Victoria Day Update

Well, it has been a long time, hasn't it?
I hope you have been having a good time while I've been working hard at being a better teacher. I sure enjoyed it. I must have, because the time sure went by fast enough.
Last December, the school that I went to observe for my field experience was the Chilla School on the T'suu Tina reserve. It was an eye-opening experience to the things that affect the First Nation students' education.
We students had been hearing about the turmoil at the school, and the recent firings of teachers. The band controls the school and who gets hired, so if a new council of elders is made up, they tend to sweep out the old in favour of the new.
So the principal we met when we went out there was fairly new to the job. When we arrived, she wasn't even prepared for us, even though three sets of students had already cycled through. The students weren't even there, as it was Parent-Teacher interviews. So we went over to the high school and spent the day there. On our second and third visit, I got to observe a grade 5 class which inevitably had a new teacher. She was still getting used to the class, and was deferring a lot of things until after Christmas. There was a lot of wasted time for the students, I thought. Instead of getting on and starting up a new unit, they were doing reading on their own, and various art projects like making a Christmas card for the elders.
I thought it would have been better in this case to hit the ground running and get them working hard right away. This group of kids were divided into two groups. One (the smaller) was fairly well able to handle the work, while the other was way behind. For math, they were still trying to figure out how to add three digit numbers. I was helping them with this, and I had to reteach how to carry. Yikes!
But they were good kids, and I was sorry that they were not being served by the band and the administration of the school.
After the Christmas break, we were in class for an intense ten-week period before we went out to a school for four weeks of student teaching. The work at Ambrose seemed to drag on, and I was more than ready to get into a classroom after it was over. I was assigned to a grade 1 class at the Col. Sanders school. I was really lucky to have not only a fantastic partner teacher, but a great group of kids. The time there flew by, and it seemed like I had barely arrived before it was time to go.
Next term, we'll be going out to schools for a 9 week period, and I'll either have a grade 5 or a grade 6 class. I'm looking forward to it.
I was renting a basement room while I was in school, very close to Ambrose. For $550/mo. I had a bedroom, a bathroom, and a big living room to myself. I shared the kitchen with the lady of the house, who seemed to cool off after Christmas for some reason. I was hoping to stay there during the summer and work in Calgary, but she wanted me out of there as soon as school was over. Oh well.
So now I'm back in the Batcave in my folks' basement, looking for summer employment.
Now that I have the time, I'll also resume posting about my adventures around the world, and in Korea. Look for those latter on What The Kimchi?
See you.