New Adventures

We all made it home and none of us got slit. Whitworth School of Ed for the win.

I made it home yesterday afternoon after sleeping the whole plane ride from Oakland. My heart broke a little every time I would think about what my Rosa Parks students were doing... "It's 8:03! They're finishing their Do Nows and leaving for ELD in two minutes!" "It's 2:30! Shoot they're out of school by now and I'm already home!" "It's 7:50 on Friday! They're just starting the Cha Cha Slide! If I go fast I can make it!" My students had a little celebration for me on my last day and it was so heartwarming. My little J man, who I spent most of a day chasing around the school last week because he didn't want to go to class, was the first to give me a hug and wrote me such a sweet card. He is one that I tried to put lots of love into... He's in 5th grade, has already been arrested, probably will be again, and has adults watching him like hawks everywhere he goes... People seem to have a hard time loving him and it makes me really sad. But I was exposed to so much there and just got a taste of learning the power of diversity and equality... A spark that lit a flame in all of us.

Originally I was supposed to be going to Tanzania, but that trip fell through. At first, I was pretty upset about it, but as soon as San Fran proved itself to be possible, the world looked a little brighter again. And I would not trade this trip for the world. While my heart still feels called to work for somewhere foreign to me, spending a month in San Fran makes me remember that pain and suffering and poverty does not exist on one continent - it happens in our own backyard.
I had a student who spent first grade living in a house with gang members who would beat him up just for the heck of it - where lies the justice in that? I have a student whose mom came to get her and yelled at her to shut up in front of me - where lies the justice in that? Half my students came from single parent homes, and I think that's high compared to most classrooms... It breaks my heart. But one of the things I have learned this month is that I cannot pass judgment on neither students nor parents, because blame nor fault lies on any one person. I can only lift this up to God and pray that He provides and loves.... Loves a lot.

Today it is back home to Spokane for the start of a new adventure: student teaching. May the pass by clear and Walternate be tough!

Wrapping Up

It's really hard for me to believe that in 48 hours I will be back in Kent, and in 72 hours I will likely be in Spokane.
I am so cliche. But I am totally leaving a little piece of my heart here.
Tonight we had our final meeting where we laughed and told stories and reminisced and shared our top 10 moments from the trip. Somehow I totally missed that this was going to be part of the meeting (those who really know me aren't surprised by this at all) and so I had to come up with them on a paper plate in about 3 minutes. But that's when the truly outstanding moments really come up, right? Here are my top 10 hits from my time in San Francisco..

Alcatraz for the Win by Alcatraz Cruises (2012)

I Like Long Walks on the Beach by Hopeless Romantic (2012)

Still cool in the eyes of a 5^th Grader by Teachers Love Teaching (2012)

Wharf-io by Chowder and Friends (2012)

I Left my Heart in Napa Valley by The Wineries (2012)

Does This Bridge Ever End? By The Peddlers (2012)

Penguin Sighting by Never Too Old (2012)

City Life by This Isn’t So Bad After All (2012)

Hallelujah by The Grace Cathedral Choir (2012)

Lightbulb Moments by Worth It (2012)

So these might be a little confusing. But let me explain the last one (Lightbulb Moments by Worth It) because this moment was one of the moments teachers live for.


I have a student who I have been working on all month with multiplication. When I got here, my teacher asked if I could work with him because he can do all the math, he just has a hard time remembering how to carry numbers and what order to do all the steps of a multiplication problem.
So we worked and we worked.
I made him some visual aids that somehow seemed to help him make sense of things in his head.
So we worked and we worked some more.
A math test came and things didn't go super well.
I got frustrated because I could see that the visuals were helping, but he wasn't seeming to memorize the process at all.
So we worked and we worked some more.
On Friday, Mr. A was trying to solve a 3x3 multiplication problem (e.g. 123 x 456). He did his first two rows  of work and tried to call it quits there... But that doesn't quite work. So when I told him he still had another line of work to do, he immediately realized what he had to do. And I was totally shocked. So I asked him to repeat to me what he had just done. And he told me fluently... It was so clear in his head! And he didn't have anything helping him! He just knew it! And thought the understanding is very much procedural (rather than conceptual) right now, it still clicked. Things aren't perfect yet, but I almost cried right on the spot and we spent the rest of the math period making a game out of checking his answers and cheering if he got them right and problem solving if something got off. He did awesome. And I wanted to cry the whole time.


