I don't want to make more bricks in the wall, Part 1

Dear Internet,

I feel like I spend a lot of time complaining (maybe more in real life than here) about teacher's college and how things are run, but not a lot of time talking about what could be changed to make things better. I've been thinking about that lately, and I want to share my ideas with you. This post will be split into two parts in an effort to not make one giant super-post. There are two things I will cover today: a disclaimer, and a (hopefully somewhat objective) description of my program and what I don't like about my experience here.

DISCLAIMER: I understand that this current program has been designed and run and taught by Ph.D.-having experts for many years who have a full understanding of the requirements to be a teacher in my province. I'm sure that they all had very good theoretical reasons for each pedagogical decision they made. I do not even have an undergraduate degree yet, so in no way am I qualified to professionally criticize this teacher education program. My ideas come from a purely practical place, based on my own experiences.

DESCRIPTION: In my teacher education program here, I am studying to be a secondary school teacher. For this program, I am required to take the following courses:

• 2 courses focused specifically on my 2 teachable subjects (for me, math and computer science)
• 1 course focused on preparing me for my practicum placements and constructing my portfolio
• 1 "focus" course of my choosing, meant to give me a particular specialty (for me, teaching Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate classes)
• 1 course divided into disparate modules focused on miscellaneous concepts in teaching - e.g. assessment
• 1 "course" that is made of different presentations and lectures and workshops each week
• 1 online course focused on education law; and,
• 1 elective of my choosing (for me, using information and communication technology in the classroom)

In theory, these courses would produce a teacher candidate who is well-rounded, with a couple particular courses that set him/her apart from others. Some of the courses are marked on a pass/fail basis, and some are marked with the usual A-F scale. Many of the assessments are reflection-based; e.g. "what does education mean to you?". Most assessments are papers, typically ranging from 500-1000 words. There are no final exams (they consider our practicum placements to be the "exams" in a way).

WHAT I DON'T LIKE: Right off the bat I'm going to say all the papers we have to write. Coming from a math background, where I haven't really written anything substantial for years, at the beginning I found that generating pages of text was somewhat of a challenge. I do not find that most of the papers are in any way meaningful to my future, and are simply an exercise in "how can I fill another half page?" Of all the papers I have written, and will write for the remainder of this month, there has been 1 which I felt was a useful exercise in reflection - my practicum summaries. I found these to be a better assignment than others because it gave me a chance to meaningfully reflect on what was good in my practicum, what was bad, and what I could do to improve things for the future; that is, I produced a document that exhibits my growth as an educator and possible steps for myself going forward to continue improving. Other papers we have been required to write were on what I would call "fluffy" topics - for example, reflecting on times when we have felt prejudiced against and how these experiences will make us better teachers (that particular paper was a little slice of 2-page-single-spaced hell).

Another thing I dislike about my experience here are the focus of the classes. I find that much of our curriculum here is rooted in theory, when teaching is really a very practical field. What I need to know how to do on a day-to-day basis in my classroom sometimes does not line up with what we are taught here. A lot of this, I think, is difficult to avoid: in addition to being very practical, teaching is also very personal. You cannot teach how to teach, you can only suggest particular methods to use to teach most effectively. A professor once told us that "everyone already knows how to teach - they've been observing teachers for years!" So here, we learn the background rules and theory and put names to things we have already seen in action (e.g. differentiated instruction, assessment as/for/of learning). They tell us what these things are, and that we should be using them, but they don't tell us a lot about the "how". How do I create math lessons that can appeal to all different types of learners?

Next post: how I would structure a curriculum class to be most useful to teacher candidates like me.

Sincerely,

Caro

This is for you, Cassy

Dear Internet (and Cassy),

It was brought to my attention this morning (by my friend Cassy) that I hadn't posted in a while! So I am rectifying that. I have a lot to talk about, anyways.

I don't remember specifically what I mentioned about my practicum experiences in October and December, but, long story short, they were not pleasant experiences. In fact, I may or may not have mentioned this, but I was severely doubting my career choice for a while and felt kind of lost. I guess most people probably go through a phase when they're all like "I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO WITH MY LIIIIIIIIIFE" but I had never really been at that phase before, and going through it so late in my undergrad career was scary.

