Pleasant Grove High School

Today is day 5 of observation at Pleasant Grove High. I LOVE it. I walked into the school last Friday and was instantly more excited about this field experience than I have been for any other one since. It was their homecoming assembly and it was so fun too see their school spirit. I totally felt that this is where I wanted to be: high school. Ahhh it was great. 

On Tuesday, I was observing a US History class and we were talking about the cotton gin and the teacher had this AWESOME hands on lesson. He actually pulled out REAL cotton. I have never seen cotton just barely picked like that before. So he passed out the cotton to the kids and it had a ton of little black seeds. He explained that the slaves had they had to pull out the seeds quickly and cleanly all day everyday before the cotton gin. If they weren't fast enough, or were doing a sloppy job, they could get punished. Each of the kids got to pull out seeds from their little wad of cotton and we did too. Harvesting cotton become more than just this abstract idea. It became kind of real because the students got to experience it a little. I thought it was the coolest thing. I'm totally lame. But it's okay.

(Please all ignore the fact that I look like I'm a part of the class.)

Tomorrow, I am team teaching with one of my classmates to a  real, live class of highschoolers. Not just in front of my classmates (8 courteous college kids who all want to be teachers also), but real teenagers. It's kind of intimidating and a little nerve racking. But I pretty excited. We are teaching Piaget's cognitive levels of development and the teacher told us we can take as much or a little time as we want. He is pretty chill so that makes it a little less stressful. I think I am going to show this video to get the class started :)

It falls under artificialism. Little kids make up ways to explain natural phenomena. Olivia is definitely thinking "preoperationaly" as Jean Piaget would say. And plus, its just really funny too. 


So, I had a huge test yesterday and was stressing out hard core. So unfortunately, I skipped TWO workouts. I know, I know. I'm a horrible person. But today, I'm going on a five mile run with my friend Brenna. It should be good! I'm starting to remember why I loved running so much. I LOVE the sense of accomplishment after I finish a run knowing that I tried hard. And I love pushing my limits. Making it to the top of a hill or running for just a minute longer. It's the best feeling ever. That's why I run. I had simply just forgotten and the last month has helped me remember.  :) 

Hello! It has been way too long since my last blog. Thank you college for making my life crazy and hectic. But, I am happy to inform the wonderful world wide web that I only missed one of my workouts amiss a very crazy week. It's been almost a month since my workouts started and I am definitely seeing improvements. And if I could just stick to my diet (I am probably the worst dieter ever. It is seriously the worst), I would probably be seeing those results a lot faster. But I am perfectly content with the progress I have made. Slowly but surely is perfectly fine with me if it means that I can still eat and be happy. Today I even put on some skinny jeans and Brent told me I looked great! He usually always says that, but I was in skinny jeans. So it made it more awesome. :)

Yesterday in the weight room, I did upper body. So mostly arms and abs. I am seriously a weakling. But getting stronger :). I actually really enjoy my workouts in the weight room. I used to just run all the time and never really set into a weight room when I was in high school and during my first year of college. So it's definitely a nice way to change things up.

This whole week I was so bummed that wasn't able to find time to write a blog post. I was observing at Orem Elementary School the last half of last week and the first half of this week and they provided lots and lots of cute stories that were just perfect to blog about. I'll be honest, I was not excited to go to elementary school. There is a reason that I chose to be a secondary education major. And that reason is that I do not like little kids very much. I think that they can be kind of gross sometimes. I'll admit that they can be cute sometimes though.  Sorry if that offended anyone. I'm sure I'll like my own alright when that day comes. But dealing with other people's germy kids? ....nott uhh. No thank you. (Unless they are babies...or toddlers. Then I think they are adorable! But only when I can give them back to mom and dad when they start screaming). I was always that babysitter that put on a movie until  the parents came back and then I just sat on the couch and made sure they didn't kill each other. But after this week, I gained an incredible respect for elementary school teachers and after only spending five days in a classroom of second graders, I even thought that most of them were kind of cute by the time I left. I was actually kind of sad to leave. Tuesday was our last day and when the kids found out, they ALL came over and hugged me and my classmate Kelsey. It was the cutest bear hug with about 25 six year olds you have EVER seen. I am so sad that I didn't get a picture. But trust me, it was cute. So...after everything was all said and done, elementary school wasn't all that bad. I kinda liked it. But it by no means made me want to change my major to el ed. 

Y mountain

The start of a new week means a new set of goals! Last week, I really wanted to focus on stepping up my workouts. And I think I did a pretty good job. I ran hard and worked hard. But, I let my diet slack. So this week, my fitness goal is to stick to my diet better. When I do both, I feel like my progress is so much easier to feel and see. That is goal number one. 

Goal number two is to get to bed by 10:00-10:15 PM every night! Last night, I went to sleep at 11. And usually its after 10:30, which makes waking up at 6AM every morning harder. Today I actually slept in til 6:36 and then didn't have enough time to get things done in the morning before I had to leave. So that's the goal this week. Get to bed on time!

Saturday, I went on an awesome run. I worked out the full hour and probably ran about 40-45 minutes of it. I live pretty close to Y mountain and that means there are lots and lots of hills. When I was a freshman in college, I used to be able to run from Heritage dorms all the way to the Y mountain parking lot in 15 minutes. So, not the Y itself, but just up through the neighborhoods to get to where you actually start the hike. Those are still some steep hills. I always told myself I would get to the top of the Y one day, but it never happened.

On Saturday, I ran uphill from my house up to the parking lot, very, very slowly. It took about 25-26 minutes and I walked a bit. Once I got to the parking lot, instead of going up the Y trail head, I went on the Bonneville trails to the right and ran for about 20 minutes before making my way down the mountain. I felt sooo accomplished once I got home. It was a really good run. One of these days, I'll be able to make it up without having to stop and walk :)

9th grade archaeologists...

