Shooting the Moon

I'm slowly working on reading children's books so that I can decide on what I want to have in the classroom I will someday be teaching. The most recent one is called Shooting the Moon by Frances O'Roark Dowell. The story is set during the Vietnam "Conflict". The main character Jamie (12 year old) is excited because her brother has enlisted and is sent off to be a medic in the war. Over time she comes to learn that war isn't as exciting as she and her brother imagined. Instead of writing her letters her brother photographs his experiences to her. He never writes her a single word.

This was a very good book. But I worry that if I had it in my classroom it may upset or depress student's who have family in our current conflict, but it might also give them hope. I think it would depend on the maturity level of the student. 

I was surprised about this book. It was given to me by one of my students when I was student teaching. It wasn't something I'd have thought he would read. It was his favorite book at the time. I must have seen him carrying that book around and rereading it throughout most of my time in his classroom. He had his mother buy me a copy from the book fair. It was very sweet of him. I hadn't realized that I'd made that much of an impression on him, or that he was that selfless. He definitely made me reassess my estimation of him. 

Area and Perimeter with Cheez-Its Lesson Plan

I've finally gotten off of my lazy butt and decided to post the whole darn lesson plan. This is because a number of teachers have located my blog, and emailed me requests for this lesson. I do have to admit that the idea is not my own, but I did add to the worksheet that I found. Originally the worksheet had only four problems on it, but I felt that a mere four problems would not be enough of a challenge to my students. Here you go! I hope this helps your students to learn area and perimeter. It certainly was effective for my kiddos.


Each cracker is about a square inch. So if you want a worksheet for this lesson plan, simply make sure that you are drawing rectangles that are in square inches. If you want a copy of the worksheet I made, email me and I'll try to get it to you sooner rather than later. I tried to put it on here, but it didn't work so well.


*** EDIT*** Found the website I got the worksheet (which I modified because I wanted it to have more problems):  http://www.proteacher.net/. 

The rain it keeps on falling ...

The weather in my area has been rather wonky and a bit on the scary side these past few days. We even got what my husband and I called "the lake" in our apartment complex parking lot.

The "lake" eventually went away, but flooding in the area has been slow to disappear. Not to far from my home tragedy split a small family of four up. Their car was sucked into the water and the mother and baby died. The father and young child survived. I feel so bad for the family. I cannot imagine how awful that daddy must feel right now, let alone his young son. To be honest, I don't want to imagine it.

I hope that there are no more horrific things that happen because of the nasty winter weather that is yet to come. If it is scary in your area... please try to be safe.

LadyGrace

Giving this another go ....

Another year has come and gone, and with it brought a lot of changes. It feels very cleche to type that out. It is the truth though.

Major events for myself and my husband this past year:

Dad got injured while working and was not able to return to work until his busy season was nearly over (he does house painting, landscaping, and the like).

I graduated from college with a double degree in Education and English. I managed to do it with a 3.51 at the last second, earning myself a Cum Laude honor.

We got pregnant!

My husband was fired from his somewhat well paying job for something he didn't do. Causing us to have to push back our long term goals and burn through our hard earned savings account.

We had our 1 year marriage anniversary.

I managed to get on the substitute teacher list for a local school district, but found out in January do to an unfortunate paperwork incident I wasn't really on the list.

My husband found a new job that paid considerably less per hour, but allows him to work from home.

We found out that we are going to have a little girl.

My grandparents reached their 60th wedding anniversary.

My grandfather reached the age of 90.

After six long months of job hunting, and several let downs I finally find a job. It starts on Jan 30. I'll be taking phone reservations for Enterprise Rent a Car. I find myself depressingly back in the same situation I was in prior to starting my college career. Working in a call center, except this time I'll be paid less, but get to work from home. Well at least I'll finally be bringing in some money, so we can get hubby on his way through college.


Items I've crafted last year:
I crafted more items than this over the last year. I've just been very bad about taking photos. I finished a quilt for my grandmother, as well as made pillows as gifts for the holidays. 


The below dino was made for my friend Kyla who was having a baby. It is a small wall hanging for the nursery.

Below is a table runner I made for my mother in law for Christmas. 

Below is the dino quilt I've been working on for my daughter. I'm nearly finished with the applique, and will soon move onto the the quilting process.

Below is the quilt I made for my mother in law.

Anticipated major events for this year:

The birth of my first child in April!

Hubby getting accepted to, and going to college.

Me starting graduate school to gain a masters degree in Education with an emphasis/endorsement in reading and perhaps ESOL.

My 30th birthday.

Our second year wedding anniversary.




Take care and be well,
LadyGrace

Where did Spring Go?

I've been so blasted busy with graduation and job hunting that I've neglected what I swore I would not neglect. The time has come to come back to my blog, which I have missed.

Spring term was both delightful and terribly difficult. I fell in love with my students, and bawled on my last day with them. I keep hoping to catch sight of them out in the community. So far I've seen one of them, and it made my day to see her bright smile again. I know if I ever do get a classroom of my own that the hardest thing for me will be to let my students go at the end of the school year. I was only with this class of students for about 11 weeks, and it broke my heart to say goodbye. One of the students who really cares for me asked me if she could get her parents to hire me as her babysitter. It was a very touching moment. At least I've got pictures! They also signed a sort of end of the school year class book for me.



The quilting continues. I've got new pictures to post (but I'm on the wrong computer to do it) so pictures of the quilt I made for my mother in law are forthcoming. She really loves it, which makes me feel all warm inside. I'm making a quilt for my father's mother, which is nearly finished. Then I think I shall finally make a quilt for myself. Funny how I get so into the giving spirit that I forget often to think of making anything for myself. Well gosh darn it, after three years of quilting, I'm finally going to make a quilt for me!! I've been looking through my quilting books for ideas and I think I've decided on one I like. It will be good for me because it involves applique. I haven't done any of that before, so it will be a good learning experience. I'm aiming for a simple quilt for my first time with applique.

I miss my quilting group. I need to start going back to them again (if they still meet on Weds). I hope they do! I know that they will forgive my absence.


Pictures of lots of things soon.

LadyGrace