Mixed Media

Last fall Kyle bought and hung a bulletin board for me.  I love having an area where we can post cards we receive from home, art made by my students, and passages from scripture.  It's a nice reminder in our "office" of the good people and things in our lives.  I learned very quickly that our bulletin board can only sustain so much weight without crashing down and squashing half our goodies (it is held up by powerful putty, but it could be a tad more powerful...).  When the new year rolled around, I emptied the board in anticipation of new treasures.  Well, it took a little longer than I had expected from my students.  Perhaps the word spread that I make the big boys cry or it simply could have been that their English grades at the end of the trimester didn't earn them much good will from their parents.  Either way, I thought I had lost the favor of my dear little students.  I'm glad to say that this week there has been a big turn around.  Here's what I have to display to you this week.

Pretty peacock

Amira graciously glued a picture of a peacock to a sheet of notebook paper for me.  It is quite lovely.  She wanted to make sure I didn't see the image on the back side; it was very thoughtful of her to have hidden it.

Animal beads

Marine crafted a cute bracelet for me out of animal shaped beads of all different colors.  I need to wear it more so that she knows I like it.  Right now, it has a place of honor on the board of honored things.  It fits quite well, and I can put it on and take it off easily.

Classic hand drawn portrait

Deborah drew a great picture of me.  I love these modern looks the children give me; I promise you I haven't worn anything like this to school.  Sadly I'm sinking into the French style of blacks, grays, and the occasional color.  It's all denim and boots and lots of layers.  I love my students' imaginations~ a world wear young women can where colorful belted tube tops with matching leggings!  Let me draw attention to my features which she has mightily improved.  I love that I have retained my fair skin on my face as to prevent any melanoma or other unsightly skin conditions.  However, I am miraculously golden brown and sun-kissed on my bare shoulders down to my fingers.  I now have very flashy streaks in my hair to match my ensemble (a la Lady GaGa).  The happiest sight is that my legs have doubled in length; if only this were true.  You see, my fifth graders are hitting growth spurts and are reaching heights I have never known.  Oh Deborah, if only you could will me to be this cool and tall in real life...  My favorite part is that my name, so mundane in English, gets the French treatment and is elevated to a very sophisticated level with it's accent over the "e".  It has a touch of class which I may keep when I eventually legally change my last name (it'd be easy enough to throw a little dash over the "e" in my first name on the application...)

There you have it.  This late and great turn around in my popularity I think relies a lot on having introduced multimedia in my lessons.  I'm interesting again~no more pushing vocab and written exercises like the bad old days!  This week they got to watch Martin Luther King Jr.'s I have a dream speech with french subtitles.  Plus, they learned the dance (if you can call it dancing...) to the Hokey Pokey.  It's better than when we learned the days of the week song.  If only I could video tape the students...I would love to show you how they dance and enjoy themselves.  I even instituted my personal favorite dance move into the Hokey Pokey and made my students believe it was part of the moves.  Alas, these are memories I'll just have to store up and treasure when I'm no longer their teacher.  I just wish I could have fun with the kids instead of teach and discipline and grade... All in all it was a great week at school.