Ahhh, yes

This is what I think about when I only have 5 more weeks of school. Get me there please! K, it won't happen, but ahhh... it's the thought that matters.

From worst to best

Though I thought I had already had my worst day of teaching, there seemed to be one day that just topped them all off. Yesterday. The day was going great. The morning ran smooth, there were no melt-downs, my math lesson was absolutely amazing. But let's just get to the nitty-gritty. 2:00. My supervisor walks in the classroom. Everything was going just as planned. I had stayed up the night before planning and preparing for this lesson that my supervisor observed. I was confident that this lesson was going to go well, and we started the lesson.
The kids were down right stinkers! They were so excited about using GoogleEarth that they were absolutely horrible! I usually have good control of them and have several classroom management plans in affect. Not today! The screen on the board was pulled down covering all of our behavior management plans! I had nothing to use! Besides the fact that they were uncontrollable...I felt that the students learned absolutely nothing from the lesson, which in turn, was my fault. To make a story short, my supervisor came up to me and said that I controlled everything well, and mainted the student's focus in a professional matter, and that overall, the lesson was good. Lie! How nice of her to say that. But it was a lie! As I soaked in what had just happend the emotions started coming. And if you know me, when my emotions come, THEY COME! Tears flowed and I could not control myself. I stepped out of the classroom, took a couple minutes, and managed to walk back in the classroom. My supervisor came to me, hugged me, and began to give my a pep-talk. I started to calm down and tried to listen to what she was saying. "You'll have days like this. Sometimes you'll wonder why the heck you're teaching! But we all have days like this. You did fine. Don't be so hard on yourself. I gave you a perfect score." (don't know why she did that, but I'll take it) The tears kept a coming. The students were silent. They didn't know what to think of it. The teacher's crying? No such thing.
Again, I stepped out of the classroom to try to calm down. I walked down the hall into the teachers lounge and just sat and cried until I could finally just breathe and focus. I came back to the class to find my mentor teaching having a nice little talk with the students about their behavior during my lesson. She was hard on them, and boy did they have the guiltiest looks on their faces.
So, the good side? Today. They were absolute angels. I guess something good can come out of a total wreck. One boy walked through the door this morning and said "Mrs. Forbush, I am sorry that you got your feelings hurt yesterday." The same boy and a few other students made some "i love you" cards during their free time. So the point of the story.... this whole year I've been the teacher trying to support and guide and help my students' emotions. When they cry, scream, yell, or hide under their desks, I've been the one trying to help them get through it. Well, I guess what goes around comes around. Today, my students had MY back. They were the ones there for me, and they were the ones that got me through the day.

Intelligent Design Park City

Sean White walking away with 20 grand.

Big air

Here we are at the snowboard competition at Park City. The competition was a big-air, jib, and half-pipe run all together. This experience consisted of an amazing view of the half-pipe, some sweet rap tunes all day (gotta love it), drunk people trying to climb up the hill (hillarious), and best of all some good ol' family time.

115th day of school

It's been 6 months now since I've started teaching. I have learned a lot and am continuing to learn a lot with these wonderful kids. My experience so far has taught me a lot about how kids need to be loved and how they react when they don't feel loved. It's absolutely amazing and absolutely frustrating at the same time. It's a very strange balance that I'm learning to adjust to. I've really learned to love all of these kids, even the ones who wear me out to nothing by the end of the day . I can see myself changing and molding into a teacher. I am beginning to feel the weight and responsibility for these kids and their education. It's a very tiring job to say the least. But to me, it's the most rewarding one out there.

My New Calling: Primary Chorister!

Last Sunday was my first time being the primary chorister at church. I was a little nervous at first, forgot a lot of the words to the songs, and accidentally said "Mrs. Forbush" instead of "Sister Forbush" like 4 or 5 times. But we had a great time and the kids sang sooo... well! I was so impressed as I stood in front of them and could see that every child was singing! Yay! I really look forward to seeing them every week and learning new songs with them.

Wisdom from the Ninja Village: Keep going

The character for the word nin in ninja means ‘to endure’ or ‘to persevere’. It combines the character for knife on top of the character for heart, it means to go on despite having your heart under the knife!

Thus, a ninja is somebody who perseveres with his heart’s intentions even under threat or pressure.

This ninja philosophy is really simple to remember, and is summed up in 2 words: keep going.

I'll take any advice I can get, especially from the Ninja Village. ha. But really, I can do this. I can make it through my student teaching with success. I can make it through my last semester and feel prepared. I have confidence in myself and I'll use it full throttle. Now let's do this.

Pine Valley Snow

Hailey's first time sledding!

Yeah, it was intense bro.

Mom, Hailey, and meself

Most of the crew just a chillin'