WELCOME TO KINDERGARTEN!

Well, I guess this is what they call 'back to reality.' Most of the time my experiences overseas seem like only a figment of my imagination now. Although that chapter is over, I am excited in welcoming this new chapter to see where it leads me. 

Last week was my first week as a full-time teacher! It was a great week and as my second week has come to an end, I am very grateful for weekends to rest and mentally recharge. I do genuinely love being a teacher. It's challenging, difficult, surprising at times but it's always about the smile on the children's faces and the warmth they put in my heart. 

I am very grateful to have a gorgeous learning space for the Kindies! I have twenty-one kindergartners who come to school for full days every other day. Their excitement for learning and coming to school is admirable. Just this week, we were able to read our first poem! They were so excited for it that they wanted to show their moms and dads. I had to run down to the photocopier at recess time to run copies for them to take home! ha ha! 

My kinders singing "Five Little Monkeys" by the Learning Station. They LOVE this song and video!

On the days the Kindies don't come to school, I trade in my paint and marker covered hands for oven mitts! Yes, I get to teach Grade 10 Commercial Cooking! I also teach Grade 1 Social, Science, Computers, Library and Printing on those days. But mostly, I am excited for my cooking class. I have to say, the noon hour before the first class started I could barely eat I was so nervous. I didn't know how many students to expect as the roll hadn't yet been confirmed and I was picturing them all as giants! 

My Cooking Lab has 4 awesome kitchens!

These guys were cooking up Chicken Quesadillas and homemade Salsa!

As it turns out, teaching grade 10's isn't at all half bad. I really enjoy it and I have a great group of students. It's nice because this is a class that the students get to choose, so they enjoy coming to class as well. It's a win win for everyone! Being able to teach grade 10 has been a nice balance for me. I have often asked my grade 10's if they would like to stand up and do a "brain break" or do a little dance because I feel so bad for them sitting and listening to me talk for more than 15 minutes! Ha Ha!  

While I've got you here, allow me show you around my classroom. I've put a fair bit of work into it and I'm proud of how it's turned out. Each time I am done with one project, there is always something more waiting to be done. I spend most evenings and weekends at the school fixing everything up and getting the paperwork done as well! 

I love my "BEE-utiful" board where students can post pictures they've created. How cute is it!?

Kolby is one of my students who is so passionately curious about everything! He asks many intriguing questions and I am so happy that he likes looking at my map. He is always finding new things on the map and really enjoys it! I got the map from Costco ages ago and I was so excited to hang it in my room! 

I made this poster so that we know who the Helpers are each day! My "Helping Hands" also get to sit in folding camping chairs instead of at their regular spot on the carpet! 

Speaking of our carpet, here it is! Unfortunately the gorgeous rug does not belong to me, but how great is it!? It's a thick rug on top of our carpet, that makes it double comfy! Each student has their own letter to sit on so they always know where they are to sit! 

Here's a quick look into a few of my centres. I made name tags of our writing centre. The students really enjoy writing or stamping out their friends names! Next, we've got some coloured pasta with our zoo animals. They love sorting pasta into colours and types of pasta! I also have a sensory bin that they can dig around in. At the moment there are seeds in there. 

During our normal centres, I let the kindies have a choice of what they would like to do. They can choose between heaps of activities and dramatic play. But, when I do my literacy and math centres as well as my investigation centres, I like to keep the kiddos a little more organized. 

So, I went ahead a made what I like to call my "Swap Cards." Each card has a students name on it. They carry it around with them to each centre. I organize them ahead of time so I have students in particular groups. When they look at their card they know what centre they will need to go to first. Once there, they peel the velcroed number off and come place it back in my blue basket. I set the timer for a designated amount of time. When they timer goes off, they know it's time to swap and head to their next centre. 

I'm finding that my Swap Cards are working really well, in the beginning it takes a bit of getting used to! 

Sometimes the biggest challenge of teaching it that there are not more of me! I especially wish I had at least 6 more of me when I take the Grade 1's to computer class. 

At this point, they have a REALLY hard time logging on to the computers. Some don't know how to type their full name while others just can't find the right letters on the keyboards. I spend nearly the whole class going around to log every one on. 

So, I went ahead and made login cards for each student. I took a screenshot of the login page and typed for each student what they need to type in. I then made a list of websites that they can go to for a play which coordinates with a document I made on their desktop so that the links are easy and quick to find and click! 

This solved a few problems, but we just need more time to familiarize ourselves with the computers! 