But don't panic! I kinda have some of it figured out now. There's still a lot of uncertainty, but I figure that's not so bad because I'm only 21. The bottom line of what I'm thinking right now is going to grad school (or trying, at least) after undergrad to keep my options open. Then when I'm done, I can either go on to do some sort of real-world job, or go back to teaching and make more money (hopefully/probably) than I would have without a master's.Win-win? Next goal: get into grad school. That'll be interesting.

Anywho, let me tell you about how awesome my last 7 weeks have been (January kinda sucked because I was in classes, so I'm going to pretend for the sake of this blog entry that it didn't happen). For 4 weeks in February, I was at practicum yet again. I was dreading it a little because of how discouraging my previous experiences had been, but I tried to retain a bit of hope because I would be at a new school with a new teacher and a new subject. And it's a good thing that I did retain that hope, because it was super awesome! I was teaching computer science, and it was just a super great experience that made me think, "hey, maybe I'm NOT totally wasting my time in undergrad and COULD do this for the rest of my life." I've decided (as I have rambled endlessly about in my copious reflection papers) that it's all got to do with the students in the class. Which may seem obvious, but I don't think you can really fully understand the full scope until you're standing up there and teaching. Even between sections of the same course, students change the entire flow of things. Between math and computer science, there was a HUGE difference. I attribute it to the fact that students who are taking computer science are taking it as an elective and are more likely to be motivated in the class, whereas students are forced to take math and likely do not actually want to be there.

So yeah, computer science teaching is super cool but I won't bore you with it too much because, well, if you're not a teacher then you'll be super bored by my incessant rambling. So I'll move on to the next 3 weeks I had after that, where I was teaching back at my old high school. I actually did very little teaching there (I came at an awkward time in the trimester when they were winding down and preparing for tests/exams), but it was still pretty cool. The 3 or so lessons I got to do in an AP calculus class were so worth the boring downtime I had - I got to teach about slope fields, exponential growth/decay, and, most importantly, DIFFERENTIAL EQUATIONS. I bored the hell out of them by starting that lesson by rambling about all the different uses for DE's and how they're everywhere and so cool and how sometimes you can't find solutions and sometimes you can and sometimes you can only find properties of solutions blah blah blah. (My favourite part about teaching that class was being able to go full nerd at them.) That particular lesson was another moment of "maybe I can do this" - I realized while rambling to them about math that I just loved being able to share with them all this knowledge that I had, like the knowledge was pointless until I was able to share it with someone. Super corny, I know, but it was just so exhilarating and wonderful to share what I know with them.

Another great aspect of teaching at my old high school was being able to live at home. That was great - I got to hang out with my youngest brother and my parents, whom I don't often see any more because I'm in this whole other country and it's hard to get back on a regular basis. Which is funny because I'll be back the first week of May. Then for a weekend in June. And see them all over the July long weekend. So maybe I see my family more often than I think I do (not to mention I live with that sister person of mine currently). But still! Family is cool.

If you finish reading this and are like, "I totally do not understand all the things she's saying about teaching - she loves it, but doesn't want to do it, or does she hate it.....waaaat", that's kind of how I'm feeling right now, so I'm glad that I was able to accurately convey that for you.

I think it's that moment in my blog post where I realize that I've pretty much said everything that I want to say for now but can't think of a good way to conclude it.

Sincerely,

Caro

P.S. Do I use the word "super" enough? Wow.

Looking Back and Looking Forward

Dear Internet,

Happy new year! I am pleased to report that my New Year's Eve was a lovely, low-key night spent with family, and that my New Year's Day was spent watching Fringe (my favourite TV show, in case you were unaware). Today I'd like to take a look back at some of my highlights from 2012 and look forward to what I hope 2013 has in store.

My Top Moments of 2012

1. Vacation in Antigua with My Family

For a week in February, the entire clan escaped the bitter cold of Canada and soaked up some rays in beautiful Antigua to celebrate my grandparents' 50th wedding anniversary. It was the first time in a couple years that everyone was able to get together, and we all had a great time (minus a couple incidents with Long Island Iced Teas and bumpy boat rides). Here are some of my favourite pictures from the trip.

The view from our room

My sister relaxing on the beach

My mom and sister at the open bar

My brothers and me by the pool

My uncle rocking a flower

My brothers' sandcastle tree

Rainbow!

2. Cooking and Baking

I got a lot more into cooking and baking delicious things this year. Here are some pictures of the menu! Some pictures are currently trapped on my phone (don't want to use data while I'm roaming), so some things  are missing.

