I won times 2!

So....


When I posted my last blog in March, my husband and I found out just how effective getting healthy can be! We found out right before I posted my last blog that I am pregnant! This has been a very, very long road for us. We tried fertility and that certainly didn't work and then we tried prayer. Good old fashioned, "When God wants it, it will happen." And that is exactly when we got pregnant!


So needless to say the first trimester is over now and that is why I am posting. Not because we were keeping it a deep secret as all of our friends and family already know. But because I was just so tired and out of it for those few months that my day consisted of work, nap, make dinner, eat dinner, lay on the couch and go to sleep again. This interrupted by Church stuff and going out when necessary. That was about it.


So now, I am in my thirteenth week. We have seen the baby on ultrasound twice! And heard it's little heart beat! I am full of energy again--so much so that Saturday I prepped my veggie garde, planted 13 tomato plants, two squash plants, 6 green peppers, 6 japanese eggplants and watered all 5 gardens. Plus a trip to the garden fest, Home Depot, and CVS. I did then take a 2 hour nap, but it was necessary as we then went out with our friends for dinner in Waltham!


I am down to barely any naps during the week but still going to sleep at a reasonable hour as before baby, I was a night owl and midnigh was my usual bedtime!


We have yet to make changes to the house but once we get going on baby room plans, I will keep you posted!!!

Our little munchkin (9 weeks)

The state of teaching in the United States

     I have not written a blog in quite a while. Life has been busy and I always say to myself..."I should blog about that..." and then life gets in the way.
     But here I am with some down time and  I haven't wanted to blog about teaching in this country for a while so here goes...
     I read an article today about the legislative changes that have taken place in many of the States in our country. From losing collective bargaining rights, to changes in tenure teachers are being punished and hurt all over our country. Some of the states that are making changes are not known for their quality school districts as it is, and being a teacher, I can tell you, by making changes  that hurt the teaching profession they will lost quality teachers.
     The States that are going to do well in this day are the States that say "Yes we value what good quality teachers bring to our schools." The States that recognize teaching as a difficult, challenging and deserving profession. In the present day more and more States are requiring teachers to obtain higher level degrees (Master's, CAGS, and PHDs) and yet teachers often do not receive much in return. I read a statistic (and I'm not quoting so my wording and exact data may be wrong but...) that said something like, "15 years ago, an entry level teacher and an entry level associate at a law firm (read law degree passed the bar...) made the same amount of money. Now teachers make something like 75% of what the associate makes."
     We are constantly being devalued by society and we are constantly being asked to provded more and more services for our students. This must stop if the state of education and the teaching profession want to find the same page in the book and help our students succeed. We must acknowledge that teachers are where our students find their inspiration, education, courage and drive. And we must realize that a standardized test is a horrible way to tell if a teacher is doing a good job or not.
     Many students come from borken homes, homes with addiction, abuse, violence, busy parents, parents that don't care, and parents that aren't there. Couple that with increasing loosening of morals, higher unemployment and poverty, more gang violence, more chances for kids to be exposed to drugs, alcohol and sex at an early age, less money in the school systems, less afterschool programs to serve more kids and many other problems we are facing in this modern age.....and we wonder why our state of education is in such disarray....and we blame the teachers.
     If we want to compare ourselves to other countries, we must not only look at student achievement (or lack thereof) but also look at poverty, crime, unemployment, social services, marriage rates, etc.... If these are equal with ours, then yes, we need to fix the educational system...if they aren't....then we can't blame the educational system for society's flaws...it isn't right. Public schools worked for MILLIONS of Americans. We all turned out better than fine. We can't blame the public school system when things haven't changed within it when we all received a quality education. Has technology improved? Yes, and public schools have added technology. Has history changed? Yes, and public schools have updated their text books and curriculums. Do students learn differently? Well they always did and now we are recognizing that more and more and making the changes we need to make.
     So why is public education and subsequently, it's educators being blamed for all of the problems we face today? Well we need a scapegoat....why not blame the group that some say has the most influence over our students today? Because that group, that is made up of dedicated, hardworking, well-educated people will walk away. Not because they want to, because trust me, I will never be happy if I'm not teaching, but because government forced their hand. People will move to States who support educators, they will move to countries who will pay them well to teach in their American and Private Schools, they will retired instead of teaching an extra 5-10 years, they will find some other profession. It will happen if we do not recognize how important our teachers are. We must--or the state of our educational system will falter and fall apart.

Kids are great!

The other night my 2 and half year old nephew picked up my sister's cell phone, dialed my number and before I even answered, handed the phone to my sister and said "Its Lala."

Go figure. He is not even three and he can figure out how to call me. I'm sure it has to do with the fact that he has 3 big brothers and they were all very precocious as well.

When my 13 year old nephew was 5, his father was driving him to the house for me to babysit all three of the big boys and his dad looks back and says, "Boys, please behave for Rachel tonight" The 13 yr old (5 then) says, "Dad, we prefer Lala."

Out of the mouths of babes!

I can't wait to hear what they say next and I can't wait for the day when my own children silence me with their witty and precocious comments!

Here is to kids, God Bless them!

Dyslexia Conference

     I went to a conference on Dyslexia yesterday with my wonderful colleagues from Bay Path College! It was definitely worth giving up a whole Saturday! Rick Lavoie was the key note speaker--he is one of the most engaging and inspirational speakers I have ever had the pleasure to watch. Rick is also the creator of a very famous 20 year old video called F.A.T. City that is a PBS special and has been viewed thousands of times by more than thousands of people.
    The reason why Rick is so inspiring and can stand up and talk to a captivated audience for 3 and 1/2 hours is that he shares knowledge that you can actually use in everyday situations. We sat there entertained by his anecdotes and jokes and learn the myths of motivation and what you can do to motivate your students. I thought to myself, finally, someone who actually has something to say! More often than not speakers get up and talk and talk and talk and really say nothing at all. At my graduation for my Masters our keynote speaker was the man who founded Yankee Candle. His story had a lot of potential to be inspiring but in the end all he did was promote himself. Rick Lavoie is the exact opposite, he tells relevant, interesting stories that have everything to do with inspiration and have nothing to do with promotion.
     Our afternoon sessions were wonderful as well. I learned a lot about executive function skills (the 'organizer' of our brains) and I got many great strategies to bring back to my classroom, especially from Sarah Ward who is for all intents and purposes an expert in the field.
They day went by very quickly and I really enjoyed myself and I definitely bought Rick's book! I'll let you know how it is when I am finished reading it! (the book is called The Motivation Breakthrough). I am including links to the two speakers' websites if any of you teacher folk want to jump on over there!
http://www.ricklavoie.com/
http://www.executivefunctiontherapy.com/