Lastly, I think this is my favourite thing I have done. I asked my students what they would like to be when they grow up and recorded it on to a chalkboard and then took a photo (in front of my awesome map, of course!) Their responses were so sweet and they were genuinely excited! Not only do they LOVE seeing pictures of themselves hanging in our classroom, so do the parents! Parents come in and take photo to send! Too Cute!  

DON'T WANNA LEAVE BUT I GOT A JOB!

It's crazy to think that this is my last week left of my year long stay in Australia. It has gone by so fast and to be honest, I am slightly nervous to move back to Canada. My life and experiences have been so incredible here that, at the moment, I don't want to begin picturing how everything will change when I move back. I am really going to miss my life in Melbourne. I love this city!

These last two month has been amazing for work! I have only had four days where I went without working. It has been very busy but I am grateful to have the opportunity to experience different classrooms and connect with so many people. 

Yesterday I was at a school that I have been to quite regularly. I've always enjoyed going to this school as the staff is absolutely amazing! I found it strange how a bulletin didn't make it to me before the first break so I went into the staffroom to check out if I had a yard duty. As I was checking the bulletin, the vice principal spotted me looking and added , "Nope, no duties for you today Kaitlyn!" This came as quite a surprise because as a CRT, you almost always have at least one yard duty a day, if not two. This is because we are paid to do a yard duty, so the school will swap us places with a teacher who would normally be on duty. I don't mind at all because I know the regular teachers would have heaps of things they could accomplish in their break whereas I don't have much to do.

I grabbed a seat in the staffroom, made a coffee and was ready to settle in for the next 40 minutes. There were mini muffins set out on a plate in front of each seat at the table. I began talking to the vice principal about my plans for next year as a kindergarten teacher and how I have so much enjoyed teaching in Australia, especially at this school. Once more of the staff had settled into their seats, the vice principal got up and began to explain why they were having a morning tea with mini muffins. One of the teachers got a full time job so they were celebrating, then he mention the two high school boys (who I was working with in PE) who had been volunteering their time in the sport program and that it was their last day at the school. All three of them were presented with big shortbread smiley face cookies. Then he continued as he brought out a massive jam and custard filled Lamington, "And, I have this typical Aussie dessert for our Canadian friend who has been a great addition to our school on occasion and is returning home shortly." I was completely shocked! I had no idea and I nearly cried out of the genuine gesture and for realizing my time here is down to the last few days. He said so many other kind, meaningful words to me but I forget most of them as I was completely surprised by all this happening. He explained to the rest of the staff where I come from and what the weather was doing there and then had me explain what I would be doing when I get back home. 

Which brings me to my latest news... I GOT A TEACHING JOB FOR THE FALL! Yessss, I woke up one morning at the beginning of the month to a job offer! I was absolutely thrilled because I had been feverishly applying to jobs all over Canada since March! This was another big surprise to me because I did not even interview for the position - I was just offered it. I accepted the offer because it was in Saskatchewan and because it is temporary (I will be covering a maternity leave!) I think it will be the perfect opportunity for when I get home and I will have the chance to move onto another adventure come January when my temporary contract is up! 

Meanwhile, I am so sad that my time here is coming to an end. I keep doing regular things that I have done for the last year and think, "This is the LAST time I will be doing this." It's going to be so hard to leave this place. I already miss it and I haven't even left yet. This Sunday Jenna and I did our last South Melbourne Market trip - something we have done nearly every Sunday for the last year. Today, I went to the Queen Victoria market and just took it all in being it would be last time there. The weather has been rainy and cold, I'm thinking it's mocking my feelings about leaving. 

Before I return home, I will be doing some final Australian travelling. On the first of July, I head off to the Red Centre, the heart of Australia...the OUTBACK and I am going solo! I am so so excited about this because I will get to explore Uluru, Ayers Rock, Kings Canyon and more! I will meet up with Alannah in Sydney where we will continue to do a sailing adventure through the Whitsundays Islands, head up to Magnetic Island, Mission Beach and Cairns! I'm glad I get to end my time off in the warm and tropical areas of Australia.

COOPERATIVE COLLABORATION

Just as I thought I wasn't going to get a call to work this morning, my phone rang and I was happy to accept my assignment for the day. My assignment was to teach Phys. Ed. - something I haven't done since before Christmas, so I was rather excited. 