Biscuits

Courtney's birthday cake

Dad's birthday cake

Cookie cake with cream cheese frosting

White chocolate fudge squares

Chocolate mousse

Banana muffins with cream cheese frosting

Maple pecan squares

Chicken noodle soup

3. Teaching My First Lesson

January through April of 2012 found me working at a school for the first time ever. Near the end of January, I had the opportunity to teach my first lesson to an actual high school class. If I recall correctly, it was trigonometry applications in a grade 11 university math class. Was this the first in a long, long line of lessons to come throughout my life? Only time will tell!

4. Surprising My Dad on His Birthday

In September, my dad turned 50. My mom decided that, since it's a big milestone, we should all be there to celebrate it, so she flew my sister, my brother, and I from Canada as a surprise for him. He was definitely surprised - although it was hard to tell at the time!

5. Weight Loss

I tend to find this one difficult to talk about, but it was a major part of the latter half of 2012 for me, so I'll discuss it briefly (no pictures, though!). Between May and November, I lost a total of 25 pounds. I was not overweight to begin with...but I saw my habits taking me in a direction I didn't like, so I did something about it. I went to the gym almost every day and counted calories, and now I feel better and more comfortable with myself.

My Hopes for 2013

I haven't organized a particular list of goals or resolutions, but there are a few things I want to accomplish this year.

1. Continue Improving My Health and Body

I am really pleased with the weight loss progress I made in 2012. In 2013, I want to continue this progress a little bit. I don't have much more weight I want to lose - in fact, I really just want to lose what I gained over the holidays. After a couple more pounds, I want to focus on gaining muscle instead of losing fat. My goal is geared towards "fit and strong and healthy" as opposed to just "thin and skinny." One of the first things I have to do this year is to take this and translate it into a better-defined goal (i.e. a quantifiable one).

2. Finish Teacher's College

If you've read any of my other posts in recent months, you know how much I am looking forward to being done with this. Assuming all goes well and I don't do anything stupid, I will be done at the end of April.

3. Improve My French Skills

This term, I started taking French courses again. I used to take French in high school, and was pretty good at it by the time I came to university. I took a French course in my first term, but once my major courses started to take over my schedule, French took a back seat. In fact, until this fall, I hadn't taken a French course in 3 years. I was quite rusty, and still am, but I hope to take a couple more courses and get into the swing of it again. I'd love to someday be fluent - not just because French is a pretty language, but it also opens a lot of doors for teaching in Ontario.

Those are the major things I can think of off the top of my head. 2012 was a great year. A little bit challenging at times, sure, but nothing can be really rewarding if there is no challenge. I hope that 2013 will be at least as amazing as 2012!

Sincerely,

Caro

My Practicum Experience (...so far)

Dear Internet,

For the past three weeks, I have been student-teaching at a high school as part of my B.Ed. program (and we all know how I'm feeling about THAT so far). It has certainly been an interesting experience (in some good ways and some bad ways). Now, I have taught in a high school classroom before, so this experience didn't completely blindside me. The difference between my previous experience and this experience is that this time I was in an applied-level classroom whereas last time I was in an academic-level classroom. For those of you who are not familiar with this classification of classrooms: applied-level is for students who maybe aren't as motivated or strong with math and can't handle faster-paced classrooms, whereas academic is for higher-achieving students.

I knew going into the classroom that it was going to be a challenge - my only mistake was thinking that I was prepared for it. I had learned all these "classroom management strategies" in my classes and I told myself that I could apply them and get my students to learn and make them love learning and inspire them to do great things in math and become their most favourite teacher of all time (okay, maybe that fantasy spun out a little too far into unrealistic-land). Needless to say, I did not quite achieve this. Three weeks with this class and I feel like a bitter old hag who never wants to deal with another teenager ever again. Don't get me wrong, there are a few students in my class who are great and do their work and answer my questions and are generally good kids. Unfortunately, they are not the majority. For my last day tomorrow, I'm going to play a game with them, so I really hope that they actually get into it and that I get fewer contemptuous stares standing at the front of the class.

I know that learning proper classroom management is a skill learned through LOTS and LOTS of experience. I know that I am an inexperienced 21-year-old who, after only three weeks, could not possibly hope to earn the respect of a class of 25 students who do not want to be there in the first place. But it's still disheartening when I get students who cheat on my quizzes and are outright rude to me and pretend they don't hear me when I talk to them. I do my best, but I'm just way too passive of a person to effectively manage students' behaviour right now.

