December craziness.

December was here and gone before I knew what hit me... It started with a tour of the new school (see previous blog post) and an opportunity to be on a committee to choose new reading curriculum for our district. It was a very interesting process and I am so grateful that I was able to be part of the committee to choose the curriculum. I am very excited to get it and implement it into my classroom next year.

After getting back to Alakanuk, I had 8 1/2 days of teaching left in the term... That meant only 8 1/2 days to get my kids ready for the Christmas program while still maintaining our routine of reading and math rotations... Holy cow. As it turns out, it was enough time... The kids had fun, the community loved it and the staff did a great job of pulling everything together.

Some of the staff pulled off a surprise dance at the end of the program. The crowd LOVED it. :) You can find it on Youtube here... http://youtu.be/czhBVggFnJA Go ahead and watch it, and like it. We wanna be on Ellen. :)

The trip to Oregon was an interesting one... We got out of AUK on time and were excited that we had good weather. When we got to St. Mary's (KSM) we were informed that the dash 8 (the 35ish seater plane that takes us from KSM to ANC) was having mechanical issues and wouldn't leave ANC until at least 1... So, we settled in for a few hour wait... Most of us hadn't packed lunch or even snacks because we're silly and we forgot so one of the pilots ran us to the AC store in St. Mary's... Turns out every they called to give us an update they were putting off the plane coming for another hour or 45 minutes. By about 4 some of us had given up hope that we'd make it out of KSM that night... Some of the pilots were trying really hard to problem solve and get us to town SOMEWAY... Finally around 6 we got a call that said the dash still wasn't fixed but they had another that had been doing charters all day that would be available to leave ANC around 7... This was going to get us into ANC around 1030-11... A few of my coworkers had scheduled the 1130 or 1230 red eye flights so they were stressing if they'd make their flights... Everything ended up working out okay. Jana, Zoey, and I got their luggage to mail while they sprinted to their gates. Everyone has made it home safely and will be spending Christmas with their families. Thank goodness for staff having different flights out of ANC because as it turned out, Jana and I didn't have time to get their stuff mailed... So we had to call upon Paul and Cheryl to take care of it for us.

Now its time to relax,  enjoy the beauty of Oregon and the ridiculousness of my family. :) Can't wait for them all to get here!! YAY!

New School Tour

So over Labor Day weekend we were able to tour the new school... And I blogged about it... Just kidding--I didn't blog about it. Maybe I mentioned it on Facebook about how I was so excited for the exposed beams, the huge gym, and the woods/metals shop... At any rate, I ran into the guy in charge of the construction crew and mentioned that I'd like to see the progress they've made... He said no problem. So yesterday morning Holly, Nathan, Sarah, Culea, and I piled in the van and headed for the new school with Deana and Katie on their 4 wheelers behind us...

Even though it was Sunday, there were a few guys up on the roof finishing a section.

The front of the school... Those windows are in the main office-perhaps the principal's and assistant principal's offices?

Looking toward the main office, teacher's lounge, principal's and assistant principal's offices, and 2 time out rooms. So when you walk in the door this is to the left.

We put Sarah in time out... Time room--2 of them between Diane's and Cheryl's offices with a window connected to their office as well.

To the right of the entrance... I think he said this will be the library. 

The gym!!! SO EXCITED for a big gym.

One of the classrooms... Gonna be good sized. 

Walking down the hall of the elementary classrooms.

Upstairs. I'm sad to see that all but the last 5 feet of those beams will be covered. 

View from one of the classrooms upstairs. So pretty!

Looking down from the upstairs hallway.

So, closest to the far right of the picture is the library. Then between the two rows of metal is the computer room, and at the far left is the Yupik room.

Same here... Far left is the Yupik room, then computer room, then the library, and the far right is the entrance hallway.

Its looking pretty good!! :) So exciting to see the progress.

This is Katie and Louis's new Can Am 4 wheeler... I think it'll be my next big "you will never be out of debt" purchase. 

Veteran's Day through Thanksgiving break

Its been three weeks of cold, but clear weather. That doesn't make me happy because I want to go ride my machine...

