Hallelujah!!!!

I'M DONE!!! You have no idea how excited I am to be done with this school year. WOW! It was one crazy ride, but I wouldn't change it because I learned so much about teaching and managing kids in the classroom. When it comes down to it, they are all just kids and I really did like all of them, it just was crazy when they all got put together! I am so ready to start fresh again in August.

This last week was full of craziness and fun, but I would say the highlight was going to the sneak peek of Eclipse on Tuesday night with my family and a big group of friends. SUCH A GREAT MOVIE!!! I loved the first two movies in the Twilight Saga, but man, this movie blew them out of the water! A lot better acting and great, cheesy lines that made me bust out laughing. Not to mention it was just fun being with all the people I was with! I also ended up making a shirt to wear to it, so I do have a few pictures of that night.




This is a picture with all of us with our vampire teeth that we recieved as a door prize for going. If you can't tell, my shirt has a wolf howling at the moon and the back of it has "Team Jacob" on it. So nerdy but fun! :)

Since I have been a horrible blogger lately, I will give a little update from what happened since last time I wrote. I passed the PRAXIS test I took in April and even got a fancy certificate in the mail saying that I placed in the top 15% of all test takers. WAHOO! :) Who knew? My job is also safe and I will be teaching 4th grade D track again at the same school. Yeah! I will be starting a reading endorsement/master's degree as well, in August, that is through the University of Utah and is a lot cheaper and closer to home than all of those other places I was looking at. The only downfall is that it isn't online, might take longer, and I heard that the U is harder than other places. Oh well! It is worth a try! So my life just might get a little crazy this next year, but I might as well get some more education while I can! :)

As for my 6 week summer, I don't have a lot planned, but I am excited just to sleep in and relax! I get to take care of the class hermit crabs (oh joy!) and am looking forward to finishing the quilt I started in April and reading a few good books! I may go to Jackson Hole or someplace like that with some friends and also to Wyoming with my family the first week in August as well. Oh so much fun! :)

This and That

Well, again, not much happening at the moment, but I thought I should post something! I am currently off track for one more week...no, I did not go anywhere this time, so it has kind of been weird. I am pretty sure I am annoying my mother being around all of the time, but on the other hand, I run a LOT of errands for her while she is working away!!!

Regardless, it has been nice just not doing ANYTHING!!! The only thing that I had to do was take a test called the PRAXIS. It is one of the hoops I have to jump through to be a teacher. I have to pass this test within the first 3 years of teaching, so I am hoping I passed! Otherwise I have been sleeping in, reading, running errands, and I started a quilt that I have had the fabric for since my birthday in August. It is VERY cute material and I have it to where I can start sewing it together. As soon as I do that, I will post pictures!

I have also been thinking about going back to school to get a Master's Degree. I wasn't really planning on doing it so soon, but I want to get it done so that I don't forget how to be a student myself!!! I also want more job options as well. I want to be "specialized" in something so I am not doing the same thing my whole life. I was thinking about special education, but now I am thinking more about reading and literacy. I love reading and always have, so I think I would just love to learn more about helping kids to read, especially the struggling ones. I have been researching schools all around the country and have found a few that offer that type of degree online, but all of them are so EXPENSIVE!! So, I am kind of scared to start anything because it is a big commitment to spend that much money. If you know me, I am definitely not a big spender of money and I am not in debt right now, so that is why it is so scary! However, I think it would be worth it in the end! I will have to keep you posted on how all of that turns out.

Anyway, in the meantime, I am just waiting to hear if I am staying where I am at or not for next year. I am pretty sure I have a job, I just don't know what or where yet. My principal said that as of right now, I am in the same grade and on the same track for next year, but they are doing a lot of administrative cuts in the District so that may or may not trickle down to affect me, because some of the administration may go back to being teachers. Ya, lovely, I know. I wish they would just hurry up and make a decision already so I can make plans for sure next year!!! It is pretty stressful at my work because of all of this, so I am glad to not be there at the moment.

Well, 8 weeks and counting starting next week for me and this class I have...yes, I am quite ready to finish this year and pass them along...sad I know, but I can't hide my stress of trying to manage this group anymore!!! They are crazy, but I guess that is better than no personality at all and I have learned quite a lot! :0

I'm Back!

Sorry I have been such a slacker lately on blogging! Not much has been going on, just the same old, same old! It seems like March has just FLOWN by, which is crazy because it is APRIL now and it is supposed to be warmer, but it isn't!

Let's see...March...oh yes, Parent/Teacher Conferences were in March and although they were long, I did have EVERY parent show up and it went really well! I am grateful for parents that are supportive with their kids! I am having a hard time with some of my kids that are really good students, but don't get the best grades though. I don't know what to do about them! It is hard to tell a parent why they don't have good grades when that happens, because at the time I teach, it seems that they understand, but their tests and some assignments don't reflect it. ARGGG...it is so frustrating that I don't have enough time to work with these kids to figure it all out and help them! I think my dream teaching job would be no more than 15 students so I could actually teach them!!! Hahaha...what a dream! I WISH!!!

I don't know how many of you have been following the news lately, but Jordan School District was going to lay off 250 of its teachers for next year. AAAANNNDDD you have it right that seniority was how they were going to do it, which put me and many other "newbys" on the chopping block. So I was kinda sick about not having a job next year for a few weeks, but the District got their heads on straight again and said they had enough money after all to cover us. We are still going to lose a lot of our nice aides and other programs for students though. Which means no PE, computer, literacy, copy, and library people to make our jobs a little bit easier. I don't know how they expect us to give the rising generation a great, quality education with all that is happening,but I guess we all just have to "buck it up" and teach!!! Which...I am learning to do, especially this year with the class I have!!

Yes, they are still quite the stinkers, with bullying problems and what not, but I am learning to be a little bit tougher this year I think. I did end up losing one of my students last month that moved to another fourth grade class, but apparently it wasn't me, it was the kids in my class. Anyway, to make a long story short, he was one of my more difficult kids and I was RELIEVED to have one of them gone. I am so ashamed of saying that, but it cut my stress level a little bit, not to mention the work load of one less student!! I am now down to 27...oh how I envy my student teaching days of 22 students!! :0

Well, to end with, my class finally earned the 30 class points they needed since the beginning of the school year to get a class pet. They have wanted one so bad!! So, we voted on a couple of different animals to get, like a snake (I was TOTALLY against that one!) and a turtle. Well, it turns out that a parent of one of my kids told me about her son's hermit crabs and how easy they were to take care of, so YEP, you guessed it, that's what we got! I took them home last weekend, just to see what they were like, and they are the some of the strangest and captivating things ever! I could have watched them all day, every day. So meet Rocky, Stitch, and Stacy, the newest members of Miss Lloyd's 4th Grade Class!!! :)

This is their home. Even though there are only 3 of them, there are a lot of empty shells in there so they can "shell shop" if they want to. They usually do it when they molt and become bigger. You can't see any of them in this picture because they are hiding in the mulch, under the water dishes!




This one is Rocky. His shell isn't painted, so it is hard to find him sometimes! He has been by far one of the most active ones (even though it doesn't look like it here!)



The one in the red shell is Stitch. He likes to hide a lot too...but he has since moved into a yellow shell that has a race car number on it (my kind of crab!!).


This is Stacy...she was quite shy! We still are not sure she is a girl, but we think she is because she is in a shell with flowers on it!



We are having fun with them so far, but I will have to let you know how it all turns out! I seriously hope they survive to the summer with this class! LOVE IT! :)