Whenever I complain about something to you, I like to add in a bit about the good side of things so that I don't seem so whiny, and this time is no different. Here is what I liked about my practicum experience.

First of all, I have a really good idea about my strengths and weaknesses as a teacher. The thing about working with higher-level students, as I have in the past, is that they can pick up on concepts easily and quickly and lessons do not need to be particularly differentiated. Really, you don't have to be a particularly good teacher to teach these kids. This is not the case with applied-level. With my class, I have learned how to break up my lessons into smaller chunks and give them a lot more time to work through examples on their own. I think I'm starting to get a bit better with the classroom management thing, too, but that will take a lot more gradual improvement over a long time.

Also, despite my complaints above about rude students, I do have a good number of very nice students. If it weren't for these kids being respectful and doing their work and doing well on my quizzes and actually talking to me, I would have gone mad after day one.

In addition, in no particular order:

• I have had a lot of practice with making handouts
• I have organized, planned, and replanned a unit when things did not go as planned
• I have been able to see some friends and my wonderful brother and hang out with Steven
• My friends who are housing me during my practicum are super super nice and have a beautiful home (and make awesome food!)
• I've been sleeping really well (working with these students is EXHAUSTING)

So now I'm torn! I'm definitely ready to take a break from teaching...but I REALLY don't want to return to teacher's college and go back to classes. As frustrating as teaching can be, the classes about teaching are more so. Just a couple more months of teacher's college and I can return to my math.

Anyways, that's all for now!

Sincerely,

Caro

Teacher's College So Far

Dear Internet,

I started at teacher's college (excuse me, the faculty of education) this past week. I'll be here for 8 months to earn my B.Ed. before returning completing my B.Math. There are no words for how tired of school I am. I'm tired of assignments and going to class and putting up with boring classes and annoying profs. Of the 7 total classes I have here, I (so far) feel that one of them will be useful to me.

The problem is that it's a lot of stuff that I need to know but don't care about. For instance, politics of schools and developmental psychology for adolescents...stuff that I should know to be an effective employee of a school, but not necessarily needed to be an effective teacher. But then again, what the hell do I know? I'm a 21-year-old teacher candidate, and presumably these programs have been designed by people who have been working in education for many years, possibly longer than I have actually been alive.

I think my main problem is that I'm frustrated with the format of my schedule and courses. In math, it's easy: you have an assignment every week that you complete and turn in on the same day every week, there are 50 minute lectures at the same times on MWF, one (maybe two) midterms not quite midway through the term, and a final exam at the end always worth at least 50%. My classes here follow a much stranger schedule (some have 2 two-hour blocks in a week at different times, some are 1 hour and meet once, etc.) that I'm not sure I'll ever get used to (much less memorize). Assignments that are worth marks are sporadic. Most classes require some sort of reading for every class. And I'm pretty sure I don't have any midterms or exams or tests (which, I suppose, is a plus). Really, I'm mostly annoyed with the reading. For example, I have a class tomorrow (that I of course put off doing the readings for) that wants me to read about 5 15ish page papers on equity in classrooms. I looked at that earlier and just thought, that is not going to happen. It's one of those things where, the more work you have to do, the less you're going to do.

But that's enough complaining. Here's what I LIKE about being here so far.

• I'm living with my super awesome sister in a super awesome house
• I have an opportunity to get to know the girls in my program a lot better
• My prof for my math teaching class is really awesome and I've already learned a lot from him
• After I finish teacher's college, I will be in the home stretch of finishing my degrees

I guess that's about it! I'm off to contemplate doing my course readings and probably just play The Sims instead.

Sincerely,

Caro

Short Story Time!

Dear Internet,

When I was in high school, I enjoyed writing short fiction stories for fun. Unfortunately, since coming to university, I haven't done a lot of writing. I just stumbled across this story I wrote back in 2010 though, and I really enjoyed re-reading it, so I thought I'd share it with you.

Sincerely,

Caro

The Hardest Thing

The funeral, he decided, was the second hardest thing he had ever done in his life. Looking back over the years made him realize this definite and uncontested fact. Most definitely, the funeral was the second hardest thing he had ever done in his life.