We finished volleyball season with a 5th place finish at the regional volleyball tournament in St. Mary's.  Its nice to have my afternoons back to myself, but I sure do miss interacting with those kids. They really are a great group. Basketball starts soon, but I am not coaching this year. That also saddens me. I really enjoyed getting to know the girls and getting to travel with them. However, I know that their coach will do fabulous with them. :)

Thanksgiving week was tough. It was hard to see that everyone was headed to Mom and Dad's for the holiday and I wouldn't be able to make it. However, there are some cool pilot dudes in St. Mary's who invited me to join them for dinner. It was fun to go hang out with them, be away from school, and just relax a little. Jana and I went on Wednesday and came back Friday mid-morning. Friday afternoon Jamie came to visit. It was fun having her here and I spent the entire weekend being LAZY! I chuckled on Monday when my students and I were talking about what we did all weekend. They couldn't believe that I laid around watching TV all weekend... To be honest, I can't really believe it either... But it happened.

Tomorrow through Friday we're hosting the Native Youth Olympics for the 4-8th graders. I am excited to see the kids compete, they've been so excited about it all fall. I am also interested to see how it will all work out logistically... Our school isn't huge, so I'm interested to see how it goes when we add another 100 or so kids to the building. I'll let ya know! :)

I was just looking... I'm gonna be the broke girl for the next year or more until I finish my Master's degree... holy cow!! $1600-$2000 bucks a term because I'll be taking between 5 and 6 credits a term. Sheesh! Guess I better start saving now so I can afford it. But I'm excited to be taking classes again, and it will be nice to have my Master's finished too. ***UPDATE: I have no room to complain about cost of my Master's degree... A co-worker is currently in a Master's program and dropped $5000 this term alone for 5 credits... Thank you Eastern Oregon University for an affordable, yet still high-quality Master's degree program.***

I guess thats all. I thought I had more to update about... Have a fabulous weekend and I'll post again after NYO is over.

Cheers!

Craziness of my life. Catch up day!

We finally got some snow at the end of this week. The weather report was saying we'd have snow all Thursday night and freezing rain as well, so I was super excited when I woke up for work on Friday... Opened my front door and.... NO SNOW! Well that just put me in a grouchy mood for the whole day. By lunch a few people had let me know that it had started snowing, and I felt all was right with the world again. :) I didn't take many pictures, but you can check out Jana's blog at janaalaaska.blogspot.com. But good news is we've got white on the ground, now I'm just doing my snow dance every day in order to get enough so I can get my machine out and go play! :)

Last night we were going to have some female staff members over for a girls night... Zoey and Culea had shown up and they were watching something with Sarah while I was in my room on facebook. Next thing I know, Sarah is saying, "Um, Sammy. The light just went out." So I go out to check it out... and notice smoke coming from the light bulb in the hood above the oven... I immediately turn off the light and the smoke stops, then flipped it back on and it started smoking again. So I unplugged it, found my Leatherman and began to take apart the hood so I could see where the fire was. Turns out, no fire. No melted wires, no apparent heating of anything... So, I called Diane filled her in and she called her husband (he is the director of maintenance for our district.) He called me to see what was going on... After 10 minutes of flipping breakers we finally figured out which breaker it was that was affected. (It hadn't originally tripped, so it wasn't apparent.) Once we had it narrowed down to that breaker it was time to figure out if it was the heat tape, circ. pump, or fridge tripping the breaker... After a few more minutes of trial and error we figured out it was the pump. By this time, Clark had shown up to help so I got off the phone with Bob and was asking Clark. We couldn't really come up with any way to fix it, so our maintenance guy, Max, is headed here now to fix it. That meant that we didn't have the pump last night, so no toilet flushing, showering or running water in general... And our house didn't burn down last night, so I'm still not sure what the smoking light bulb was all about, but maybe we'll get that fixed today too. :)

Volleyball season is coming to an end... This weekend we didn't travel. It was nice to have the whole weekend at home to relax. We leave Thursday morning for St. Mary's for the regional tournament. We'll play thursday and friday all day then the championship game will be Saturday morning. We've got a good chance to play quite a few games, the kids are doing really well this year. I'll keep you posted on that. :)

Its been a crazy week in the classroom. I've had kids out all week with strep throat or other illnesses. Its been just as busy as ever though. We've been preparing for Thanksgiving with a fun Naked Turkey project. We get to talk with a class in Kansas on Tuesday to share our turkeys with them. I am excited for that. :)