Kindergarteners don't really have light bulb moments like that... Mostly because everything is kind of a light bulb moment for them. They're five, for goodness sake! But getting excited about math with little Mr. A was awesome... He's stellar.


One more day in the classroom with a little mini celebration before lunch, and then we are out of here! Caty and I hop on a shuttle at 7:30 Thursday morning to fly back to Seattle and retrieve our cars before heading back to Spokane over the weekend. Really weird to think that in 6 days I will be starting my student teaching classes on campus! Praying for safe travels and filled hearts as we leave this beautiful city.

Napa!

This weekend I got a chance to get away to Napa Valley to spend some time at my roommate Devin's house. Devin and I have live together for the past two years after meeting our freshman year when we lived across the hall from each other. Caty, Cory and I hopped on a bus Friday afternoon and met up with not one, not two, but THREE of my wonderful Burrow-mates: Devin, Lynne, and Erin. Lynne graduated in May and is currently on a plane to go back down to Costa Rica where she is teaching this school year. She flew in on Wednesday and was able to spend a few days with Devin before she headed back. Erin just finished up in December and moved home to the Bay area to start graduate school in Marriage and Family Therapy at the University of San Francisco.

The weekend was seriously perfect.

It was a wonderful change of pace to be curled up in BLANKETS (which I have been missing for the last month. Hotel comforters just don't cut it) and play cards and drink coffee and go wine tasting and meet celebrities (Aly and AJ, Disney Channel stars... so cool!) and read books and watch the Princess Diaries and have brunch at Erin's... It was slow and happy and full of love. Thank you SO much to the Whitmill and McLennon families for sharing their homes with us -- we were so blessed this weekend!

Our group has one full free-day in the city tomorrow (no school for Lunar New Year... Score!) and then two days in the classroom before we head out! SO weird!

(ps. wrote this yesterday but my computer died on me... free day, check. h&m shopping with caty and danielle, check. time for homework and relaxing!)

Bread Bowl: Check

"Well you know the routine so I think I'll just observe today."

Always the words you want to hear come out of a substitute's mouth early in the morning... I kind of went into today expecting that the sub would want me to do everything (since he didn't really do anything yesterday either) and that was exactly how it played out. Thank goodness I only had 8 kids there today because my sassy ones were extra sassy (one even threw up in the morning, or at least so she says...) and the good ones kept saying "Why do they keep being bad today? Do they want to get in trouble when Ms T gets back tomorrow?" It was a pretty hectic day but we made some progress and I "taught" and we'll see if anyone can tell still me what a mixture is tomorrow! I was very glad when 1:50 came today.

One of the best things about today was that all day I had the thought of "Fisherman's Wharf after school for jewelry shopping and a clam chowder bread bowl" on my mind all day! I was so excited to finally get my bread bowl here, I have been waiting all trip for this. It was so delicious, but I don't think I need another one while I am here! That thing was hearty. I also got to spend time with Caty, Danielle, and Liz afterwards too at the Wharf which was great to slow down a little and enjoy their company.

Two more days until I go meet up with Devin and Lynne Lynne Corn Dog! I can't wait to spend a weekend in Napa relaxing, watching TV, and spending quality time with people... And hopefully redeeming myself in some cribbage games :)
The current count on the trip: Caty - 5. Me - 0. It's bad.

Surprise! Your teacher is sick.

I am the fourth person on our trip who has had their teacher be unexpectedly gone one day. Today my students, a class of 12 fourth- and fifth-graders, went on a field trip to the California Academy of Sciences. I was quite surprised when another fourth grade teacher came up to me at our morning stretches and told me my teacher was going to be gone. We didn't have a substitute until we were walking out the door to get on the bus, and I spent a majority of the hour we were at school trying to take care of a girl who was missing a permission slip. But we still got to go on the field trip and it all ended up working out! It's quite intimidating to be put in a position where you are instantly shifting from a helper who's here for a month to someone who is responsible for a group of small children. Luckily we were going with another class and that teacher knew what was going on, but it was still a hectic and stressful morning. My teacher will be gone again tomorrow, she has the flu, so my stuffed-up self might be teaching a lot of tomorrow. Awesome.