9th grade archaeologists....would probably crush an ancient skull with their shovels. Yesterday was a little chaotic. In my opinion, most of the kids didn't take it seriously. They knew it wasn't real. Some of the kids even broke the little pieces of pottery they found on purpose! I felt like I was babysitting! "Hey! don't throw those rocks at people!" "Your breaking the pottery!" But, it was a learning experience. I learned that I want to teach juniors and seniors. 

Oh my SORE

Okay. Just to let you all know. I definitely stepped up my workout yesterday in  the weight room. And I am feeling it today. My body is definitely hurtin. I was seriously so intimidated when I walked out the front door  this morning and started walking towards my bike. I was dreading my 1.5 mile all up hill commute. The first five minutes I kept thinking, it would probably be okay if I just turned around and got the car... And I seriously almost did. You know that one picture that says "What I think I look like when I run" and below it says "What I'm pretty sure I actually look like when I run." Ya. That was me. Except on a bike. It was rough. But I did it!!!!!

Wanna know what kept me going? I saw this quote yesterday that said something like: Next time you look in the mirror, you won't remember the pain. So. Even though I legs are killing right now, I've got a 45 minute run to do this afternoon and nothing's getting in the way!

Spanish Archaeology

Good morning! As we speak, I am sitting at work enjoying a a delicious green smoothie. It doesn't have any blueberries though...which is super sad. Since school started, I have had to cut down my hours a lot and to save money on food, we cut blueberries for a while. Those things can be pricey....but their so good! Oh well,  the smoothie still turned out well.

Okay, so even though it is Wednesday already (thank you three day weekend), I want to set some goals for myself for the rest of the week. I feel that my workouts last week went okay. But I know I didn't give it my all. Especially during my runs. I started to get tired and stopped to walk when I totally could have kept going. And with weights too. Frankly, I kept it easy. Starting today, I am going to give it my all during my workouts. I am going to push just another minute longer every time I start to feel tired. Killer results come from killer workouts. No more excuses. I want killer results. 

Also, wanna know something super lame? So I am taking 3 Spanish classes this semester (well, I was). I plan on getting a Spanish teaching minor. And I've already mentioned that my schedule is pretty hectic. Mostly because of my intro to education class...the one that is four hours every single day. Ya. I know. Anyway, because of that, I had to take some evening classes. The Spanish writing and composition class that I signed up for was every Tuesday and Thursday from 4-5:20 and it was the only section that fit into my schedule. Well, they cancelled it. Like completely. There weren't enough students. So now I have to try to fit it into next semester. I am a crazy planner...I plan my days, my weeks, and even my entire semester with the exact classes I am going to take. And I really really really don't like when things mess up my plans. Ask my husband. So I called my mom complaining about how they just cancelled this class that I need and how I can't fit it in anywhere else this semester. Like all moms do, she told me not to worry and that who knows? It might have happened for a reason. So, the world probably won't end. But it is still pretty lame. I'll probably just end up working on my online class and get it completely done this semester. Good ol' BYU. 

One more thing, the class that I am observing at Karl G. Maeser is doing a archaeological dig tomorrow. It's like a field trip within a field trip....field-ception! (Sorry, that was really cheesy). Don't worry, I will tell you all about it in my next post! :)

Friday was awesome. I observed a 9th grade History and English class. They were having a socratic discussion over Plato's Apology and I. was. impressed. The majority of the class was actively participating and they had very intelligent and well thought out opinions. It was the same group of students in the English class as well. (The school does a socratic style of teaching and completely combines their social studies with English.) They started acting a little more like normal 9th graders during this half. I observed not only the teacher's teaching methods, but how she handled behavioral problems with some of the students, which was super interesting. Classroom management is crucial to effective teaching. It's kind of overwhelming when I think of everything that goes into teaching and that one day I'll be in charge of my own classroom. But seeing it play out live in action is pretty helpful. Also seeing her present information to her students and being able to point out the different aspects of her lessons plans (after having learned about some of them in class this past week) was cool! We get to go back to the same school all next week. This first week, I honestly want to just observe a variety of different teachers and see their all their different methods. So hopefully that gets to happen. I guess we'll see!

Here's a picture of the guy himself: Karl G. Maeser.

Just in case anyone doesn't know who he is, he was an prominent Utah educator and president of Brigham Young University for 16 years. What I personally know him best for is his incredible integrity. Most BYU students are familiar with his quote on honor (we see it every time we walk into the testing center) and I think it's worth sharing:

 "I have been asked what I mean by 'word of honor.' I will tell you. Place me behind prison walls--walls of stone ever so high, ever so thick, reaching ever so far into the ground--there is a possibility that in some way or another I may escape; but stand me on the floor and draw a chalk line around me and have me give my word of honor never to cross it. Can I get out of the circle? No. Never! I'd die first!"

Cool, huh. It's definitely a concept that the world could use a reminder of.

Anyway, I will definitely be updating my experiences at Karl G. Maeser Preparatory Academy as I continue to go throughout the rest of next week. 



Now for the work out update. Yesterday, I did 50 minutes of cardio. I know, 10 minutes less than I should have. But it was hard. Especially since I was on a treadmill the whole time...it was raining most of the day. Treadmills can be convenient sometimes. But personally, anything past 30 minutes on a treadmill is way too long. I'd rather be outside. It's so much better. My cheat day ended up being yesterday. I had a get together with some old roommates and we brought cookies and cakes and cinnamon roles and the whole shabang. It was great. :) But now its time to get back on track for next week. Here's to another week of getting back in shape. Just gotta take it one day at time.