This morning as I was waiting for Max to come, I decided to clean my room a bit... I came across my knitting bag. Holy moly I need to get going on dish clothes. Then I decided that I'm tired of doing just the same old dishcloth pattern, but I don't know how to purl so all the other cute patterns are off limits. So, I googled "teach yourself to purl" and got a good website that lays it out pretty clearly step by step. I haven't actually started anything to practice purling, but I plan to tonight. :) Hopefully its as easy as it said... If it is, then I found a cute pattern for a knitted ear warmer/headband thing that I'm going to try. :)

This morning I woke up to a missed call from dad at 530 AM. Those of you who know my father know that this is nothing out of the ordinary in my life. :) However, the entire message was in regards to whether I've been doing my research on pilot's license related business... Guess thats what I'll spend my afternoon doing as soon as I finish my lesson plans. Thanks for the reminder, Daddy-o!

Continuing Education

So... I've been doing a lot of thinking lately about a Master's program... I've already got some graduate credits through Eastern Oregon University. I've been doing some research on different colleges and programs... I have gotten some good input from some important people in my life. (Thanks Karyn and Sam and everyone else who has contributed to my Master's degree dilemma.)

Last year, well like 20 months ago now, I started taking some classes from EOU toward a Master's degree. At that point it was mostly because I wanted something to do in addition to my substitute teaching for 6 months. And now I'm in my second year of teaching in Bush Alaska (which I LOVE, don't read into this wrong) and I don't have much of a social life to take me away from homework and being focused. Okay.... I do have my snow machine, but I definitely feel like now is a good time to be working toward a Master's degree.

So, after much debate, research and contemplation I've decided to finish out my Master's at Eastern... I'll be doing the Curriculum and Instruction focus area because I've already got my Reading and ESOL endorsements... This won't lead to another endorsement on my license, but if I ever wanted to get into a district office position, it could lead into that, potentially.

I am hoping to get this finished over the next 16 months... So at the end of my third year of teaching I'd also have my Master's degree. Maybe even sooner if I can stay focused and love college as much this time around as I did the first time. :)

Mount up for Eastern Oregon!

Volleyball updates...

The past few weeks have been SUPER busy... We hosted volleyball games 3 weeks ago. The kids did awesome, played hard and enjoyed hanging out with their friends and family from the visiting schools of Pilot Station and Scammon Bay.

The following weekend we traveled to Emmonak to make up for the weekend of games that got cancelled because of high winds and not being able to fly. We had another successful weekend losing only to Emo. The kids are improving with each game we play. Its so fun to watch as a coach that they're actually listening to what we've been saying and actually doing what we've been practicing...

This weekend we traveled to Kotlik for our third weekend of games. We played Mountain, Nunam, and Kotlik. I am pleased that our kids did so well. We lost only to Mountain Village and I know that if we are to rematch at the regional tournament, our team is capable of overcoming Mountain.

Here are a few pictures from the games yesterday... I'm not very good at photographing our playing, I'm more into the coaching aspect of the game. Ha!

Her serving is SOOOO much improved. She is working hard and doing well her Freshman year.

Most of us are remembering to be down and ready. 

Time out! 

His serving has also vastly improved this season. Too bad he's a senior and won't be playing with us next year.

Why I love Elementary...

"Its the 10th Anniversary, what are you going to sell me for CHEAP." ~Sammy while reading an email.

"You're married?" ~Jana's student

"No, its a store that I bought my sewing machine from."~ Sammy

"You're married to a store?!"~ Student

**Giggles** Jana, 2 more students and Sammy

"No, it means its ten years since they've been open."~Sammy

Bats, buddy reading, and volleyball.

This week our theme was bats... We had fun reading the Magic School bus book about bats and then getting to watch the Going Batty DVD... We learned that bats sleep hanging upside down, use echolocation and we learned what guano is. :) The kids thought that was funny... (Its bat poop.)

We had the privilege of working with some high school students two different afternoons. The writing teacher, Holly, had her students write their own children's book so they high schoolers came down to read their books to us. It was fun to watch the big kids and little kids working so well together. My students loved having older buddies to read with and I think it was a good opportunity for my kids to see that they can be authors too!

Sharing the couch with our big kid friends.

Giggles at the stories.

