Possible Relocation

Hey my few readers (Nessa I mean). I have decided that I don't really like blogger as well as I did when I created this over a year ago. It's not horrible, but there are a couple of things that it doesn't do that I would like it to. Therefore, I have moved! I have now created a new blog at WordPress. Here's the link:

kristilis.wordpress.com

Sorry for the inconvenience,

-K

Oh yeah...

So, I was reading my sister's blog and then decided to check my email to see if she had responded to my video blog thing. Then I noticed that I had a bunch of emails from her. Actually I didn't, I just had a bunch of notifications that she had commented on my blog. Her final comment mentioned that the explosion of comments happened because she just remembered that I had a blog. 

Don't feel bad, Nessa. I forgot too.

Random thought about reading as a social exercise

So, I was reading my texts for my English Method's learning community and I was thinking about something that we discussed in my Children's Lit class last year.

We were reading a book about the importance of reading aloud to children and the author mentioned the benifits of reading. Out of the many benifits that he described, one was a "social aspect" of reading. The author didn't really explain it--he must have thought it was common knowledge or easy to understand--but it was something that I had not conciously thought about and in class many of the students did not understand and then later out right dissagreed with it.

Many of these students who disagreed with the argument were not education majors and most likely did not enjoy reading (in fact that was probably why they signed up for "Children's" Literature as they figured reading picturebooks would be easy). They argued that the author's argument did not make sense because it would imply that people who read a lot would have more of an understanding of social norms and the social aspect of life in general. Furthermore, that would imply that the heavy readers would be more socially competent since they would know more about interacting with others. From their experience, those who read a lot before college were the misfits and were the ones that were socially incompetant. These students continued their arguement by explaining that instead of learning about social interaction through practical experience, these people lost themselves in their books. A choice that only exacerbated their incompetance.

Not even the professor agreed with the author. This was frustrating, because at the time, I was unable to voice my disagreement with this argument. I tried, but in typical Kristina fashion, I could not find the words to convey the concept that had suddenly and urgently formed itself in my mind. All I knew was that I had felt that the author's ideas were groundbreaking and seriously spoke to me and my experiences and that I wanted to express my point of view so that the rest of the class might just understand what the author might have truely meant by it. As I tried to grace the class with this wonderful, amazing, empowering concept, I floundered, sputtered and everyone stared at me, confused at why I was even arguing the topic in the first place. This happens a lot for me as I tend to have trouble expressing my thoughts when they are at their most important.

Anyway, as I was reading my new set of Language Arts Methods texts, this idea came back to me and I finally came up with what I had wanted to say in the first place. Granted the students who always had their noses in books may not have had the most practical knowledge of social interaction. Granted they may have used reading as a way to cope with that fact and escape from the social skills that escape them. However, that does not mean that they do not gain understanding about human interaction through their reading.

In fact, I'd argue that, in some ways, readers often know more than non readers about social interactions. In my experience, people who read often have more of a grip on reality. They understand that people have multiple perspectives as they have spent time reading about ideas that conflict with their own or stories with multiple points of view. They also have had more time to explore the different perspectives, personally think about others' ideas and finally come to their own conclusion about the topic.

I could go on and on about this, but I doubt that anyone really wants to hear any more of my rant from over a year ago :)

-K

He loves me :)

So, I just wanted to write a quick note up here to record this. I barely believe that it is true now, so tomorrow I'm going to want this permanent record of this actually happening. I think I'll start from the beginning...

Tonight was my first Valentine's day with a boyfriend (the wonderful Nathan that I talked about in an earlier post). Nathan and I have been dating for almost 11 months. Our evening was wonderful. First of all, he bought me flowers :). I love that :). He took me out to Osaka for the Japanese food that I love (second only to Italian, but I eat Italian all the time and I was touched that he went there with the intention of trying sushi for the first time. You know a guy cares for you when he's willing to eat raw fish ;) ). Anyway, instead of eating the sushi like we'd planned, we ended up sitting at the hibachi brill and we had that instead.  It was a wonderful production and I had a lot of fun.

We then went back to his apartment and spent the night watching movies (The Breakup and Princess Bride) on TV. We started watching alone, but Jeff, Tom and Mo came back and watched with us and Davy came a bit before I left. I really like them all, they are great people.

Anyway, that was not the exciting part (it was just a good night :) and I wanted to talk about that as well). The exciting part was when Nathan dropped me off at my house. As I was getting ready to leave the car, he said "I love you." I couldn't believe that he said it. I'd been wanting to say it myself for a while, but there were a lot of reasons why I hadn't said it. The biggest of these reasons was that I wasn't sure he felt the same way--or even if he did if he would say it back. 

Unbeknownst to him, I've been saying "I love you" to a closed cell phone whenever we finish a call and his house whenever I pass it for a long time. I think my natural insecurity (I'm always insecure) was increased mostly because he kept on saying something about us "not being serious." I never could figure out what he ment by that. I may understand better now though (but that's my secret). 

Anyway, I am so happy that I can shout to the rooftops "Nathan loves me and I love him!"

So now you know.

Time flies...

So, I haven't written a blog entry in a year.

