this is who i am

This is a cheesy little assignment that I had to do for one of my education classes, but it turned out to be a pretty accurate portrayal of myself, so I thought I would post it on my blog. I am not usually one for poetry, so please bear with my ways...

I am a husband, a student, a brother, and a son
I am a sojourner whose journey has only begun
I am the northern prairies of my childhood home
I am a view of the Rockies and Calgary’s Saddledome

I am a magnifying glass focusing sunshine rays
I am a study break clearing heads that are dazed
I am a hammock swinging between shady trees
I am a prayer of faith whispered in the breeze

I am a footnote dangling below the text
I am the curious voice wondering, “What comes next?”
I am a buzzing string on the bridge of a guitar
I am a letter from a friend who has journeyed afar

I am the crest of a wave breaking on the Great Lakes’ shore
I am a skeptic’s question continuously searching for more
I am a yellow highlighter running across the page
I am a message delivered from a podium on a stage

I am the blade of a plow turning once hardened soil
I am a late night study session burning midnight oil
I am a stiff cup of coffee, steaming and hot
I am the product of reason from which I was wrought

I am a coolie on the bank of the Old Man River
I am a teacher in training learning to deliver
I am a husband, a student, a brother, and a son
I am a sojourner whose journey has only begun

work and school

I have taken on a part-time time job to help out with the ongoing expenses associated with going to school. I just started training with Convergys, which employs a lot of people here in Lethbridge. It is a call center that deals with customer support issues for over 50 different companies all over the world. Here in Lethbridge we take care of Comcast and I will be dealing with customers who are having problems with their Comcast internet service.

Convergys seems to work with student's schedules very well, so hopefully that will work out well with all the reading and lesson planning that I get to do. The extra cash will definitely be a great assistance.

professional semester one

Jeremy asked about the classes I am taking this semester so I figured I would talk about them a little bit in a regular post...

As most of you know, I have just been admitted into the Faculty of Education after two years of undergraduate study in the pre-education program at the University of Lethbridge. The Ed program at the U of L is comprised of three professional semesters. In PSI we start the semester by taking a number of "seminar" style courses that specifically relate to various dymamics intrinsic to the profession of teaching.

My seminar courses include:

• Curriculum & Instruction: here we learn all about lesson plans (including year planning and unit planning), and how to incorporate all the requirements from the Alberta "Program of Studies" into our lessons.
• Evaluation: This course is all about how different students learn and how to fairly evaluate the learning that is taking place within the classroom.
• Educational Psychology: I take this class for the first time this afternoon, but it looks pretty self explainatory.
• Language in Education: Again, I havn't taken this course yet, but think it is all about teaching kids how to read.
• Teaching Seminar: this is a course where we specifically talk about the role of the teacher, and we deal with practical things such as classroom management. We also develop Professional Portfolios, which we are required to work on throughout PS1, 2 & 3. By the end, these portfolios are designed to help us showcase our experience and abilities to potential employers.
• Communications Technology: This course is primarily done online where we learn to incorperate a variety of technologies into the classroom setting. The Government of Alberta has specific technological requirments that all students are required to learn, so this class is designed to help us do this effectively in the classroom. Believe it or not, our first assignment was to create a blog and discuss how blogs could be used as learning tools. We were required to create a new blog if we already have one; mine is called techno-pedagogy (Wesla thought that was a really lame name, but I like it!).

These seminar courses run for eight weeks, until November 7th. Then we get assigned to a Teacher Associate in a classroom where we get to try and apply some of the things we have been learning. The practicum portion of the semseter runs until December 14th. The best thing about this schedule is that there is no final exam week, WOOO HOOO!

humbled by a softball

I am back in Lethbridge and I am back into the swing of my Education program, which is great in many ways, but that is not the subject of my post today...

This past weekend my wife had me join her weekend softball team for a tournament in Okotoks... and I have never sucked at anything so bad in my entire life! Mind you I haven't played a game of ball this entire year and I was thrust into a competitive tournament at the end of the ball season, but that is just me making excuses. I struck out twice, and nearly every occasion when I got on base was due more to a poor play by the opposing team than to any ability that I was demonstrating with the bat. My hitting was poor, but my play in the field was absolutely terrible. On two occasions (in the same inning no less) I mis-read the distance on a fly ball as it was coming into right field, which resulted in the ball soaring over my head and rolling into the fence. In fact I didn't manage to catch a fly ball the entire weekend, and by the end I was praying that no hits would come in my direction.

I am a competitive guy. I like to do well. This was an absolutely humbling experience. On the bright side, Wesla also has me playing "Fall Ball" with another team in a much less competitive format. So, hopefully I will be able to shake off the cobwebs before winter sets in.