A long awaited update for people that care about me
And if you don’t care, you may as well stop reading, because this will bore you.
I will first say it is so good to be back in Houghton. I just love being here. I am RAing on the same floor with some of the same girls and it’s going to be a fun year :) I finished my second day of classes today and I am so excited about them. Who would have thought that you actually would like the classes you go to when they’re in your major?! No more integrated studies for this girl. Pretty much I’m done with my liberal arts requirements and I’m just taking education and english classes from here on out (with a few gym credits here and there). I’m taking five classes:
-Intro to Literary Studies (m/w/f 12:30-1:35)
- only a half semester course, yay! This is a basic course about the four genres of literature (poetry, plays, novels, and short stories). It’s part of my English concentration
-Immigrant Literature (t/th 3-4:50)
- this course concentrates on Asian immigrants and their stories. We’re reading a bunch of books that look either really depressing or scary war stories. So it should be interesting. It’s a small class though so we should have some good discussion and one of our projects is to write a paper on our own family’s immigration history.
-Curriculum and Assessment (m/w 3:-4:50)
- One of my core ed. classes in which we learn about curriculum and assessment (surprise!). It’s actually really exciting. I was intimidated by the upper level ed. classes because they seemed so serious and important and SO much work. But the work is all very practical and engaging. And surprise surprise, I am actually looking forward to doing the papers and projects. Weird how I actually like the classes in my major, right? Actually I feel really re-affirmed that I’m doing the right thing in college because I enjoy the thought of studying how to educate children. Nerd.
-Foundations of Language and Literacy for Diverse Learners (t/th 8-9:50am)
- Another big Ed. class- scary and important! This one is completely devoted to learning how to teach kids how to read and write. And it’s 2 semesters long. But that topic definitely deserves that much time. And it’s not just a normal classroom, it’s special ed, gifted students, international/english language learners too. Crazy. I had to buy a honking big 3 inch binder and print out 2 inches worth of articles to read for this semester. It’s a crazy amount of work but it must be done :) And it’s interesting.
-Inclusive Childhood Education Practicum (W/F 7:45-12:30)
- This one’s also a year long. Essentially, I’m assigned a classroom which I will observe in all year. The fall semester I’m there in the morning and the spring semester I go after lunch. My partner and I will observe the kids, the teacher, and even do some teaching from the lesson plans we’ll learn to create. Pray that I and my partner, Kelsey, get a good teacher who is invested in our learning. This class requires a lot of my time but it will be so good to get into the schools again.
So there she blows. It’s an exciting semester and I really do love the Ed. classes and all my fellow ICE majors :) Dan and I have also been hired to lead worship at the church we’ve been going to. Well, he’ll be leading and I’ll be on piano. There will also be a drummer, bassist, etc. So that’s exciting. We’re also being compensated, which answers a lot of prayer/worry about finding a job for gas money this semester, since Kelsey and I will be doing a lot of driving to schools.
And that’s basically the news. I hope everyone in VT is safe and well- seeing the pictures on facebook is surreal. Many people here have asked to make sure my family was safe because they saw VT on national news. Crazy times….
I’ll try to update kind of consistently, but I do have a busy schedule and a lot of responsibilities this year. :) Bye!