Wow.

Anyway, I decided to procrastinate from homework like usual and decided that blog writing was a good way to go about doing that. This way I can feel as if I am creating something and am communicating at the same time.

So, like the last entry, I am nearing the end of winter term. A lot has happened since that last entry. I passed that content test :)... of course now the APT test is coming up. At least it's the last one before I have to apply for certification. I have also finished an entire term of 7th grade language arts and reading clinicals with who else but my old 7th grade language arts teacher. That was interesting. I now see that he was a lot more caring than I perceived back in 7th grade. I also spent another summer working at Olin with the guys in hardware tech.

In fall term I did my student teaching. That was a difficult term for me. I have always wanted to teach upper elementary and was given 1st grade. It was a challenge, but I believe that I met that challenge face on. Now I need to finish my resume and start applying for jobs. Yuck.

On a personal note, there are a couple of new things in my life. First of all, on September 8, 2008, I became a proud aunt of Arcadia Grace Taylor. She is the sweetest, most wonderful baby on the planet and I love her very much. I tried to put a picture up, but it wasn't quite working... I'll have to fool with the blogger program for a bit until I manage to figure it out. Bare with me, I'm only employed by IT it's not like I'm a professional or anything ;).

Another big thing happened about two months after that entry. I started dating Nathan :). He's pretty much the sweetest and smartest guy ever and I am really happy :). I can't believe that it's been 10 months! Crazy to think that about a year ago, I barely even knew him. I knew he existed--pretty much since freshman year; I would be lying if I said that I hadn't been interested in him when I first met him (I'm not sure he knows that actually)--not that we talked or anything, he just happens to be my type, but I didn't give it much thought after that. Until Heather pulled one of her random "I know two single people of the opposite sex...they should date!" scenarios. I thought about it and asked her to see if she could get the ball rolling (I'm not really one to make the first move). Soon after, he called me up and asked me out. He also joined Heather and my astronomy course, but I don't think that that had much to do with me. I'll try to get a picture of formal up here if I can.

So, I'm more than halfway done with my senior year. I'm kind of excited for classes to be over and everything, but I'm also really nervous and a bit stressed out. The biggest thing is that I have no idea what's going to happen to me next year. I don't know where I'm going to be, what I'm going to be doing... I really don't know anything. In fact, I have no plans at all after August 1st--which is actually Heather's wedding. Another thing that I cannot fathom at the moment.

So, this post has really lived up to the title of this blog as it is random and most definitely full of ramblings. But what do you expect? It has been a year.

Kristi :)

No more pencils, no more books, no more teacher's dirty looks...

...at least for another week and a half.

Anyway, the point of this entry is that I am done with classes for winter term! I am really happy about that, even if next term is going to kill me...

Even though I'm done with my finals week, I do still have a test coming up. The Illinois Certification Testing System's Elementary/Middle Grades Content test. I have to take that mouthful next Saturday. Fortunately, unlike when I took the Basic Skills test, I don't have to wake up and be there to take the test at 7:30am. I was fortunate enough to be signed up for the 1:30pm session, something I am eternally grateful for! Still, I'm going to have to look up the map because for me the hardest part of the basic skills test was actually finding the building. So, I have one week to study all of this and for the first time in a long time I am actually studying something on time instead of last minute cramming which leads to basically winging the test.

So, I think I have decided that I need to go find someplace that is sunnier year round to settle down. This is because I really noticed my lack of productivity during the winter this year. I also had a huge slump in my mood. For example, before winter break clinicals seemed to be going well (granted I didn't want to wake up for them, but still). However, when we got back from break, the kids seemed to go crazy and I felt extremely incompetent. I was honestly strongly second guessing my decision to become a teacher. And then Valentine's day came and the kids seemed amazing again. At first I thought it was just their renewed appreciation of me :) but now I think it was also the fact that it is getting sunnier out and I am getting happier. The kids seemed to be getting happier as well, which made things easier. I'm going to miss them a lot, but I'm alright with moving on as well.

So, I started this by discussing how on task I'm being lately. However, writing a blog doesn't really qualify as being on task, so I think I'm going to be getting going and back to my studying! TTYL -Kristi :)

Feeling more productive/ambitious...

So, I never got back to that last post. Story of my life. Anyway, I think I have come up with a solution (or at least a plan) to keep me from having as much crazy stuff to do next term. I'm going to see if I can get some of the big things out of the way before classes start. My friend Crystal suggested that I start getting ideas for my science unit that I will have to complete by myself before the end of the term. So, I'm going to actually take it a bit further. I'm planning on (attempting) to start to plan--maybe even make a rough draft--of my science lesson durring spring break. I also just emailed my Lit Professor about my books for next term. As soon as she emails me back, I'm going to buy the books that are assigned for class and I'm going to try to read those during break as well. That way, I won't have as much to do over next term. Let's hope that this will work so that I can manage throughout the term.

While it's snowing out right now, you can see by my new surge of motivation that it's getting to be spring... or at least we're getting more sun. I didn't want to do anything all winter and now I'm making plans and getting creative all over again. I wonder when the weather will begin to reflect my mood...