and have no idea what I'm doing. It's the oddest thing. Yet as soon as I get out my children's stories to find a good book for the first weeks-The Kissing Hand, If You Take a Mouse to School, Timothy Goes to School to name a few- it all starts to flow and I can't stop myself. Before I know it the day has passed by and I'm completely engrossed in plotting a planning for my new set of kids. This year I'm thinking of incorporating Writer's Workshop strageties into my classroom. I'm also going to make use of the one of the many bags I have. I'm thinking of having students pic out one or two books to take home to read to their parents...I'm still fiddling with the details. Overall I'm as excited about this coming school year as I am every year. I'm just really hopeful that we get great LTs that stick out the year. I have no desire to be the only LT at my school anymore. Diffused responsibility would be nice.
