Fun Semester

Spring 2012

This probably was the most entertaining semester I have had ever since returning to school.  I only did 10 credit hours this spring.  Elementary Spanish II w/ Lab, Math Teaching I, and Intro to Teaching II.

The best out of this bunch was the Math course.  It was very intriguing and the teacher/professor was great. Probably the best I have ever met.  If you are ever attending Tarrant County College (TCC) and have to take a math course look for Alan Cazares.  Anyways, this class show you some ways of teaching mathematics to students in 1st through 8th grade.  I have always loved math in school, but this definitely broadened my view in the subject.  It makes since because I probably would have been hard to teach math to kids with the knowledge I knew before this course.  He helped show us the simplest way to teach it, but the biggest struggle most of the students had was way over thinking the concepts.  Finished with an "A".  I'll be taking the second part this Summer.  Will be pretty busy, but I'm sure will be fun again.

Elementary Spanish II was the continuation of the massive amount of work I did last semester.  It has just as much homework, 2 Charlas, 4 writing assignments, 8 quizzes and 4 exams.  I was a lot to do.  I did learn a lot with the both classes, but I doubt I will continue Spanish in the fall.  I need to finish school with as little stress as possible.  I may finish in the future or just buy Rosetta Stone.  The instructor, Belia Freedman was a pretty nice to have.  She was tough, but very reasonable.  I definitely made you put in the work.  Some students were cool with her methods and others were none to happy.  I finished with a "B" and that's all good with me.

The last class (but not least) was my second teaching class called , Introduction to Special Populations.  This class was very great to be in.  The instructor, Ms. Elizabeth (Lisa) Self, was a probably the most energetic teachers I have ever met.  Her methods were pretty interesting like Mr. Cazares.  There was a lot of reading involved in the class, but when we went to the class sessions, instead of going through a lecture on the subject, she had us do activities on the subject including class discussions, group activities, book reports and presentations.  Now these were as tough as I thought, but you still had to put a great deal of work in it and you had to be used to working in a group, because you worked with the same individuals in your group every class time.  The challenge to was keeping up with the reading and retaining all of the information for the exams (not one of my strong suits), but I must have done well enough because I finished with an "A".  Way better than I was expecting.

To top this semester off, I was invited and installed in an organization called, Kappa Delta Pi.  It's an International Honor Society In Education and like the profession of teaching has a women majority and I was honored & proud to join them.  I was one of 2 men installed in a class of 20 this pass spring.

So that is my update from this pass Spring.  A semester to remember.

Later...

Early Childhood

So I'm attending this conference on Early Childhood and we had two great presenters. One talked about Magical Moments in Music and brought up this great quote: "All children are gifted; they just open their presents at different times". It does make since in some way. We also sang some old songs we had sung when we were kids.

The second presenter talked about art and how science plays a big part in it. We took part in doing some art activities that uses the following process skills: observing, comparing, organizing, communicating, measuring and predicting.

It was a good conference and I may check it out again next year. We'll see.

New Addiction

So, I would like to thank those close to me for forcing a new addiction on to me.  I don't know if you heard of this show, but it's called The Walking Dead.  I heard about this show before it premiered last year and thought, "Seriously?  How can this develop into a show?  How can you make anything about this?  It's just about zombies!" 

I didn't hear much else after the first season, which was only six episodes long, but I guess it gathered quite the following.  I'm sure starting with your normal zombie movie loving crowd, who probably got excited about a TV show on it.  The thing that really caught my attention was when my close friends were talking so much about it. I was realizing that this show was becoming a phenomenon like Lost and Heroes (sad to see both of those go), along with a panel talk show called Talking Dead followed each episode. 

Eventually I was going to check it out, but I was busy with school and catching up on my own favorite shows.  Then the second season had a winter finale and folks were already crying about how they have to wait until February.  Well I had still had not checked it out and peer pressure was pushing strong on me so I decided to start checking it out.  I saw the first season on Netflix.  And I had to do a marathon of the first part of the second season.

I'll admit this show is great and I'll continue to watch it, but more so to see how far they can take it.  I'm sure very far again like Lost and Heroes, but like every phenomenon show there is a drop off point.  Curious on when that will be.

Good luck on the show, Frank Darabont.

Later.........

Less Stress

This is pretty much my mantra for the year 2012.  Will I be able to eliminate it?  Naw, not really, but I can bring it down to a more tolerant level.  I'm just trying to not sweat the small stuff so much.  My tolerance level had become very low (almost zero) and noticed how it was effecting things, including home.  So, I am working to raise that and get healthier.

I have been noticing just a few people making some changes in their life and it is helping reduce the stress in their own lives.  Some are eating healthier, working out more, dropping unhealthy relationships (including on Facebook and Google+) and even changing jobs.  These folks so far are already looking happier. 