Rockin new teacher showing the kids how its done. And a few first graders showing the big kids how to sit and listen.

Thats the most still those two boys EVER sit. :)

Criss cross applesauce, hands in your lap.

The big kids were scared to read so my sweet child read to them instead. (And our awesome bats on the board with bat facts!)

We had an assembly on Thursday to pump the kids and staff up for the weekend of home volleyball games. We just finished our first night of games and our kids did awesome. They have been working very hard and their teamwork has improved so much. We beat Pilot Station in 5 games. Then we played Scammon Bay and beat them in 3.

Over all its been a fabulous week. I'm exhausted, my roommate is back and she has a cold. So, I'm hoping to get enough sleep tomorrow night and Sunday to NOT get sick again... I'll see if anyone has any pictures from the games tonight. Aaaannnndddd.... I'm off to bed so I can be back at school in 6 1/2 hours for breakfast and more volleyball. Whoop whoop!

Fire safety practice with Jana's class

Stop!

Drop!

ROLL!!

Roll some more...

And some more...

Fall!

and crawl!

Sassy Jimmy was asking me how low you were supposed to crawl... What a funny fellow!

Last Wednesday it was a beautiful sunny day in Alakanuk. My kids had been working hard with me, Sam, and Sarah on learning some fire safety tips. Jana and I did a little co-teaching and decided that perhaps we would give the kids some fresh air and practice what it looks like to fall and crawl and to stop, drop, and roll. Our wonderful para-pro Jimmy was the man behind the camera as we practiced all kinds of fire safety. The kids loved it!

As we were walking down to the road to practice what we should look like in case the school caught on fire, we split boys and girls and sparked a little competition. The kids loved it. They also did a fabulous job of walking with anchors and bubbles across the deck, down the stairs, and to the road.

What a fabulous line! And a ridiculous look on the teacher's face...

Good listeners, fabulous at following directions.

The boys...

The girls...

So I'm not sure exactly what Jana's boy/girl count is... But it is apparent in this picture that there are more boys than girls... I know in my class I have 10 boys and 4 girls... So many sweet children and as soon as we can get school appropriate behavior nailed down I know we'll make HUGE leaps and bounds in learning to read and write and do math. :)

Thanks for all your support folks--the kind words, the helpful hints and the smiles mean so much!

Iced coffee and memories.

For the past week or so I have been on an iced coffee kick... If I lived in the lower 48 or even inland Alaska that might mean stopping by the local coffee shop and grabbing a 20 iced vanilla latte... However, since I am in Bush Alaska I improvise and make my own... That means my daily iced coffee is what I would have consumed hot simply poured over ice...

As I was watching the ice melt and the creamer mix with the coffee it started reminding me of my college days... I have one super super super sweet friend with whom I shared many meals, laughs, homework sessions and a few tears. She is NOT a coffee drinker... However, she loved to fix a cup of coffee for her husband or me or anyone who wanted one because she loved watching the creamer mix with the coffee...

While remembering this fond memory, it got me thinking about how awesome my college career was. I had so many fabulous friends and classmates and professors that made my four years in La Grande the best I could have asked for.

So this post is to say thank you to those of you who made my time at EOU so awesome. Its fabulous to have such strong bonds with my Mountaineer family! Happy homecoming weekend Mounties! Mount up!

Sam squared in the classroom.

Yesterday I had the opportunity to watch my awesome friend Sam teach in my classroom. (He is the one who inspired me to do my iPod donors choose projects.) So Sam comes up with the super cool lesson where my kids write what they think is the most important thing about fire safety then we use iTalk (an app on the iPod touches he brought with him) to record the rule each of them had written down. Holy moly, at first I was very concerned about how the kids would do. The lesson was in the afternoon and I’ve had a hard time getting the kids to do a ton of writing in the afternoons. (Now that I think about it in my half-exhausted state, perhaps its just that I either a. need more adult support in my room so my writing can be in small group setting, or b. I am not planning lessons that are appropriate difficulty.) Anyway, I was super impressed with Sam’s management of my crazy kids, his patience with them not knowing what to push, etc. The kids were super engaged. They thought it was cool to get to use the iPods and then listen to their own voices. After they were successful with the lesson Sam and I decided that perhaps they’d earned a few minutes of game time on the iPods. They enjoyed the games and getting a little bit of extra technology time.  Here are some pictures of our awesome lesson… And by our, I mean Sam’s awesome lesson. :) Thanks again Sam for coming in and showing us such cool stuff!!! We can’t wait to get our iPods and start using them every day in our room.