I was lucky enough to have the first session of the day to have time to plan (and have a cup or two of coffee) and figure out what I should teach for the day. There was no plan left for me and no one seemed to know what the students have been doing in Phys. Ed. Although not having a plan of any kind would normally slightly stress me out, I was excited to have control of what I got to teach. 

It was a 'wet day' today meaning it was very rainy. Generally, schools have all of their Phys. Ed. lessons outside on the ovals or on the courts, but on days like today, we are left with the hall - a small space that is only used for after school care and the odd wet day. After seeing the space, I realized that getting 30 students in grades 5 and 6 could get quite crowded and rowdy. 

The hall is quite a small space.

Instead of planning to do a bunch of games, I thought it would be exciting to focus my lessons on the idea of cooperation and collaboration. As I planned, I thought of games and activities to do (with minimal running due to space constrictions) that would promote working together as a group for the same outcome. The students enjoyed the activities we did and they liked it even more when I added in a little challenge component by recording the time it took to complete the challenge or splitting the students into teams and racing. 

After having a discussion about what cooperation and collaboration is and what it looks like, I began my activities. The first challenge I called Wall Ball. I had the students lay with their backs on the floor and putting their feet up against the wall. Their task was to pass the ball from the first person to the last using only their feet. Not only did I notice that the students were helping each other out (with their feet) while the ball was passed from person to person but also they began motivating each other and positively cheering their classmates on. 

The second challenge was my favourite - The Hula Hoop challenge. To start, the biggest challenge was getting all the students to hold hands. I've never had this problem before since I generally teach preps and the younger grades, so I didn't anticipate this situation with the 3/4 and 5/6 classes. We had a spontaneous, quick lesson on holding hands and once again - the idea of team work. Unfortunately, I had a few students choose to sit out because their fear of holding the hand of an opposite gender was just too much. Basically, the students needed to all hold hands and pass a hula hoop all the way around the circle by going through the hoop and staying connected. It was a lot of fun and the challenge heated up when I split the students into teams of boys and girls. 

I had another game planned out to play, but as it turns out, we were short on hula hoops for this activity. I was so excited to play it so I will have to save it for another day at another school. It's called Caterpillar Riot - the name itself it so exciting! 

With the remaining time, I decided to do a silent vote for which game we should play. I let the students choose the games and we went from there. I despise dogdeball entirely - as a student and as a teacher, but every single student voted for it. There was no way I could skew the results to play a different game so we ended off the day with a game of dodgeball.

YOU CAN BE BATMAN IF YOU WANT TO BE

As a CRT, yard duty (supervision) can be rather stressful at times. I actually don’t mind yard duty at all, in fact, I will even offer to take a yard duty from teachers who look like they just might need an extra break. There are many things that I enjoy about doing yard duty such as being outside and having the opportunity to observe students in their natural habitat of play and exploration. However, we all know that there is a tendency for many things to go wrong at recess. Being a CRT does not help in these situations. It’s not that I can’t solve problems, break up fights or reason with tempered students, it’s that I don’t KNOW any of the students very well, including their names, especially at  schools I don’t go to often. I'm never sure which students I should be keeping a watchful eye on or the ones who tend to over exaggerate conflicts with friends.

With that being said, today was what I consider to be a good yard duty day. While the playground was still bustling with busy students at play, boys getting more footy balls stuck in the tree tops while trying to get one ball down and major girl drama under the play structure, I had what I would consider to be a really great moment with a student.

“Excuse me, miss” I hear as one student comes running up to me. I get to be decked out in a lovely florescent orange vest, which makes me an easy spot for anyone within a few kilometres. At this particular school, we also carry around a first aid kit and a clipboard with a paper to record any serious situations on the playground. No matter who you are, you will always be followed by a posy of preppies (kindergartens) who beg to carry all these things around for you. It’s insanely cute.

“My friend has been punched and I think he’s hurt!” I get him to lead me to his friend. On the way over, I ask, “So do you know what happened?”

“Yeah, I punched him.”

I stopped and looked at him saying, “Dude, why would you punch your friend?” and I thought, this has to be to most incredibly unique situation where someone punches their friend only to feel really bad about it and go to retrieve help.

When I arrived at the scene of the crime, there was a boy laying on his back with tears rolling down his cheeks. A group of students hovered over him speculating him like a foreign subject. As soon as I approached, all the witnesses wanted to share their take on the story at once. There were names being thrown around, fingers being pointed and nearly a dozen voices explaining everything in discord.