I've slowly been getting better and I think I'm finally starting to get better, but I still feel pretty miserable and am blowing my nose all the time. We spent Monday afternoon lounging around at Golden Gate Park and it was glorious, minus the huge rip I found in my jeans that permitted me from doing much of anything! It was quite unfortunate. The elementary group + Caty + Cory made another sunset trip to the beach again tonight and though it was much windier (and therefore colder) today, it was still gorgeous and fun to spend quiet, quality time at the water together.


This weekend I am going to my roommate Devin's house in Napa about an hour away from here and I am so excited to get to spend time with her and a few other of our friends sightseeing and relaxing! I have been wanting to try and figure out how to get to see her house for a while now and this worked out perfectly.


It's really crazy to think that our last day in the school is a week from tomorrow. I adore these children (well, most of them) and it will be hard to pick up and leave. Although I do miss my kindergarteners like crazy! I have to try and figure out how to send pictures in an e-mail to them. I think that will be my goal for tonight...


Hope everyone in Washington is enjoying the snow :) My brother and sister had a snow day today... Totally weird to me as I walk outside in khakis and a shirt!

Set Go

My weekend in as few words as possible:

Biking, Golden Gate. Sausalito. There and back. Hip flexers = OW. Worth it.
Siri's birthday. Mexican food. Dancing.
Sick with a cold. Very annoying to me. Very annoying to my roommate.
Glide Memorial Church. Gospel. Awesome.
Haight Ashbury. New jeans. Win.
Homework.

I have come down with a cold and am so thankful we have a three day weekend so I can keep trying to recover tomorrow. It's very annoying when neither DayQuil (my go-to medicine) nor Sudafed do anything. Time to watch New Girl (my new favorite show! I want to be Jess) and take some NyQuil. Happy Martin Luther King Day!

Graduation Ceremony

One of the most exciting things that happened this week was receiving an e-mail from Betty Williams, my advisor at Whitworth, telling the special education department that our petition to sit as a department in the graduation ceremony this year was approved.

Let me explain why this is so exciting for us.

In years past, the School of Education (elementary, secondary, and special education) has been chunked as one big group at graduation. Many secondary majors chose to sit with their content area (e.g. math or science) because secondary education is technically a "certification program," not a major (it's kind of silly). As special education majors, Whitworth requires us to get an elementary major as well, so it made sense to have us all sit together... At least, it made sense in the eyes of the people running graduation.

This year, there are seven people graduating from the special education department. Two of us will be done this spring, while the other five are coming back to do their final student teaching in the fall. Six of the seven of us have had a large chunk of our classes together and have become a very tight-knit community. All of us are passionate about our special education classes and futures and have every intention of being special education teachers... One who wants to do secondary resource room, one who is really interested in Behavior Intervention, three with early childhood certifications as well, one who is getting an additional endorsement in Deaf education, a few of us who really want to go to grad school, a couple who want to work with people with severe disabilities... We are a varied and wonderful bunch. It's not that we don't love general education, the professors we have had, and the people we have our block classes with. All of us will student teach in general education classrooms and we love our kids to pieces. And the people I have gen ed classes with are some of my favorite people at Whitworth. I'm in San Fran with 12 of them right now, for goodness sake! But we wanted to be able to sit with our department at graduation because these people and this major are what we love.

So we had to petition.

We stayed for an hour and a half after Tuesday night class one night to pump out a petition to go to the Education department.
Then three of us had to meet with Betty.
Then the Education department had to approve it.
They did.
The the Graduation committee had to approve it.
I heard they weren't going to.
Then they did.
And now we have changed thing for the better.

Students have asked about sitting with special education in the past and they were denied.
They said "But we're a separate major! Business, marketing, and accounting might all be in the business department, but they get to sit separate... Math gets separated by a BA and a BS... Why are we the exception? Why can't we sit with the major we want?"