So folks, if there is something you really want to work on, try reducing as much stress out of your life.  You'll be amazed how it will help just about everything else.

Later.......

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Pretty excited!!!

So I haven't told you guys how I did in the Fall of 2011 so here it goes.  Man was that a challenging semester.  2 classes with constant homework, 1 class with a paper due every week, 16 hours of classroom observation with one district being difficult until the last minute and workouts for 6 straight weeks (once a week).  I ended up doing very well with an "A" in College Algebra, "B"s in Elementary Spanish I and Intro to Teaching and a "C" in Concepts of Physical activity, which should have been the easiest class.  Oh well.

Choosing classes for the Spring semester posed some hurdles including deciding if I wanted to continue with espanol.  I ended up registering for it.  My other two classes were no brainers where I will be taking Intro to Special Populations, my second teaching course, and Foundations of Math/Teach I.  I had my first class today in Foundations and it was cool.  The teacher was very interesting and seems like this class will be fun.  The only other major hurdle, that is going on, is financial aid. I hope it gets resolved very soon.

Oh well, like I said before my first class tonight was fun and I am looking forward to more sessions.  Friday are my Special Populations and Spanish 2 classes.  Kind of glad the semester has started.

More soon............I promise.

Bye Bye Angels

So messing around with my DVR and I noticed that this week's Charlie's Angels did not record.  So I went into my settings and saw that no more episodes were scheduled to be recorded.  Did the Angels get cancelled?  After confirmation with several sites, yes they were.  In fact 5 of the new shows of the 2011/2012 season have been dropped including:

Free Agents (NBC)
HBR (CW)
How To Be A Gentleman (CBS)
The Playboy Club (NBC)

and of course Charlie's Angels on ABC.

Bummer.  And I really liked that show, too.  Oh well.

Good luck to the other shows.

Been a While

Hey folks,  I apologize for the big gap between blogs in school, but if you have not guessed it already, It has been an very busy semester and I am almost to the half way point.  I am taking four, I repeat four classes this semester.  They are Concepts of Physical Activity (Fitness/Health class),  Functional Approach of College Algebra, Elementary Spanish and Intro to Teaching Profession.  Can you guess which of these classes are the most demanding?  Go ahead and guess.
I will definitely say that all of the classes do require a lot of your time with homework, exams, labs, class observations and workouts.  I am doing a lot to keep up with the classes, but in order to do this I had to sacrifice some things.  My DVR has been filling up a some because TV watching is near to nothing.   I don't do as much with my wife, family and friends as I use to and even my sleep is starting to be effected (I need to sleep now to be rested for my 6pm class tonight).  I will add that working overnights on a major store remodel isn't helping much although it does allow me to his my labs and exams a little easier.

I'm sticking to it and working as hard as I can.  It is safe to say I will not achieve a 4.0 this semester.  Already had some hiccups with a couple of the classes, but made adjustments to make them easier for me.  It's getting better. 

Well, let me jump off of here and get some sleep.  Again, feel free to guess which of my classes for this semester is the most demanding.  I'm sure you will not get it on the first try.

Later................

Adventures in Skoolin': Fall In!

Well! A new school year has started. I am going to take it a step (or maybe 2 steps) further and will take 4 classes this fall semester (2 on campus and 2 online) totalling 11 credits. As like the previous semesters, I am very nervous be cause I will be taking more in and working a remodel overnight for 6 weeks (whew!).

I remembered I never reported on my summer classes. In a nutshell, I aced both classes. Not too much of a surprise for the Computer Apps class, but I was shocked with the Music Lit class. I'll take what I can get, thank you.

This semester will be challenging, but my friends and my wife have faith I will do well. And so I will, too.

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ARGH!

Wil Clark (@becauseimwil) has shared a Tweet with you:

"TheOnion: [audio] Pirate Written Up For Dress-Code Violation http://t.co/qYNoFpe"
--http://twitter.com/TheOnion/status/105973826243936256

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Music Review: Evade Kanye's Zone

So, I was checking out the new CD by Jay-Z and Kanye West called Watch The Throne.  The long awaited album was the talk of the nation for months even tough I never heard of it until a week ago.  Being a huge fan of Jay-Z I felt it would be worthy of my library.  Boy was I wrong.  I haven't been this disappointed in an album since Erykah Badu's Amerykah Part 1 in 2007. 

I just can't figure what they were thinking.  There maybe only one track I like and I mean maybe.  Some of you folks may love this release and will blast it forever in your vehicles, but I think it will never enter my player again.  I gave this CD 3 chances.  I couldn't even go complete through the it the last 2 times.

Jay-Z and Kanye, if you guys decide to do a full album collaboration again please take longer to think it over before hitting the studio.  I'm still a fan of you two, but not of this release.  Stay out of your Zone, Kanye.

One other thing, WHAT IS THE DEAL WITH THIS FELINE PICTURE?  Geez!

C-