“Jude took my batman mask and I can’t find it.” This was part of the story that I had heard before I stopped everyone, “Woah, woah, woah. Let’s break this down.” I pointed to the student who came to retrieve my help, “So, you’re Jude?” “No, Miss. Jude is a boy who doesn’t go to our school anymore.”

Alright, let me get this straight. This entire brawl got started by a student who doesn't even attend this school?! What is going on? While I'm still not sure I understand exactly what happened on the playground this afternoon, here are the facts I do know.

One student wants to be batman. He lent someone his batman mask..in grade 3 (we're dealing with grade 6 boys)..to a student who no longer attends this school. However, said student lent it to someone else who still does go to this school. He just wants to find his batman mask. If Ben Affleck can be the new Batman, he can just as well be Batman if he moves to America. In his search, his friend told him he could, in fact, not ever become Batman. In frustration of having a friend not believe in his dream, he punched him. Complicated, right? RIGHT.

Even though I have only ever seen one Batman flick, I can relate to this student. He understandably became upset because someone didn't believe in him and let me tell you, that kind of stuff hurts. It doesn't matter who you are, if you have the ability to tell someone their dream is stupid, you probably have no heart.

After getting all the students involved sorted out, making sure everyone was feeling at par again, I asked the student if he wanted to take a walk and hang out with me. He agreed.  I had him explain to me what his dreams were, what he wanted to do and how he would achieve this dream. He had it all figured out. At the end of our talk, I turned to face him. “Now, if you have a dream, I don’t want you to think that anyone can stop you from achieving it. Just stay positive, do what makes you happy and don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t do what you set your mind to..but let’s not use violence if someone does tell you that.”

It has nothing to do with becoming the next Batman or not. Who knows, the odds could be in his favour. But I wanted him to know that if he has a dream and if he believes in himself - that is all he needs. And it felt good being, perhaps, one of the few people to believe in his dreams and let him know that anything is possible. If even for a moment I gave him the courage to go after everything he has dreamed about, it made my little heart smile. I am always the happiest when I can make other people happy and I know after our talk, he was feeling pretty happy too.

We high fived it out before I headed up to the staff room for lunch and he went off running in the opposite direction, chasing his dreams. 

THE FEEL GOOD TEACHER POST

Even though I have loved travelling for what was pretty well two full months, I was ready to get back to teaching again. I missed it. Since it was the beginning of the second term when we returned from New Zealand, the calls were few and far in between. I had worked one day out of a possible six for the first week and a half. I was beginning to wonder if my agency had forgotten about me since I had been away. Finally, I got a call on Wednesday which lead me back to one of my favourite schools to teach! Luckily for me (and not so lucky for the very ill teacher), I got to continue teaching there for the remainder of the week. It's funny how, as CRT's, we are always hoping for someone to get sick. Not that we truly want them to be sick, we just appreciate the work that comes along with it. In the staffroom today, a teacher was talking about how she thought she was coming down with a cold of some sort. I leaned over and said "If you ever need to take a day, I'd be happy to take your class!"

For the last three days, I've been teaching a group of 3/4's. I love this school in particular, but there is one class, with one student, that everyone is afraid of taking. Since I hadn't been back to the school since Term 4 last year, I wasn't sure which class was the 'scary class' as all the students would have moved up a grade and swapped classrooms. On the train to school Wednesday morning, I found myself mentally preparing for the odd chance that this particular class would be my assignment. As I signed in at the office and chit-chatted with the ladies, one of the secretaries handed me my schedule for the day saying "You've got 3/4D" with a look that could only mean one thing: 3/4D was the class I wanted to avoid. 

As I made my way down the corridor to the classroom, I passed by the other 3/4 teachers. "Now Kaitlyn, listen," the first one said. "If James* does anything at all today, you bring him straight to my class." Alright, good to know that I've got back up going into this. "Kaitlyn, how you going? Have you got 3/4D today?" the second teacher asked. She continued apologetically, "You'll be okay but let me know if you need anything." She then patted me on the back and looked at me, with her eyebrows raised, as if she had just left me heartbroken.

It's not that this student is a terrible child, he is just extremely loud and usually takes pride in disturbing the entire class. I flash backed to last term when I was teaching in year two. He was cartwheeling through the classroom in the middle of the reading lesson, stomping on others' reading books only to cuss at them when they kindly asked him to stop. These things were only the mild. 

