“That we leave our homes, that we step through our doors to the world, that we travel our whole lives not because we want to collect exotic T-shirts, not because we want to consume foreign adventure the same Western way we consume plastic and Styrofoam and LCD TVs and iPads, but because it has the power to renew us—not the guarantee, not the promise, just the possibility. Because there are places our imaginations can never construct for us, and there are people who we will never meet but we could and we might. It reminds us that there is always reason to begin again.” - Stephen Markley, Tales of Iceland or "Running with the Huldufólk in the Permanent Daylight"
Well the old adage is true, if you don't like the weather in Calgary wait 5 minutes! No sneak attack hail storms today, just a gray start, a blue middle and a chilly but clear ending! Dadda has officially become part of our staff, she knows not to wait around for me as chances are I'll be called away to do something or other. (clean up the remnants of a sore tummy, cover a lunchroom, fix an iPad...you name it!) Although I am grateful she is just fine finding her way (with the trusty schedule we devised of course!) I do long for a bit more time during our day together. That being said we spend a great deal of the evening talking about our days, sharing stories, laughing, and really getting to the heart of why we engage in this work with full hearts. Today we tackled the notion of teacher evaluation, the benefits of coaching and dealing with difficult situations. In Iceland, they do not have a formalized teacher evaluation process. Even in a large school (over 450 - which is very large in Iceland!) Dadda commits to frequent staff check-ins, classroom visits (both formal and informal) and one-on-one conversations focused on giving and receiving feedback. I admire her calm demeanor and sense of humour very much and feel like I have known her forever already! After a morning in grade 1/2, and experiencing our RTI (Response to Intervention) math groups we were off to a Math Coach Principal's meeting. Here we discussed the progress thus far of our system math coach model and shared what has been going well, where we can improve, and an open floor in terms of suggestions. With a focus on peer coaching and data collection, we have much to learn from this opportunity and are so fortunate to have a coach of our own at Marlborough. I look forward to using this opportunity, and the goals and strategies inherent within it, to support our School Development Plan and seeing even further growth this coming year. After racing across the city back home to grab Little Britches (Cai) we headed off to solve the puzzles of Prohibition and the Magic Genie in a Bottle in 2 Locked Rooms! Split into 2 teams Cai, Jody and Hannah conquered the Genie and the 1001 Arabian Nights while Dadda, Mike, Charlotte and I tried, miserably, to figure out who "The Don" was of the Muddy Waters Gang in time to diffuse the bomb left for us. Needless to say, we didn't make it out alive and the Muddy Waters Gang can continue running whiskey to the local speakeasies. (Thank goodness Cai was on Team Genie!) We ended the evening in true Canadian style with soup, sandwiches and hot drinks at Tim Hortons. It's official...she drank the Kool-Aid! Go Team Vicanuck!
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AuthorAubrey: "Leader of the Elves"....that's me. Mom of two amazing guys, wife to one bigger (yet no less amazing) guy and teacher of little ones. Blogging about the adventures (usually with my rubber chicken in tow) is one of my favourite things. Archives
April 2019
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