Can I see? Can I see???

I learned recently that my students don't like to have their picture taken, BUT they do love to A picture taken of something of their choosing.

Today their Yupik teacher Anita took them out to have them collect plants. I don't know what the objective was for this outing, but it was nice to take some pictures of them out and about.













They loved giving me plants to eat and watching my reaction.

"Try this!"

or

"This is a medicine here. Try it!"

Everything was tart. I won't be surprised tonight if I wake up with a stomach ache. Oh, and don't think that I am just an ignorant fool. I made my students chew these plants first and SWALLOW before I dived in.

This is my pet...

I was instantly reminded of where I am currently living when my colleague Ben, who teaches second grade, showed me this:

Do I stay or do I go now?

If I go there will be trouble.

I was thinking of this particular Clash song this morning as these questions starting floating through my head.
I kept thinking- do I stay or do I change now?
Will what I am doing eventually catch on, or do I switch to a totally different classroom philosophy?

When will we be a functioning unit?

Is this normal?

What am I doing wrong?

I spent a lot of time this morning just sitting at my desk praying for a peaceful day and pondering how to make that happen.

We are in week 3 and I am waiting for my class to kind of get into the groove of how we do things. I am now thinking Thanksgiving.

I still have the occasional outburst and every once in awhile a runner, but today things calmed down quite a bit- even with my challenging students present.

I am learning to accept, but push them further, encourage but not overwhelm, be patient and sometimes relentless....

They respond even to my version of the evil eye. The more strict I am, the more they sit up and listen.

It's hard for me to constantly read my students and not crack a smile, sometimes downright exhausting! But it works- they need those permanent boundaries and constant reminders.

And chocolate cupcakes. Definitely chocolate cupcakes!

Home Sweet Home!

Arctic Entry.


Washer/Dryer.


Entrance into apartment.


Living Room.




Kitchen.





Bedroom.







Bathroom wall.

More pics...

Kasigluk, a nearby village in the evening.



Our dump...looks a little different from the one in the Cayman Islands b/c even though I have lived right next to a pile of trash two times...this one will be removed soon. Insha'Allah.



Outside decor.

Door prizes...

look a little different here.

Parent Conferences

This morning started off with some sad news. There was a death last night of a young adult. Found in a boat on the river. Tragic loss.
It's not common, but it does happen. There have been three losses recently due to health reasons, this mysterious one makes it the fourth.


I was forewarned first thing this morning that I may see a few absences. I normally see 4-5 students out on a daily basis with 2-3 students tardy anywhere from 1-3 hours.
This morning I had 4 out and 1 tardy by about 3 hours.

But on a lighter note, it's parent conference week and I was expecting maybe four or five parents in all. I have 18 students now and I had all but 4 of my students' parents.

Can we say, "Awesome!"

It was enlightening. I was able to ask some questions and hear from parents their thoughts on the school system out here. There were some some good points made, and then there were others that just made my heart break. Many changes here. Many.

Right now I am just counting down the final 30 minutes of parent conferences while our tech. guy Matthew tries to pull a transparency out of my copier. (I have my own copier by the way! It is my new best friend.) I was apparently not supposed to feed it anything but plain paper. My suggestion to Matthew was to use a sledgehammer and then duct tape it back together.

He looked at me like I was crazy- he's not use to my sense of humor just yet.

Week 35. Done.
Off to the post office. Then home. bon week-end

Quotes of the day:

"Oh my. You are a girl teacher. The way my son was talking about you, I thought you were a man."

"My son came home on Monday with a smile on his face. It was the first real smile that I have seen in a long time. He said you were strict and it made him happy." (Pray for this boy...He went hunting during the first week of school, has been in class all this week and he didn't want to get out of bed today and come to school. I don't know why the sudden change)

Getting to know you...

Just a few of my students and what they are about.

Ice to the Scream!

When? This morning.

Where? MY classroom.

Who? One of my students.

What happened? I was given this:



I jumped for joy. Someone finally got my "hints" in class and brought me berries. They just happened to be mixed in with Crisco and sugar. But did I care???? Nope. I was ecstatic that one of my students thought to bring this for me.



And to make sure she understood how much I appreciated what she had done:- I wrote her a thank you note)

Things that make me smile.

The rainbow that I see after a rainy day.



Dinner with friends.

Deborah is on the right and she is an Alaska State Mentor for brand new teachers. I invited her over for dinner last night b/c right now I am being schooled by my students and I needed some, well... help.
Eight years of teaching and I am currently in the dark on how to run my classroom. She gave a lot of insight into what I can anticipate, where I may be going wrong and then what I am doing right.

It was a good discussion and it helped greatly after a day like yesterday. Well, that and her homegrown veggies served with salmon belly meat. Amazingness!

Today was rough but once again ended with good run with some of my students that are on the cross country team. I have four boys out of the eleven that are on the team and that makes me proud. They just make me smile.

And I needed that after seeing two kids ( at different times) run out of my classroom. And b/c I worry, I am constantly checking on the situation even though I have 15 others in my class still that need my attention It was quite the crazy day.

I am grateful that tomorrow is a short day as well as Friday. It gives me some more breathing room and time to process that this will happen b/c it is the norm here. Take off like the wind, never to return til the next morning- or afternoon. AS long as there is someone to teach in the morning- I will be ok:)

What's in your water?

Uhh...whatever makes this pleasant sight:)


I am so thankful that we have a distiller and 2 water purifiers. It makes all the difference!

Tonight's menu?

Oh, that'd be cookies galore:) And we will be eating those puppies up while we grade papers and watch The Closer on our new 19 inch big screen tv-lol.

So glad for the small things- thanks Nana!

Meet my meat.

Let the crock pot games begin!

I was so happy to see that my meat was found and brought right to my doorstep this evening.

I ordered 25 lbs. of meat on August 8. It was processed and sent out on August 11. It was then lost and somehow recovered, placed on a plane, then boat, and then in my hands at 5 o'clock tonight, August 21, 2011- for the low, low price of 165 bucks ( 92 for the order, the rest- airfare for the meat).

It's my hope that it was frozen the entire time. If not, oh well... lesson learned. Buy in Bethel.

Another beautiful warm day.

As I sit here waiting...

for a phone call telling us that we are in fact heading out on the river to go fishing...I'll post some pics of Nunap's 2011/12 first Friday Fiesta Dinner...courtesy of Matt & Ben.


While the kids were outside enjoying their freedom...we were inside enjoying some great food and good conversation.



Matt was quite the busy cook. Running to the stove to check on his food, then over to the smoke detector every 30 seconds.



Let the games begin.








Then home for a good night's rest. 10:40 pm.


And as I wrap up this post...I have to sadly say that there will be no fishing on this lovely day. I am sad that this is the case, but ok with the fact that I have a little more time to pull things together for four classroom visits on Monday.