I entered the classroom and began preparing for the day with a positive mind set. What could I do to avoid possible problems with James*? How will I get him to pay attention in my lesson? I knew that if he wasn't paying attention during the sessions, it would be hard for the rest of the class to learn. He was going to be my focus so that I could deliver quality lessons throughout the day. 

The morning bell rang and students began making their way into the classroom, noticing that I am, in fact, not their regular teacher. The girls were around my waist immediately showing me their darling loom bracelets and all trying to tell me everything all at once. The boys gathered around some car book at the back of the room and collectively asked only one question,"Are you our teacher today?" Yep. "Cool." Then, in walks James* and the moment he realizes I am the teacher for the day, his eyes light up. "WHOOOOHOOOO! Mr. A isn't here today! We can do whatever we want! Guys how awesome is this!" and then he looks at me and I go, "WHOOOOOHOOOOO! Miss. Kaitlyn is here today and we are going to have the most awesome day and learn so much!" I'll admit, it was a risk to copy his behaviour, but it worked. He came up to me, pointed his finger and said "Yeah, I remember you from last time Kaitlyn." "Alright, go put your bag away and come join us on the floor." And he did. There wasn't a dispute, there were no interruptions, he just sat calmly on the floor - ready to learn. Awesome!

We started our morning Maths lesson talking about symmetry. "CEMETERY!! Why are we learning about where dead people get buried!" After explaining what symmetry is (and the difference between the two words) I asked James*, "Now, can you think of anything in a cemetery that could be symmetrical?" "A GRAVESTONE!" and I drew an oblong semi-circle with a flat bottom on the board. He loved it! He started finding other things in the room that had a line of symmetry. He was participating in the lesson and actually motivating the other students to help him find more symmetrical items! 

Recess time came and a grabbed myself a cup of coffee in the staffroom. One of the other 3/4 teacher's walked in and asked how James* had been. "I was expecting him to be in my room by 9:02!" she stated. "Oh no, he's been great and he is participating really well in class!" I exclaimed. I watched as both 3/4 teachers' jaws dropped and in replied in unison, "Wow!" I went on to explain how the morning had been great and how there were no disruptions or disputes of any kind and each teacher in the staffroom was shocked. To be quite honest, I was just as shocked myself but I couldn't help feeling proud of myself for doing something 'right.' 

Following recess, a teacher who was on yard duty came to the classroom door. "Can I speak with James*?" she asked. My mind immediately wondered if recess had been a turning point for him. Had he misbehaved on the playground? Get into another fight? She looked at me in disbelief as she whispered, "I actually have to tell James* how great this recess was and commend him on his behaviour." I smiled.

The rest of the day went off without a hitch. As the class ate lunch, he asked me to share a story about a time when I was his age. I told the class about the time I had caught a garter snake and kept it as a pet and named it Joe. I shared about how I later caught what I thought would be his 'best friend,' a juicy frog named Blake. I had the class guess about how their friendship together in my small fish bowl worked out. James* guessed it, Joe swallowed Blake whole! He was so intrigued with my story and began asking me more questions. 

Thursday was just the same! A great day with lots of learning and a James* with a positive behaviour! I noticed another student purposely doing things that would irritate James* to 'set him off.' Even the other students weren't used to this behaviour. Thankfully, I recognized the attempts of the other student trying to throw him off and diverted the situations before they amounted to anything! James* was absent on Friday but part of me wished he had been there because he was doing so well the previous days. 

I was asked to write a certificate for the Pupil of the Week. Each classroom teacher chooses one student and on Monday morning at the assembly, the students will receive their certificate in front of the entire school. Without a doubt, I wrote James'* name on that certificate stating that he had been making good choices with a positive behaviour. I wish I could be there on Monday to see his reaction to getting a Pupil of the Week certificate because he deserves it! 

It could be that James* was just having a good week, but I can't help but feel that I was doing something right. The key is always being positive, even when going into tough situations. I believe that positivity breeds positivity and creativity and that the outcome can be nothing but awesome! It feels really great to have experiences like this and I have to say, I am no longer afraid of 3/4D. I walked out of school today with a smile on my face, hoping that I will get another chance to teach 3/4D this term!


*James is a pseudonym to conceal identity.

Lessons from a Wonderful Year

It is officially the last day of the year. While I'm not one to pick and choose favourite seasons, I do reserve a soft spot in my heart for December because of the holidays. This December though was unlike all other, and though I don't necessarily miss the cold, I sometimes wish I could wake up to frosted windows and falling snow. Even though Melbourne weather is highly unpredictable, snow just isn't in the cards. 