Now we can.

Somehow the group of us became affectionately known as the "Dream Team" by our professors. At first, it made me really uncomfortable. We are just students who love what we do! That's the way it should be.
But these people are some of my favorite people from Whitworth.
I love phone calls from Morgan that usually have to do with what cute thing a small child is doing.
I love Azteca dates after finals where we laugh until we cry, and two hours later realize we're the only ones left in the room.
I love sitting on the ground during night class because Dana says "do whatever you need to do to be ale to learn!"
I love "friendly review games" that turn into cutthroat competition. Though that might have been my fault.
I love Cy's animal facebook pictures that come up as a constant source of conversation.
I love taking food from the Psychology lounge during night class and hoping it wasn't important to one of their experiments.
I love that we have a Facebook group called Dana's Groupies and Dana both knows about it and finds it funny.
I love that our professors are our educators, our mentors, our employers, and our friends.
I love that our professors trust us with their children.
I love that we have bonds and experiences and future career paths that can keep us in touch for many years to come.
I love our acronyms and our inside jokes and our endless conversations about data and interventions and reinforcement of our roommates and ourselves and our pets.
I love how nerdy we are together and how well we embrace it.
I love these people and the roles they have played in my life.
Dream team for the win.

Six more school days!

So we leave in 13 days and only have six days left in the schools... Work hard, play hard :)

Our group has made two trips to see the San Francisco sunset over the ocean this week and it's been beautiful!

Last night a group of 10 of us went to NightLife at the California Academy of Sciences. It's an after hour half-price admission to the museum and it involved seeing penguins, so I was sold. But the CAS is neat because it has an indoor rainforest dome, a planetarium, and a bunch of other cool exhibits to check out. Caty and I went to peek at the "Living Roof," aka the roof of the facility with a wide variety of plants growing on it, and ended up listening to a man talk about constellations and the night sky... It was really interesting! They also had a telescope set up so we could see Jupiter.. Double win.

School is great and I'm becoming really attached to my kids. I've had many instances where my special ed training has come in great handy... I spent a lot of today trying to coax a kid back into class after he walked out when he didn't want to do work. It didn't help that there were a ton of adults involved and he's used to getting what he wants, but we  bonded over four-square and jump rope... Then he proceeded to spend a lot of the afternoon calling me a stupid teacher. But I've gotten much worse from kids before so I'll take it! But these kids really are great and I am loving getting to know them. We talked a lot in our group today about how transitioning back to extremely non-diverse Spokane is going to be really weird!

Most of us are renting bikes tomorrow and trekking around the city and over the Golden Gate bridge! It's also Siri's birthday so we're going to Mexican food somewhere. I've heard nothing but good things about the Mexican food here in the city so I'm real excited.

Beach Bound

This week has felt like it has dragged on forever. Not in a bad way, it just feels as though we have been in school forever. I am getting more comfortable in the classroom and with my kids. My three little fourth graders are darling... Well, two are the sweetest (and funniest) kids ever and one likes to drive me up a wall by saying nonsense answers even when she knows the right one.

"M, where would the Indians have gone fishing when they first came to California?"
"The pool."
"Ok, where in nature could they have gone fishing?"
"The pool."
"M..."
"The pool! That's where they went fishing!"

Drives me mad, but usually one of the other two will pipe in and go "the river!" Thank you, fourth graders.

I have had a couple conversations this week with my teacher about there students, where they come from, what their home life is like, and it is really interesting and overwhelming to get background on my students. I have three students from Yemen, five who are African-American, two who are Vietnamese, one who is Latina/Italian (my un-favorite... because I don't have favorites. Definitely not. No way.), and one who I believe is Hispanic but that might not be correct. And my teacher is not white, but she grew up in San Jose and lives in San Francisco now and grew up going to Catholic school, so the culture of an inner-city school is about as foreign to her as it is to me. It's hard to hear that half of our students (6 of 12) are WAY below grade level, and of those six, 5 come from single-parent homes and the other has a learning disability... There are so many stories and so many heart-breaking situations that these 10- and 11-year olds have already gone through, it's really hard to imagine what their lives are like and will continue to be like.

