the last flaming hoop

here goes...the last hoop i have to jump through (if you don't count an extended waltz with financial aid) is an interview at 2pm. they're threatening to have us do "impromptu" teamwork exercises.
whatev'...
if i can handle a roomful of sullen uncooperative teens, i figure i can handle anything.
so here's to hoping i get in grad school this next spring.

about those teens. whew, today was a bag full of tricks.
jordan and leon pretty much spent most of their time messing around with each other, and buggin' about pizza every 5 minutes. it would have been a complete loss except that the eerie thing is they did some actual work. even leon who i thought wasn't going to show any signs of doing anything wrote a paragraph rather unexpectedly. it actually made a good intro to what he wrote last week.
i don't know what to think about the two of them...i can just imagine the potential if they weren't totally distracting each other all the time.
i saw them talking to what looked like a coach out in the hall. i hope that will help with motivation because leon actually has decent writing skills...and needs to pass English if he wants to keep playing sports.
this other kid huyen showed up, voluntarily i guess. i didn't have any trouble getting him to do his work, he was all ready to go, so i tried to teach him the tricks i know for spotting verbs in a sentence very quickly so he could finish. hopefully he learned some of them, because i find them very useful myself.
probably the most surprising thing that happened today aside from this mysterious work that happened to be mixed in with a healthy dose of screwing around, was that all three boys like green tea. huyen i could see liking tea, but they were all raiding my tea like it was coca cola. normally i'd be pissed about some teenage boys drinking all my tea but frankly i was more mystified and bemused, and let them have at it to see if they were really enjoying it. they drank all of what was left after i drank half of the thermos on the ride out there. crazy...

the interview situation was much easier than a room full of teenage boys for sure. we had to discuss a lesson plan which was tricky because we were a group of two english majors and a science major. fortunately i have some science experience so i can forsee some interdisciplinary possibilities, which is essentially what we had to come up with. i'm glad i have all the classroom experience that i have because these things are so much easier with a bit of real life practice. i don't think there's anything hard about coming up with a lesson plan anymore...

then we had to write a two page statement on how we would implement diversity training in our classroom. another easy one. dude, i'm taking multicultural ed right now so this is what we've been talking about for months. not to mention i have lots of experience to go with all the theorizing in this area as well.

i think the one thing i wish i had more experience with is discipline. i never had much of a problem with discipline in adult ed (people are only there if they want to be, so they tend to behave--the only issues i ever had were people were late to class, or talkative which were easily dealt with). working at the botanical gardens, i never had much to deal with even with 600 kids. oddly enough they usually behaved themselves...the adults on the other hand...
i work in a high school now, and have situation like jordan and leon messing around, but don't have any idea what my role is in a situation like that because i'm not the teacher, and don't have any idea what the rules are. beyond telling them not to do something, i don't know what more i can really do, other than not let them get under my skin (i suspect in a way they're really testing me more than each other) so i try to show them that they aren't bothering me. but in real life, i would never let this stuff float, and i would have some way of seeing to it that they behave a bit better. but i guess this is my weakest area, since i've never had to deal with it.

tonight's class was interesting. we were talking about aging issues, how people deal with death, and how incredibly shitty nursing homes can be. honestly i feel pretty good about aging, but it's probably because i've got some really good role models. i know some kickass old folks, the type who would never be mistaken for "old" because they look and act years younger than their age suggests. here's a few people that make me think getting older isn't such a bad deal:

1. helen. if she's still alive (and knowing her she might be) is probably about 100 years old. last time i saw her she was 95 and frankly looked like she was about 65 or so. she still worked, and although getting around was probably troublesome, she still enjoyed being around college students so much that she made the effort to "go to work"every day.

2. gertrude. she's in her 70's now but you wouldn't know it. she tells strangers she isn't a day over 16 and she must smile even in her sleep. she's got a hug and a nice word for everyone and frankly it brightens my day just thinking about her. even having knee surgery didn't keep her out of commission very long. my motto in life these days is, what would gertrude do in this situation?

3. my grandmother. she's dead now, alas, but when she was alive she never sat still. i remember her hitting baseballs into outer space in her 70's.

4. howard mcdonald. i'm sure howard must've had a fairly hard life, but i never heard him complain about it--or anything else for that matter. he was a deeply religious person, and full of good advice about weathering the ups and downs of life. i miss his wisdom.

those are just a few of the people i know that make me think having grey hair and some wrinkles isn't the end of the world. they turned out alright, i'm sure i will too. as they say, it's all in your attitude.