I started 2013 in a completely different atmosphere than I am ending it, which leaves me to wonder what is in store for the year to ahead. At the beginning of the year, I had no idea I would be living and teaching in Australia or that the experiences I am having would be real. 

I feel like nearly everything I did this year was wonderful and caulked full of new experiences so I thought I could leave you with some lessons that I've learned through the year! 

You can do anything you set your mind to (and don't let anyone tell you that you can't!) This isn't necessarily something I've only learnt this year, but it was a big part of my year. If you want something, get after it, it will probably take hard work and persistence, it may challenge you, but always keep in mind the outcome. And, if someone has the nerve to tell you that you can't, let that be your fire to prove them all wrong! 

Someday doesn't exist. If you are given an opportunity to do something, do it! There are too many times in conversation where I will hear people promise themselves "someday I will." The truth is that the "someday" that they are banking on doesn't exist; never has, never will. Don't make excuses to push an opportunity beside, don't promise yourself a day that has not come. Get out there and do it now! 

Always choose happiness. Sure, at times happiness isn't always the easiest choice, I get that, but if you aim to choose happiness in the morning and in a bad situation, you may be likely to live a happier life. You can't go back and un-do whatever it is that's got you down, so why be mad about it? Be happy, enjoy life and don't waste your time being grouchy!

Smile. I can bet that a smile signifies the same this worldwide: happiness. Smiling is contagious, makes you happy, makes others happy, makes you look good and had the possibility of evolving into laugher. That's a serious win, win situation. (I'm smiling now, are you?)

Get your butt out of bed! Although I used to always sleep in on the weekends, I never enjoyed it, I just enjoyed sleeping. I'm up everyday, no matter what, by 5:30-6am and it feels great! You can get so much accomplished all before noon and still have an entire day of unlimited possibilities ahead of you. And, when you wake up, begin with a smile! 

Travel. Do it. Go near, go far. Just go! Experience something new. Meet new people. Listen to others stories. Eat. Drink. Emerge yourself in a new culture. Dance with waves of he ocean. See the world. Stand in awe at the edge of a cliff wondering if there could ever be anything more beautiful. Reward yourself be feeling more alive than you thought possible. 

Perhaps you could say my lessons could be a little advice to anyone. Maybe they sound like cliches, but cliches are cliches for a reason - they work. 2013 has been a wonderful year, but I'm so excited to welcome 2014! Five days from now I will be off the travel the East Coast of Australia, a month after that my sister will arrive for some long overdue sister time, followed by my family. Shortly after that, my mates and I may head off to New Zealand. I hope for a chance to see Uluru and Tassie before I leave. 

With all this excitement, the year is bound to fly by. Before I know it, I will be back in Canada seeing all the beautiful faces that I left behind, and that is something else I am totally looking forward to! 

Teach, Run, Listen, Explore

Long time no blog. Lets catch up. 

It's now spring here in Melbourne. It tricked us by being 25°C on the very first and second day of spring. However, we haven't seen the sun much since. The weather is very indecisive here at the moment. It can be sunny and warm one minute and the minute you blink it's cold and pouring rain. This cycle repeats itself over and over again. I'm finding it quite challenging to dress myself each morning. 

Work has been very busy these past few weeks as I have work nearly every day. It's fun being a CRT because I get to do different things each day. So far I've taught all grades from prep (kindergarten) to grade six, I've taught phys ed, I've taught at a special school and in a P-12 school. At each school, I learn more about myself and who I hope to become as an educator. It's so awesome to have the opportunity to dabble in each grade level, in different subjects and different types of schools. 

Today I was teaching the little preppies at a school I go to often. One child wanted to take a picture of me and my peg board work (but really, just the board). I'm wearing my coat because it was really cold and rainy out today and also because the schools here don't have heat, just small heaters in each classroom, so it's pretty cold in the mornings.

Other than working at schools, I've been trying to explore Melbourne and I've found some of my favourite places to be so far. I went down to the coast on a day off for a run and I found a terrific footpath that goes all along the ocean for five miles (well it goes much further, but that is the distance between the two trains I use to get back to the city). I found Brighton Beach which is where these beautifully coloured beach houses are, maybe you've seen them in pictures before? I go all the way to St. Kilda Pier and at the end of the day, that's a nice place to sit on the sand and watch the sun go down. It'll be flippin' cold at that time, but it's a sacrifice I'm willing to make. I do that about three times a week!

And here's what a run looks like at sunset time.

