Sunday 28 October 2007

Update

It was time I updated my blog, made it a little more trendy. You can see the new additions in very bright and obvious colours above and on the sidebar. Now you'll be able to check out what the time is where I am and when I'm due home in Australia. They also serve as a subliminal promotion of healthy eating.

In other news, MSTIE is finally over, with the final components being handed in tomorrow. Yay!

Saturday 20 October 2007

MSTIE 2

The second week of MSTIE is over, and we're all counting down the five days left until the end of another prac. Don't get me wrong, I am enjoying it. I'm loving the team-teaching and the chance to teach an on-going topic. But working under someone else (the supervisor) with limited scope (one specific topic) can get tiring. Probably the worst thing about pracs is the added pressure of trying to impress and be professional so you can score a job in the future (you don't have that pressure once you've landed one!).

Some days I think the people who come back beaming and gushing how they love prac must be from another planet. I used to think I must be the weird one; the teacher-in-training not enjoying the training-for-teaching. I know I'm not a 'natural' unfortunately. But having my own 'classroom' at Flora Hill is a completely different story to prac, which gives me hope that I'm not unteacherlike after all.

I guess the people who 'love prac' to such an extreme are also the ones who think that report writing isn't so hard, the holidays are longer than everyone else's, and teachers are appallingly underpaid.

Monday 15 October 2007

I need a secretary

Busy, busy, busy! Do you ever feel like you're really busy just because you have to make a series of phone calls (or am I just weird)? Some days I feel it would be nice to have a personal secretary; someone who takes my calls, photocopies my worksheets, arranges my schedule, makes things happen. Some days I realise I already have 'secretaries' in my life! Where would we be without those people who look out for us?

Saturday 13 October 2007

Five Years

Wow, we're getting old!

But more seriously, Stoz and I enjoyed a beautiful evening together on Thursday to celebrate our five years dating anniversary. We went to a posh restaurant with exquisite food and my favourite music playing in the background - how much more perfect could you get!

Wednesday 10 October 2007

"We're going on an adventure!"

A cooking adventure, that is. It goes a little something like this.

It all began with a trip to Keck Street to pick up an over-sized rice cooker and bags of rice, carrots and onions. Back at Neale Street, we proceeded to overcook the first batch - about 13 cups - of rice. The next lot was much better. Then began the tedious peeling of the vegetables, followed by the mammoth clean up.

Some things we have learnt from this adventure:
* A V-slicer is a useful kitchen tool.
* A well-ventilated room, a nearby burning candle, or chilled onions are not successful theories for preventing stinging eyes when dicing onions.
* Goggles work well when dicing onions.

Monday 8 October 2007

MSTIE 1

Welcome to MSTIE!

MSTIE is the Maths Science Teaching Integrated Experience that our course has created for third year B.Ed. students to do instead of 'normal' rounds. 36 hours of painstaking planning later, we have a professional little folder and some idea of where we're headed. Despite all the slog and criticism, I must say I am so far enjoying the distinct lack of nightly lesson plans and evaluations! In a way, it's much more like real teaching than anything else we've ever done.

Saturday 6 October 2007

Update 2

I had my final Twinrix shot - glad that's over with! I'm now immune to the most nasty of the diseases at risk in Indonesia (I didn't get yellow fever, polio, Japanese encephalitis, rabies, measles-mumps-rubella or tetanus-diphtheria, although I've had a couple of those already and the others really don't apply). I also paid some of my fees, so it's starting to get serious!