Halloween, 2nd Grade, and DayQuil

Many updates!

#1: The ladies in charge of the student teaching program with Chicago Semester invited the Spring 2009 student teachers to Chicago for a day to meet, greet, visit, and get our questions answered. The visit day was on Halloween which in and of itself was amazing! We did three school visits, spoke with a few current student teachers, and became more familiar with our surroundings (the Chicago Semester offices and, of course, the city). It was a great day! The weather was perfect and it was so nice to meet some of the other student teachers ahead of time. I was pretty excited :)

#2: I've been placed! I will be student teaching in a 2nd grade classroom at Farnsworth Elementary on the north side of the city. I requested a K-3rd grade placement but secretly hoped for 2nd :) So far, I'm thinking Farnsworth will be a great fit :)

Big, eh? Here's the killer - I will have about an hour commute. Eeek! Apparently Google has a Public Transportation Directions Generator which, to my surprise, informed me that I will need to:

a) Walk to the bus stop.
b) Take the bus to the Blue Line.
c) Take the Blue Line to the designated stop.
d) Walk to my destination.

Yey? Naw, I'm looking forward to it. I like having time like this to just sit back and relax. I'm a people watcher, too, which should be fun :) My question is this: Exactly what time will I need to be there each morning? This could be an issue.

I've been working on my packing list. I'm organizing it with tables, bold, italicized, and underlined fonts, and, of course, colors. Ha! My mind would be exploding if I didn't do such things. Currently, the bulk of my list is surprisingly not in the food or clothing sections, but rather in the First Aid and Wellness sections. I know, crazy right? Cough Drops, Cold Ease, Tums, Sudafed, Zyrtec, Heating Pads, DayQuil, NyQuil, Vitamin Water, Tissues, GHA! My biggest fear, over everything else, is getting sick. I know that I won't want to miss any school, so I'm dreading the day that I have to teach closed-figured polygons and Homophones with a cold. I'm sure the kids wouldn't mind me teaching with a tissue lodged in my nose, but I'm not too sure I could survive what it would do for my reputation as an effective and professional educator. Maybe I'll keep that remedy for the comfort of my couch and stick to the DayQuil.

It's getting close :)

Call me impulsive.

Today I had quite the change of plans. Initially, I was planning on completing my dual placement of 18 weeks (10 weeks in Elementary, 8 in Early Childhood) in Chicago through the program; however, after a round of phone tag and a chain of e-mails, I came to the decision to only do my elementary placement in Chicago. My stay with the program will be traditional, meaning I wouldn't need to come early and stay later than the other interns, housing will not be an issue, and I wouldn't miss the week-long orientation into the program. On the other hand, I will need to return to Michigan to complete my 8 week early childhood placement. Here's the killer: the placement coordinator at Spring Arbor suggested that I split my placement in two - 3 weeks at a Headstart program in the Detroit area in January before I leave for Chicago, and then the remaining 5 weeks after the program is over at a pre-school or Headstart program in Jackson. Whew! I am almost certain that I would be able to stay in the same apartment I'm in now when I return; however, that is still something I need to check into. If this works that would be great since I could begin my job search right after graduation, not to mention experiencing the pure bliss that comes with knowing that I would be completely done in May! We'll see how it all works out, I guess. I'm just so thankful that both placement coordinators (through Spring Arbor and the Chicago Semester) are so amazingly kind and determined to work things out to my best interest! I feel like I'm finally beginning to see the fruit of my hard work! It's about time.

On another note: I will be traveling to Chicago on Halloween for a visit with the other student teachers for the spring 2009 semester. We'll meet at the program offices downtown and then travel together to 3 different schools where current student teachers are working. I'm pretty sure we'll be ending the visit by going over and completing official applications from the Chicago Public Schools to student teach.

It still feels surreal. Whew!

Hi!

Here it begins - October 17th. I should be keeping up with a countdown, I guess. That day will come, I'm sure of it!

I made the decision to begin blogging now for the following reasons:

1. Things are FINALLY beginning to come of all the hard work I've put into my preperations for the semester - finally. I am beyond excited and I would love to share the details with you all!
2. January will arive before we know it and I would like to get in the habit of updating before I am in too deep of a hole to remember! [Hey, I have to prepare myself!]
3. I, for once in my life, am finished with my homework early [yes, early.] and even had enough energy left to want to do something constructive with my time! [Or I have a few papers I could get started on but, of course, I fell into the charms of procrastination, yet again. You decide.]

I'll post again soon!