Now, I'm not sure if this trumps the beach running or not but my other favourite thing to do is to walk down Bourke St on a Friday, Saturday and/or Sunday afternoons. It is so amazing and packed with talent! All the buskars come out and show everyone what they got. I especially get excited when I find out my new favourite bands will be playing. I can just sit and watch them perform! If you're looking for some new music to check out take a look at Woodlock and Amistat. By the way, the guys of Woodlock are super cool and I had a chat with them after one of their performances when I bought their CD! Bourke Street has it all and I love it!

This is the last week of school before we break for term four, which means we have two weeks of holidays! I'm not sure yet what we are doing, but one thing is for sure, we are going to explore in and around the city. I'd like to do day trips to surf or go out into the country on a train because that isn't too expensive. Oh, and I met another CRT at school today. Where is she from? Saskatchewan. So we are going to meet up over the holidays as well and go on an excursion of some sort!! 

Here we are a few weekends ago hanging out at Docklands by the Yacht club - hoping to score some friends with a massive yacht. No luck yet. We will keep trying. Ha Ha!

Hope you all have a great week!

Swipe On, Swipe Off

The past two weeks have been pretty busy for me! I've had work everyday excluding Tuesday which turned into a Ben Affleck movie day. The thing about being a CRT is that I have to get up at 6am every morning and wait for a phone call to determine the rest of my day. These past two weeks though, with the exception of two days, I've known where I am going before I wake up in the morning. Either I get a phone call the night before or the school I was at the day before asks me back for another day. It's nice to know before I go to bed where I am going the next day so that I can plan out my transportation. To toss in a fun fact, Melbourne has one of the largest rail and tram systems in the entire world! This is why it is essential to plan out where I am going. 

Timing is very important when you travel using the public transportation system. In the city, it doesn't much matter if you miss a certain train because it is likely another will be departing in the next 5-8 minutes after. However, if you are out in a suburb and you miss a train, you're in a jam because the next train probably won't be for another 20-30 minutes. Early this week, I was out at a school in the Pascoe Vale suburb and since I had been at the school several times before, I knew the train left at 3:47pm and that the walk from the school to the train station took about 10 minutes. However, after school I poked around talking to some teachers and such. I finally started on my walk and realized that the train would be shortly arriving at the station. As I approached the cross walk, I saw the train pulling up to the station. I knew I could not miss that train as the next wasn't until 4:20pm. Although I would not advise this, I ran across the roadway (looking both ways of course. Here, you must look right first then left) and up into the train station. The doors were closing so I put my arm in right before they closed so that the doors would open again to let me in. My only problem, I didn't have time to swipe my MyKi card (transportation pass) but ain't nobody got time for that when your catching a train the way I did. This turned into a bigger problem then I expected as when I got back to Melbourne Central Station, I swiped my card for the gates to let me out and they wouldn't open. I went to talk to one of the guards and he said no problem and let me through. What I didn't notice was the police officer paired with a transportation officer on the other side of the gates waiting for me. 

"Ma'am, Ma'am would you step aside please." 
Although they were reasonable about it, I got a stern talking to about swiping my card each time. They tracked ALL of my past train swipes and realized that it was the only time I hadn't swiped on for a train. They let me go after swiping my card again and said, "There, now you've paid for the trip you just took." Little do they know that I never swipe on when I ride trams. Muahaha.

While we're on the topic of trains here, I'll take a second to tell a story about what happened last week on one of our train rides. Thankfully, Megan and I were together as we were called to the same school. Now, if you know me well, you're probably aware that I thoroughly enjoy watching the movie Con Air. At one point of the day I said to Megan, "They somehow managed to get every creep and freak in the universe onto this one plane and then somehow managed to stick us right smack in the middle." She didn't know what I was talking about as she's never watched the movie, but if you swap plane for train it somehow manages to perfectly describe the day we had. 

In the morning, we ran all the way to Melbourne Central Station as we were running a smidge late and we were feeling very successful as we made it to the train platform right on time for our train! We boarded the train and it was immediately brought to our attention that there was a crazy on the train as we hear a lady yell, "Get your hands off me!" We looked and saw a large man, triple our size harassing a lady by talking right in her face and putting his hands on her to move her closer to his face. Although we avoided all eye contact, we somehow managed to attract this crazy to sit right next to us.

