Before I die I don't want to die

We created bucket lists in my grade five classes this week.  Each student made a small paper booklet with three things he/she wanted to do before dying.  Our target vocab for the lesson was "I want to..." which fit perfectly with the project.  Their desires ranged from mundane -- Before I die I want to go shopping -- to accidentally profound -- Before I die I don't want to die. Quite a few kids wanted to be rich/win the lottery, and I also had a surprising number of wannabe zookeepers.  I want to fall in love was another popular one, complete with little pink hearts and smiling stick figures -- both boys and girls. My students' bucket lists highlights I want to taste food from every country. I want to...

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The Invisibles

I love surrealism.  This is an oil painting called "The Invisibles" by Yves Tanguy.    His subconscious saw imaginary beings and he painted them.  What would the world be like if everyone had the technical ability to paint their thoughts, imaginings, dreams?  Overwhelming, I suppose. Artists can color the sky red because they know it's blue.  Those of us who aren't artists must color things the way they really are or people might think we're stupid.  ~Jules Feiffer ...

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On being grateful -- This will be cheesy

I thought I was going to die.  It was painfully hot.  My backpack -- almost as tall as me -- was digging into my shoulders.  Our water supply was low. We had miscounted our distance and missed a checkpoint.  We huddled in the shade of an indent in the mountain, and started to write our wills.  Occasionally one of us blew the whistle that was supposed to bring help. ** Throughout high school I was in a hiking program called International Award (IA) in which we learned to navigate with maps, rely on teammates, and camp out with only the items we carried on our backs. During the three+day hike, each team had a map with various checkpoints we had to hit, ending in the campsite which all the groups shared.  Each...

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Bhutan, Questions, and Bucket Lists

When I first heard of Bhutan -- a small country in the Himalayas which was a closed country until recently (and is supposedly still difficult to travel to) -- I immediately wanted to visit.  A tiny, fiercely protective kingdom nestled in a mountain range; it sounded like something out of an old story. I suppose that makes me a romantic. ** My desires often seem to revolve around unattainable or mysterious places and events.  It's funny how anticipation drives me -- the promise of beauty, of fulfillment, of pleasure -- how I am so drawn to the future, the answers, the potential of it all.  A good friend once told me he thought that the mysteries of life were purposeful, that they give us reason to move forward and explore. ...

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Silly happenings

"Teacher!" "Student!" This exchange occurs around 7-10 times daily.  Most of my kids have difficulty pronouncing my name, so they call me teacher.  I return the favor with the appropriate label.  The students who know what student means - which is sadly not the majority (yes, I occasionally question my value here) - always think it's the funniest thing ever.  Almost as funny as when I attempt an occasional Korean word. Today the exchange went beyond the name to name greeting.  (Or label to label greeting, as it were.)  One of the fifth graders who cleans my classroom every day -- the kids all have an area to daily clean -- loves trying to talk to me as long as it's outside of class (her class time is reserved...

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