Fa'afetai!

Fa'afetai means thank you, and you will read some things I said thanks for on my 2nd Monday as a volunteer teacher.

Woke up and went in to work early this morning. Rode the bus, walked most of the way down the road, and then one of the administrators picked me up. He's the one with the keys for the office. There were others waiting outside the office when we arrived. Started hanging up some of the art pieces my students had done last Friday, but I didn't get them all finished before class as I wanted to look over a few things for my lessons.

I learn things every day, but today I have a few lessons I want to share with you. I'll mention them throughout this post. I'm also going to share a few quotes that I enjoy and have written in my quote book.

"You learn something every day if you pay attention." -Ray LeBland

Lesson #1: Don't pick up rocks on your way to work in American Samoa and leave them in the classroom. They tend to bring ants in with them. Whoops. haha. Oh well, I think I removed most of them. These are the culprit rocks:

For Earth and Space Science I came up with a slightly different idea this morning, so I tweaked my lesson a bit for the day. The plan for this week is an intro into each of the five branches of Earth Science this week, and I started with Geology today. The new intro activity I came up with involved going outside, taking a survey of where rocks are located on campus, and making a geologic map. It worked smoothly for the most part, except second period. They're the class I need to work on, but only one for now :-)

For marine science, we did an introduction into how things float and discussed buoyancy. We also discussed what happened with the Titanic. This story I pulled from our class textbook. After some intro material I split the students into groups and we had a little boat making competition. Each group received the same amount of aluminum foil. Had some different designs. You can see one in the bottom left corner of this photo below. I brought a pan from home to use for our lake and pulled clothespins and erasers out of my desk for weights. It was a fun activity. Most of them built pretty decent boats, too.

After lunch, those three football players hung back for a bit again and helped me finish hanging up the artwork. Those boys... but it was nice to have some help with all these sheets. Also nice to hide some of that big ugly wall in the back with some great artwork.

Here's some close up shots of some of my favorite ones. They're all great, but a few tend to stand out.

Lesson #2: Don't tell the Samoan students that you like chocolate milk unless you want a handful of cartons after lunch. haha. Not such a bad thing. I brought the four of them home. Been a while since I've had chocolate milk, and it was good.

Lesson #3: Pay attention if you want to know who leaves a flower on your desk to be able to thank them. I feel like I may have seen a student with this flower in 1st or 2nd period, but I'm not really sure. Next thing I know during my lunch period, I look at my desk and there is a nice flower in my pencil holder. Nice touch of brightness to my boring desk for a while. Wish I could thank whoever did it, but a silent thank you will have to do. I got flowers today. Wow.
"Don't ever put anything past kids. They will surprise you in the best ways." -James Van der Beek

Lesson #4: It never hurts to ask. This is why "Always ask" is one of my classroom rules. I want my students to ask me questions. "Sometimes all you have to do is ask." -Randy Pausch, author of The Last Lecture. (A great quick read, by the way.)

Anyways, what was I asking for you may wonder after a great day in school. Left work about 4:10, stopped at the bank, and made my walk back up the Tafuna road. A couple guys waved and honked as they went by (and I was getting close to the big main road). I saw them waiting in the turning lane as I approached and figured might as well ask where they're headed. My way, and they were willing to drop me off in Pava'ia'i. One of them is from Fiji and just moved here 4 weeks ago and repairs AC, refrigerators, etc. Turns out he came and worked on the AC apparently in the home of my landlord. Small world :) They were fun to talk to, and I was appreciative of the ride home, not that I really mind the bus.

I had a great day at school and a great ride home, but great things continued to happen. Came home and checked my Facebook. Found this written on my page written by a friend from Morningside:

~President Reynders mentioned you in his speech at convocation today. He said that you were "one of his favorite students" and that you had made a difference on campus and were doing so by teaching. I felt so proud to say that I knew you and thought I would let you know the good things people are saying about you! :) Hope you're having a stellar time teaching!~

Wow... Crazy! I don't ever expect to hear people say things like that about me. I love the work that I do and all the things I did at Morningside. It was weird to think that a new year is starting there, and I no longer live at my second home -Morningsie College. I wouldn't be here today if it wasn't for some of the people I met and my experiences there. I wrote my friend a message back and saying thanks and telling her that I'm glad to know her, too. My fellow SERVE friends and I dreamed of leaving a legacy with what we started and looks like it could be on track.

"Understand and be confident that each of us can make a difference by caring and acting in small as well as big ways." -Marian Wright Edelman

I was already in a super good mood and now I was even more energized. Decided to go do a workout in our yard, which was nice. After sweating it up a bit, I decided to power walk up Kenko Hill before the cooling off on my walk down. Made it all the way to the top, admired the view for a moment, and made my way back down. Exercise feels good.

Finally came home, showered, ate some stewed tomatoes and a corned beef sandwich, checked some emails, and hung a few things on my wall at home.

I am full of thanks today. Fa'afetai! Hope you all have a great day! Hope you can feel my exuberance from wherever you are :-)