There was maybe twelve people on the huge train and he sat RIGHT next to us. He then proceeds to start talking right in our faces, so I ignored him by looking out the window, but he wanted to so desperately talk in my face that that made him move closer. So finally, I looked at him and gave him the attention he was trying to achieve by nodding my head and repeating "mhmm" to keep him at bay. I then looked at Megan and said, "so our stop is the next one." Although it wasn't our actual stop, we got off to avoid Mr. Crazy and switch to a different train car. As we got off he grabbed both of our legs, which was terrifying. We ran to the next car down, got on and began talking about how terrified we were of that man. 

"Oh my gosh, he's coming!" Megan said only seconds after the train departed from the station. I turn around and sure enough, he's headed our way. The thing about the trains is some of them you can hop from car to car as there are doors and a small walking platforms that attach them. Now, he's already in our car, the one we just switched to to get away from him.  

"Get back here!" Mr. Crazy shouted at us. We began RUNNING through the isle of the train and into the next car through the little platform that you're technically not supposed to use while the train is in motion. My hands were trembling and we were both terrified. Who knew what this guy wanted! Just before he reached us, the doors swung open and we got off that train! We waited for the next train to take us to our real stop. 

You would think the story ends here. During lunch we JOKED about the crazy being on the train on our ride home. Little did we know that he would STILL be on the train and the very same car that we hopped onto at the end of the day. He saw us huddling in the back of the train, he stood up and began walking towards us. Thankfully the train stopped right then and there and we got off the train. We had to wait 20 minutes for the next train to pick us up, but it was worth not being harassed. I just felt really bad for all the other women and children on that train that he preyed on. When we got to Southern Cross Station, we reported him and they said they would look at the tapes and investigate.

We haven't seen him since. 

Terrific Timetables

I was so excited last Tuesday night to finally get a call to start teaching, after all, it is one of the big reasons I came to Australia! For the time being, I am substitute teaching (or as they call it here: emergency teacher OR CRT- Casual Relief Teacher) with Standby Teachers. 

Since that first call, I have had steady work in a few different schools. My first subbing gig was at a lovely primary school in the Newport area. I really enjoyed the caring vibe the staff and students gave off. The following day, Megan and I were both and the same school in North Fitzroy in separate 3/4 classrooms. It was a long day for the both of us as the school simply gave off no positive vibes at all. On Friday however, I was so blessed to go to a fabulous school which was located between Pascoe Vale and Glenroy areas. It was a LONG train ride and and even longer cold, wet walk in the rain, but the radiance from the students, staff and parents immediately brightened my day! I was so happy when the asked me to come back to their school on Monday, which was another great day for me. It was a beautiful school and I will be sure to write more about it in a future blog when I plan to write about school layouts (because they had a phenomenal one!) I was privileged enough to get a call for another wonderful school this morning, I am planning to write about this experience in a future blog post about lesson structure as they sure did some amazing work! 

Today I wanted to write a post about the timetables most schools here have a similar variation of but it is much different then back in Canada. To be honest, when I got my first job, I was a bit skeptical of the timetable. I thought, "How is this going to work!" Little did I know that it would become something I absolutely adore.  

Here is a variation of what a timetable may look like in schools in Melbourne:
(8:45am)-School Begins / Morning Classes
(11:15am)-Morning Recess
(11:55am)-Classes
(1:25pm)-Lunchtime and Recess
(2:15pm)-Classes
(3:15pm)-Dismissal

I fell in LOVE with this timetable - it makes PERFECT sense! The bulk of the classes and usually the heavier subjects get completed in the morning sessions. This is when the children are most alert and ready to learn. Then, they break for recess for about 40 minutes. This is also when they eat their "brain food" which has to be a healthy fruit or vegetable or "naked" foods that do NOT come in packaging. This recess break also gives them ample amount of time to be physically active, play and develop essential skills like teamwork and empathy on the playground. It's also beneficial for the teachers to have that break as well. Teachers split the yard duty time in half so that everyone gets a break! 
They then resume classes with a load of fresh air in their systems and are ready to learn again. The later lunch and recess time work well because once they come back into the school for the final class session, there is only an hour left. Sometimes, the amount of learning after lunch can take a fall as children can either be restless from the amount of sugar in their lunches or they are much too tired to do a lot of work. With only an hour until dismissal, it's long enough to get a meaningful lesson in and also a short enough time to still keep the children's attention. 

I'd like to hear others thoughts on this timetable. Would you like it or not? Do you agree with a later lunch? Do you agree with longer recesses or do you side with shorter, more frequent recesses?