My highlight of the week was the opportunity to go with Liz, Caty, and Margo to tour... The Facebook headquarters! Liz has a friend from home who's boyfriend works there, and they met over Christmas break and he offered to give her and three others a tour! So we traveled down to Menlo Park yesterday and got to see the place. Those employees are SO spoiled, it's a little crazy... But they all know it and try to be really humble about it. It makes me a little jealous of Alison Wilbur, future Amazon.com employee, and the others I know (aka my sister) going into the field of technology, where there is MONEY and lots of it.

A lot of our group is off to the ocean tonight... I cannot wait :) We have been to the bay but this is our first time to the actual coast... Score :)

Curveball on a 3-2 Count

This weekend has been INCREDIBLE.

Saturday... We woke up (after I slept for 12 hours, it was the BEST) and got ready to head out at 11. From there, we went up to Fisherman's Wharf and had crepes for lunch. It was DELICIOUS and so fun to just be super touristy and walk around. From there we headed over to the boat on our way to Alcatraz! It was seriously so great. I was pretty skeptical about Alcatraz just because I am not a history person by any means, but I figured that I'm in San Francisco so I might as well go, plus my dad probably would have killed me if I hadn't. We took the audio tour inside the main cell house building and it ended up being so interesting. If nothing else, the view of the city from the island and boat was more than worth it! It was warm, gorgeous, and just a perfect afternoon.

The real loop in my weekend came while I was at lunch on Saturday. My dream for next year is to work abroad in Africa and I have been looking into working with a school called Faith Roots International Academy in Doryumu, Ghana, where my best friend from high school Anna interned during her time in Ghana last spring. Well, Anna called me around 12 and left me a frantic voicemail telling me that FRIA was having an open house about an hour away from me on Sunday (today) because the principal of the school is home for Christmas break and she is from Redwood City, CA. I quickly stole Liz's iPhone to look up if it would even be possible for me to make it to... Turns out I could take the CalTrain (California's equivalent of Seattle's Sounder train) right into Redwood City and I would be two miles away from the church where the open house was being held. As Callie Gordon later described it, "this is divine." There's no way this should have just worked out... But it did.

So I e-mailed the principal last night telling her that I was coming (I was in contact some with her last spring but have not talked to her since then, though Anna has continued to 'name drop' me to her) and at 12:15 today I left Grace Cathedral (where our group went to church today... It was a gorgeous building, though Catholic mass totally intimidates me) and headed on an adventure! The trip was actually super easy, beside the fact that I wasted half an hour because I thought I was walking in the wrong direction when I was actually going the right way the whole time (thank you Starbucks free wifi!). But I made it to the church and was able to talk with both the principal of the school as well as the couple that started the grassroots organization that the school is connected with. It was a really incredible semi-interview opportunity to just get more information about them, where they come from, and what my role in their school could look like. I am applying to work as a special education teacher, but my role could be kind of an intervention specialist as well depending on what their school population looks like next year! I would be happy doing either, as long as I am with kids :) And there is a Children's Home on site where many of the children who have been orphaned live, so I would most definitely be getting my daily small child fix and then some!

At this point, I am praying that I can financially figure out how to spend September to May or June in Ghana, hopefully coming home for Christmas (there is about a month long break). Since I will be a volunteer teacher, I will have to work and fundraise to pay my way there as well as pay my living expenses in the country. I wish that money didn't have to be such a large factor, but it will be. I'm not sure exactly what my cost of living would be there, but as John kept saying today, "God is so good!" and if things are meant to be, I will find a way to make this all work!

So although today turned out totally different than I how ever expected my weekend in San Francisco, I am so thankful for what it meant for me. Praying that this seed continues to grow into one big adventure!

Week One: Check!

Writing that title was super weird. We were only in the schools for three days this week, and it feels like it's flown by. It's going to be really hard to leave these kids at the end of the month, I'm totally falling in love. "Are you going to be here on Monday still? Good." "Are you going on our field trip with us???" "Miss T, how long is she here for? A whole month? Yes!" Honestly, I am used to my (incredibly wonderful) very affectionate kindergarteners in Spokane, so this whole "fifth graders act really cool" thing is totally new and their little pieces of not-so-subtle affection are good for me.