It was a drizzly day in mid-March, the kind that is nearly cold enough for snow but Mother Nature decides to drench the world with freezing rain anyways. Most of the attendees at the graveyard were wrapped in huge coats, clutching umbrellas as close to them as possible, as though it could offer some meagre amount of warmth. He wasn’t, though. He thought that it was poetic and well-befitting his misery to stand in the freezing rain with little more than his sportcoat to protect him from the elements. He regretted that decision, as poetic as it may be, because he did not find that the fact that he was physically miserable helpful towards the fact that he was emotionally miserable at all. The rain simply made him cranky in addition to being inconsolably depressed: a dangerous combination.

The priest at the head of the grave seemed not to notice the rain or the cold or the discomfort and general unhappiness of the people around him. The priest, let it be known, had an interesting theory that there was a perfect balance of sullen and cheery that best serves the mood of those who are in attendance of a funeral, especially when the funeral is made particularly sad and morose by the untimely death of the subject. He had a small, sympathetic smile on his face that most of the attendees, and most particularly the man with no coat or umbrella, hated the moment they saw it.

“Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today...”

He was numb. At this point, he wasn’t entirely sure if it was from the cold, the copious amount of drugs he had been taking ever since her death, or the fact (that he had quite conclusively decided) that his soul was as dead and gone as she was. In fact, he had decided that not only would he never love again, he would never feel anything ever again. He was annoyed (and only a little bit relieved) to find out that he could in fact feel emotion again: he was quite angry at the priest, and wanted more than anything to shove his fist into the small, sympathetic smile on the priest’s face.

He turned a deaf ear to the entire affair. He stood there, nodding every so often as so-called friends and family approached him with empty words of sympathy, and soon everyone had dispersed, discouraged by the rain and cold to linger for too long. The coffin had been lowered into the large hole in the ground, and the men who intended to fill the hole (as quickly as possible due to the condition of the weather) stood a respectful distance away. After what seemed like a long time to those men, he nodded to them curtly, and walked briskly towards his car.

He felt fine on the drive home. He felt fine as he unlocked the door to their – his – house, and he felt fine as he locked the door behind him and hung the keys up on the hook. He felt fine, in fact, until he noticed the ridiculous stuffed animal she had always insisted on keeping in their tiny living room. When he saw that goose, he felt all the feelings at once, and it was overwhelming. He fell to his knees, crying and silently screaming, shoving his clenched fists into his eyes. She was gone, but that ridiculous stuffed goose (of the Canadian variety) would stay there with the ridiculous smile on its face, sitting ridiculously on her favourite couch, staring at him ridiculously every time he entered the door. But she, she was gone, and would never again smile at him, or sit on her couch, or greet him when he returned home.

He stood, furiously grabbed the goose by the neck, walked outside, and threw it with all his might into the forest by their house. He screamed in triumph, walked back into his house, and proceeded to get ridiculously drunk.

When he awoke the next morning, he decided that the only explanation for his current misery was that he must be dying. His head ached, he was about to vomit, and his entire body ached as though, well, as though he had gotten ridiculously drunk the night before. By late afternoon, he was more or less back to his new usual level of misery, and he found this satisfying in a queer sort of way. He made himself another mug of coffee, and decided that he would get ridiculously drunk again that night. Before he could even begin reaching for his next trusty bottle, he was frozen by a sound that he heard outside.

He walked towards the door, and paused before opening the door. He had a brief, powerful vision of Claire standing at the door, bruised and bloodied and broken, demanding to know why he didn’t help her, why he wasn’t there to help her. He wrestled with himself, emotion versus logic, and finally he opened the door. Standing at the door was not Claire, but an average sized Canadian goose. He jumped back in surprise. The goose simply stared at him. He looked at it for quite some time, and eventually came to the decision that it was waiting for something.

“Hi?” he said uncertainly. The goose honked curtly, then fell silent again, and continued to stare at him. He approached it slowly, but when he came within a few inches of the animal, it backed a short distance away and hissed. When he withdrew back into the doorway, the bird approached again and continued to stare at him. He sighed.

“Well, you might as well come in.”

He thought he saw the bird nod, and it walked past him into the living room, where it sat in Claire’s favourite chair. He looked at it, too stunned to really comprehend what was going on.

“As long as you’re going to be here, do you want something to eat? I might have birdseed or something.”

The goose stared at him.

“I’ll take that as a no.”

