B: Better not Bitter

Just do it...nike...
Stop,procrastinating. ...wens daar was pille daarvoor !!

Better not bitter is the silent prayer I prayed to God so many times.  Make me better not bitter. Guess I have met my share of bitter people with heart aches bigger than what their bodies can bear.  Life and the pains of life made them bitter.  Filled with anger, hate and resentment...the gall in then now spews out without control and a lot of the time they do not even realise what they are doing to their unsuspecting victims. 

A batch of marmelade can turn bitter very easily, just a little too much lemon or grapefruit and just a not enough sugar and the jam that was supposed to be sweet and yummy has a bitter twist to strong to enjoy.

People don't turn bitter that easily, well at least I think not. People also turns bitter from too much acid (lemon) and too little sugar, but it takes years. Life often layers pain upon pain, heart ache upon heart ache for us.  Only when we lace it with the sugar found in the love of friends and family that catches our tears and bring our pain before God in prayer....do we stay sweet. We become better. Stronger, with a rich flavour.

I prayed this prayer with tears many times. Even as I write this I whisper it again to God.  This last stretch of life has been hard and there are times when the anger and hate rise up inside me....and then I just whisper, sometimes with tears and not words......better not bitter..., make me better not bitter.

Weebly Website

As promised the link to the website we did....
Understandingfracking.Weebly.Com

Please keep in mind it was done with grade 9/10's in mind and it is my first of this ever!

My South Africa

In class we were given a list of statements of hope starting with "My South Africa".

Well, my thoughts...
My South Africa as a little girl is wide open space, and grasslands, telephone lines along the long long road between Pretoria and Cape Town. A place of beauty and blue skies.

My South Africa is the Xhosa cleaning lady that cleans for free and leaves bread for the kids of the white divorcee not able to make ends meet - Eastern Cape long before 1994.
A place of care.

My South Africa is the black gardener that works faithfully and continue to show respect to the white women of the house, letting his actions speak as an example.  A place of respect.

My South Africa is the place where a boy from Ghana works as a gardener, puts himself through Bible school and becomes a pastor to the people of the local township. His efforts rewarded with a wife and two beautiful babies and more.  A place of opportunity.

As a child, that was my South Africa....I was blind to hardships beyond measure of life in a shack and not having food to eat.  A place of hardships and discrimination. ...it only became that with education.

Let us not teach children how to discriminate, when they have no idea what that is, but let us not remain children, blind to the truth and pain of others.

UNPLANNED

So this was UNPLANNED.... I learned how to create a website with Weebly.  Yes it was part of an assignment.  In this year a very few things are not.  

In any case, I thought I could do this the normal way, PowerPoint or something that I already know how to use (use a blog  - you have everything you need on there....) no, not this time.

  

So I set myself to the task and "googled it".  Well it was much easier than I thought and I had too much fun doing it.  Too much, yes, too much, because I have 3 other, no make that 4 other assignments due next week and I am spending way to much time finding the right pictures and placing them just so....that everything looks A1.  Don't look now but give us a few more days and then I will post a link to the site.  NOT bad ek se, not bad at all.  

Something else I did not plan on or anticipate was the fact that I had to write my personal vision as a teacher in an assignment (due of course next week).  Well a personal vision is not something I have in my back pocket, and not something I develop in a week. Don't get me wrong, I am not without vision, but due to the nature of this year vision has been well, very much in a state of flux.  

And vision was also very much replaced by a to do list.  Keeping up with assignments and responsibilities.

I need at least a week in a cabin in the wilderness, the Fynbos around me, a lot of quiet, the sandstone rocks and sand under my feet, and the sea on the horizon to develop a good vision.

Something that will keep me focused during my first years as a teacher.  That will inspire not just myself, but also my students and colleagues.  Something that, without having to state it, will show parents that I mean business when it comes to their children's education.  That is what I expect of a vision.  A statement that will keep expecting from me to produce my best; not to give up and to get up when I get knocked down.  I few words that reminds me to keep an attitude of gratitude, a smile on my dial and a prayer in my heart.

To be the best version of me that I can possibly be. To care, to dare, to share.

To pray, play and pay my dues.  To dance, take a chance and to advance. To be, to become and to believe.

Eleanor Roosevelt said it this way:  

Fish Bowl!

So I did my first Fish Bowl lesson.  I think all of us that has done this can agree with me the set of mixed emotions is as varied as the fish in the sea.  Everything from nerves, tears, sweat, fear, anticipation, excitement and exhilaration.  For some it was a pure thrill and for others ... torture?

Where ever someone rated themselves on this emotional scale, one thing was noticible through out the building - adrenaline!

And in the moments or even days after (depending on your personal style of course) REFLECTION....
that is the name of the game.

What worked; what did not fly and why not; and on and on we evaluate ourselves and our peers.

Let's just keep our eye on the ball.  Teaching is for learning; even though we are learning to teach.

Instructions to teachers

Instructions to teachers in 1872
....This is just too good not to post.

Source:  http://wced.pgwc.gov.za/ministry/speeches/DeVilliersGraaffHighSchoo-140th-anniversary.html

These instructions include:

1. Teachers will fill lamps, clean chimneys and trim wicks each day.
   
   
2. Each teacher will bring a scuttle of coal and a bucket of water for the day's use.
   
   
3. Make your pens carefully. You may whittle nibs for the individual tastes of children.
   
   
4. Men teachers may take one evening each week for courting purposes or two evenings a week if they go to church regularly.
   
   
5. After ten hours in school, the teacher should spend the remaining time reading the bible or other good books.
   
   
6. Women teachers who marry or engage in other unseemly conduct will be dismissed.
   
   
7. Every teacher should lay aside from his pay a goodly sum for his declining years so that he will not become a burden on society.
   
   
8. Any teacher who smokes, uses liquor in any form, frequents a pool or public hall, or gets shaved in a barber shop will give good reason for suspecting his worth, intentions, integrity and honesty.
   
   
9. The teacher who performs his labors faithfully and without fault for five years will be given an increase of 25 cents a week in his pay providing the board of education approves.

#PGCEmix Interview part 3

I think I am ready for my first dry run.....
Testing my questions on classmates.

Watch this space for the results.

Nervous, not so much, just excited to see how it will go.  I also enlisted the services of an classmate to help record the interviews and if I "graduate" to the next phase I will progress to video.  (Taking baby steps here.)

The material on the internet that I worked through were very helpful and there are some great learning opportunities available.  Some sites include support as well.

I did read a bit about the setting up of questions, (open ended, humoristic, content appropriate) and about doing interviews in person or over email or phone.  I think I prefer to do in person interviews, especially because I would like to be able to get to know the people I interview a little better and a phone or email is just too impersonal.  Sure there is some valid reasons for using other options.

About 12 questions - open and closed ended. Tounge in cheek and  tell it as it is. The test will be in how they do with the actual interview, and of course how I put that into writing. 


Will you find it interesting?


http://jonahenry.com/embrace-ignorance/