After school today we headed out as a group to meet up with the secondary teachers at a park down by their school. We passed their school on the way and it's BEAUTIFUL! We also walked by a high school that's apparently pretty sketch, but it was the most gorgeous building ever. The architecture and mural paintings all over this city are incredible. We also saw the Full House houses today! And at the park across the street from them, there's a little "shoe garden": the park's gardener kept finding shoes that had been left by people (don't ask me why people were leaving their shoes at the park...) so he started planting plants in them and now there's a whole collection! It's pretty funny and cute.

I am exhausted and I'm totally miserable to be around in the morning (sorry Caty! She's been a good sport, luckily) so I am taking it real easy tonight. Hope you all have a safe and relaxing weekend :)

Les Images

Math Mode

Today I did a lot of MATH and it was the best! People who know me well know that often, I complain that I miss math... Give me an algebra worksheet and I will sit and do it for fun. Really. Math is totally satisfying and reinforcing to me, because there is a right answer and I know that I can find it. Well today I did a lot more multiplication, and though yesterday I said I never wanted to do another multiplication problem... I guess I slept that off. I spent the morning looking over the science unit we are starting next week (solids and mixtures... aka simple chemistry. Also my favorite!) and then read the chapter book that she is just starting with a small group for a literature circle. The main character in the book's name is Callie Vee, so I keep thinking of Callie G. and Callie B. back home! But then it was English time where I got to walk around and help students, and math. Math math math... I love it. And today was the first day where I really felt like I was interacting with all the students, not a few random ones from time to time. Because the class is so small, she doesn't do a lot of whole group lessons and sticks with smaller, more individualized groups. It's pretty neat to see that she is able to do that since the class size is only 12.

After lunch I did more math with a kid who is really bright but still seems to get confused when doing multiplication. We made a visual of it that seemed to help him a lot and I'm making one that he can keep tonight so we'll see if he starts to get the procedure down! But the best part of this time was that we did the math on the school roof! My classroom is on the top floor so we are able to walk out a door a the end of the hallway and walk right onto the roof! There was a picnic table out there and aside from the fact that the wind kept trying to take his papers from us, it was awesome! We all want to bottle up this gorgeous, sunny weather and take it home with us. This afternoon seriously felt like it was the beginning of finals week in Spokane! It's really hard to remember that it's only January and we will eventually be going home to cold and snow.

In about fifteen minutes, a few of the elementary teachers and I are headed down to meet Margo and Caty at Fisherman's Wharf! This is the moment I have been waiting for... Real time right by the water :) I love the ocean and water and swimming and, well, pretty much everything about big bodies of water. Minus the fact that it's saltwater, but I'll get over that.

Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing... Er, reading group leader.

First full day in the classroom: check! We left at 7:20 this morning to walk down to our school and get there for stretches at 7:50. It's the craziest thing... The whole school lines up with their teachers on the basketball court and the principal comes on the microphone (which we could barely even hear, but oh well) and after the Pledge of Allegiance and a little chant thing about the school, they turn on instrumental and the students and teachers alike do a series of dynamic stretches. I have never seen anything like it. The kids were less than enthused, as was my teacher, but they did it!

Morning was basically all independent seat work so I spent most of my time grading math.. I never want to do another multiplication problem in my life. It was pretty tedious but it needed to get done! My first recess was pretty awkward because I beat my teacher outside but I literally hadn't talked to any kids all morning and I didn't really know what to do or where to go. Eventually Elizabeth, another girl on my trip, came out with her fourth graders so I talked to her for a while. But after recess things got a lot better! I got to help students with their language arts and then took the three fourth graders out into the hall to do a reading group with them. The three fourth graders are such a sweet and smart group of girls. After we finished reading their story, I asked them where I should be sure to go in San Francisco... One told me that I have to go to a place where they make homemade ice cream, and another told me to go ice skating at Union Square (which we passed yesterday on our way to the SFMOMA. We heard you can see drag queens skating there from time to time).
Maybe not the most helpful suggestions, but what can you expect :)

After school today, Caty and Margo (our professor) came and met the 6 of us at the elementary school and we walked/took the bus to the Exploratorium! For those of you who are familiar with Seattle, it was pretty similar to the Pacific Science Center. But in front of the Exp. is the Palace of Fine Arts.. AKA a trip back in time to ancient Rome or something! It's this beautiful architecture with huge pillar and a dome and statues and carvings... Plus a huge pond and a fountain. It was incredible and totally unexpected! It was awesome to find that in front of our destination.