He decided to ignore the bird, as he was clearly imagining things. Probably a combination of the alcohol and the drugs he had been taking recently. He went back to the bottle of whiskey that he had been in the process of opening before he was so rudely interrupted by his hallucination. He turned around, bottle in hand, and suddenly the bird was in front of him, looking into his face. He was so startled that he dropped the bottle to the floor, where it loudly crashed and made a mess of the floor. The goose seemed satisfied, and returned to the living room.

“What the fuck!” he yelled loudly, anger flaring and pulsing in his mind. “Fucking bird!” There was a disgruntled honk from the other room.

“There is no fucking way a goose, in my living room, just honked disgruntledly at me.”

Ignoring the fact that he was now talking to himself, he cleaned up the mess he made, muttering to himself the entire time.

“Happy?” he called, “That was our best bottle of whiskey. Cost a pretty penny, that did.”

There was silence from the other room.

“Yeah, okay, it wasn’t that special. It was just your regular 20 buck bottle from the liquor store. You got me, okay? I was lying. Damn bird.”

The bird was in front of him again, as though irritated by his name-calling. It stared at him expectantly. He backed into a corner.

“Yeah, okay, I’m sorry. You’re a beautiful bird. Exquisite really. A paragon of your species. Happy?”

The goose appeared to nod again, and walked back into the living room.

“I have got to stop doing so many drugs.”

The bird was still there a few weeks later. He had taken to calling it Bobo, the name that Claire had given to her stuffed version, and it seemed to like that. He fed it scraps of bread, and it seemed content with mooching his food and warm house and occasionally scaring the shit out of him. Somehow, the bird’s presence was comforting, and soon he found that the apparent hole he had felt in himself since Claire had passed didn’t ache and burn as constantly.

One morning, he arose groggily, and walked into the living room.

“Hey Bobo, I was thinking we could watch some football today, how would you feel about that?” There was silence, and he gazed around the room and found that it was empty. “Bobo?”

On closer examination, he found the bird outside his front door, staring at the door expectantly and holding something in its beak.

“How did you get out Bobo? What did you find?” He reached forward, and the bird gently placed the item it was carrying into his hand. The stuffed goose. It was a bit wet and dirty, but surprisingly intact. He looked at Bobo, who nodded his mysterious goose nod, turned around, and waddled away. That moment he knew, staring at the slightly damp and dirty toy in his hand and watching the only strange comfort he had had in the past weeks walk away from him, that that would be the hardest thing he would ever face.

Life Update!

Dear Internet,

It's been a rough couple of weeks. It's like one of those days where it seems that you never had a chance to stop working and relax...except stretched out to 3 or 4 weeks. Between assignments, midterms, travelling, having an annoying cold that won't go away......it's pretty exhausting. Just when I think I've caught a break, something else seems to pop up. This upcoming week is looking pretty empty, though, so I'm holding my breath and hoping that it stays that way.

On a less whiny note, my weekends have been pretty cool, even if the weeks in between them are stressful. I try to do something exciting at least one in a weekend. This past weekend, Steven and I went out for sushi and I went to my friends birthday party (wasn't expecting to have much fun....ended up not getting home until 6am the next day). The weekend before that was the long weekend, and I went home and hung out with my family (always a good time...every time I go home it feels like I never left). Not sure what shenanigans I'll get up to this weekend, but the weekend after that I'm going on my annual trip to Stratford, Ontario with my mom and sister to see some awesome plays. We've been doing this for...5 years now, I guess. It's a lot of fun to explore the adorable little downtown area, hang out by the river, eat delicious food....oh, and watching the plays is pretty cool too. Typically we try to see a musical and 1-2 Shakespeare (my sister and I have a love affair with Willy's plays dating back to high school). Long story short, Stratford is a cool place to be.

Some more life updates (I assume whoever reads this blog is interested in knowing about my life even if I'm not being particularly entertaining):

• Getting ready to enroll at teacher's college for the fall and winter, where I will complete my teacher's college bit of becoming a teacher.
• Doing classes and stuff still. Still going well.
• Steven has an electronics business now, and it's going well! Check out his blog here.
• Been doing the healthy-eating, gym-going, calorie-counting thing. For those who know me, I am obviously not overweight, but I figure I should try to do the improvement thing NOW while I'm pretty young and my metabolism isn't shot (plus eating less food = buying less food = $$). I've lost nearly 10 lbs since the end of May when I started.

That's all for now, I think! I hope you enjoyed my update :)

Sincerely,

Caro