Working with iPods on recording what we had written down.

**I deleted a few pictures because I realized you could see kids' names... I'll do some editing and put them back in ASAP...**

MMMM Gator... and Fire Safety Week

This is one heck of a busy week. It’s been so fun to have fire safety week. Sarah and I spent THREE AND A HALF HOURS on a bulletin board… You all know how artistic and creative I am…. So, it all started with a genius idea that I concocted last week… I wanted on my long bulletin board a fire scene complete with awesome firefighters who looked like some firefighters I know/worked with… On one end I wanted an awesome fire truck with a Dalmatian and on the other end I wanted a burning house… So, I mentioned this to Sarah this weekend and she is MUCH more artistic than I am. She helped me carry out the plan. Here are a few pictures…

Our burning house... It now has water droplets with rules like Stop, drop and roll. Don't hide.  Fall and crawl, etc. 

Our spray of water across the hallway.

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Our fireman and his truck. I really wanted to put Ana's face on the wall, but I didn't have a picture of her. 

Just missing our Dalmatian!

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Monday the commissioner of education was supposed to come to our school in addition to all of the directors from our district office and our regional school board members. With all the extra people in our building I decided I probably should be on my A game. :) So, I wore a nice blouse, fixed my hair so it wouldn’t be too wild, and amped up my teaching game.

The best part of my week this far was DEFINITELY when Sam cooked dinner… MMMMMMM we had gator, sweet potato fries and deer sausage. Good food, good company, and lots of laughter. Then an after-dark walk with my good friend Joshua. Some silly conversation and fresh air was a great end to a fabulous day teaching.

Weekend festivities

Yesterday was a busy day in the life of Sammy Jo... It started with an early wake up so I could go say goodbye to a good friend who is moving into Anchorage to be with the rest of his family. Took him some Gramma Robison bread to give his wife and kids... Then it was traditional pancake breakfast with the AUK family and a trip to the P.O. From noon to two we had open gym for students who had earned brave bucks. (Similar to our old Way to Go Broncos.) It was so fun to see the students in an environment that wasn't sitting in my classroom or in a school mindset. Here are a few pictures... 

Paul helping some older kids with computers. 

The middle of a dodge ball fight with Clark and Nathaniel and a bunch of kids.

Practicing Native Youth Olympics... I THINK this one is Alaska high kick?

A little volleyball. Woo!

After the open gym we had a bonfire with some other teachers and a few of the high school Natural Helpers. We built a fire--it was tough to do because we've had a ton of rain this week... And we shot my 22 through 2 pour downs and some drizzly weather. We roasted hot dogs and made smores. (Since I'm STILL no sugar I just handed out the goods.) Here are a bunch of ridiculous pictures captured by either Jana, Michaela, Sarah or myself. Enjoy! :)

Our own little Elmer Fudd in AUK.

Sweet Holly making Sarah a hat at the bonfire.

Oh dear... 

You can see the rain clouds to the right... But a beautiful sky!

Two of these are my toys, the third is what I really want... Oh Santa...

A beautiful day to shoot a gun!

Again... Oh dear.

Loading my baby up, ready for another round of target practice on a bread machine.

Michaela loves shooting, too!

Oh what a pretty place I live in.

Taste the rainbow!

We're the village people.... YMCA!

Sarah thought it'd be a great idea to make AUK... I think we look ridiculous.

Silly girls. So much entertainment from these two. :)

And these two are SUPER ridiculous... Oh the antics...

Yay for Samsung, Winchester and inspiration from Annie Oakley.

Modern day Annie right there. :) 

I focus better with my tongue out. :) 

Fartin fire?! :)

Hot dog roast... BUT my stick burned through and I almost lost my dinner. :(

I thought this was cool... You could hear the moisture sizzling out of the wood.

These boots been everywhere...

Jana warms her buns over a campfire with her hot dog... Nathaniel also warms his buns by the campfire...

Here is a taste of my weekend... Now I'm in my classroom late at night with another hour or two of work to get done before I can go home and to bed... Happy Fire Safety week to you all!!!