 This is looking up at the buildings in downtown on our way to the SFMOMA yesterday.

 The architecture we found today! It was so beautiful!

Here is the elementary teachers + Caty + Margo! The secondary students would not have been able to get to the museum until about half an hour before it closed because they get out of school an hour and a half later than we do, which was a real bummer.

This is right when we got to our room on the first day... Our first job was to hang up the Christmas lights and make it feel like home for the next three weeks  :)

I have a class!

This day was LONG! We woke up at 6:30 this morning to get ready, eat breakfast, and leave our hotel by 8:15 so that we could bus down to where we had our orientation with the San Francisco Education Fund, the nonprofit that set up our placements for us. Luckily we left way before we actually had to be at the meeting, because we had the wrong address and ended up being 10 blocks off of where we were supposed to be. AKA we got to speed walk across the industrial district of San Francisco at 9 in the morning. Luckily I forgot to change shoes in the morning so I was in TOMS all day (blessing in disguise), but there were a lot of hurting feet by the end of the day. After a totally thrilling orientation and really awful photo shoot for our ID badges, we got our placements and were on our way to the schools! I am working in a fourth and fifth grade classroom with only 12 students in it! Everything about it is totally different from my wonderful student teaching room... The class is small, the kids are much older (I walked in during a social studies lesson and it was a little bit of a shock to remember that this is what older grades looks like), and I am the only white person in the room besides the aide that sat in the back and was silent the whole time. But my teacher is wonderful and last year she had one of my old Whitworth teammates, Morgan Veleke, so I was excited that she knew what we were about and what our role in the classroom was supposed to look like. It sounds like she's really excited for me to work with her fourth graders because there's only 3 and they have kind of gotten the short end of the stick. So bring it, fourth graders :) It's going to be an adventure, that's for sure!

After we got home from school in the afternoon (our school ends at 1:50 every day... SCORE!), our whole group (13 + prof) went to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Lesson for the day: we don't get modern art. But it was cultural and an experience and, best of all, it was free! Thanks, AT&T, for sponsoring the first Tuesday of every month :)

Also, happy birthday to my fabulous father! His birthday always seems to be either the day I leave or the day after... it's really unfortunate. Sending you sunshine and palm trees from California dad :)

First Golden Gate Bridge Sighting :)

Hello from warm (ish,), sunny San Francisco!

Our group of 13 students and one professor is here and loving every second so far! We have bus passes already so we are free to travel all around. Caty and I hopped on a (very turbulent) plane this morning and made it to our hotel around 2 after meeting up with Liz at the Oakland airport. We're not really in a hotel.. It's technically called a residence club, but from what I know it's kind of like a hostel? I'm not really sure... But it has character, that's for sure! But our room has Christmas lights so it feels like home :) We walked to Whole Foods, got some food and our bus passes, and then Caty and I went on an adventure downtown to find the school district building where we have our meeting in the morning. Turns out the building is just some numbers on a canvas in front of the space.. Hopefully we found the right place! Guess we'll find out in the morning. Caty is the TA for the trip so she gets to do a lot of planning all the fun stuff for our group to do... It's a great plus to have a roommate who always knows where you're supposed to be and what you're supposed to be doing!

But by dinner, our whole group was here. We get free breakfast and dinner at the hotel-thing every day (which is a huge blessing) so it's fun to get to share the meals together. It's going to be a fun group and a fun trip :) We find out school placements tomorrow and start in our schools early Wednesday morning! Praying that the laughter, safety, and memories continue to flood in :)