So I'm pretty bad at updating my blog...but this is as good as it gets for a while. I've been teaching....still primarily in the 6th grade. I took them to small ensemble festival and conducted them while they performed- they received Superior ratings...one group with a 93, the other with a 96...so I was very proud! Teaching is going well....it's the right thing for me to be doing- I'm just a ball of self consciousness all of the time. I'm waiting for the day that playing piano, singing, teaching and managing between 35 and 45 kids in a classroom at one time becomes second nature. I can't just teach a lesson for part of class and then hand them a worksheet to do for the rest of the class while I get things done. (Not that all classrooms are run like that)...BUT with music, they ALWAYS have to be engaged in rehearsing. I'm up in front of them singing and moving around....I'm so animated and "happy" all the time that sometimes at the end of the day I just want to tell someone to go and play in the road---except I can't do that!
I got a hair cut today. Told the girl to take off about 2 inches....hmmm someone didn't get the memo! It's a lot shorter...but whatever...that means it's about 10 pounds lighter.
It had better snow tomorrow or I'm going to have a fit. The last time they said this would happen EVERY COUNTY around Gaston was called off. I drove to school on white roads...Grant it, it was nothing compared to what I'm used to traveling in while I'm in Boone....BUT...school still should've been delayed at the least. Anyway, a close friend of mine is giving a recital in Boone tomorrow night and I was going to go...but looks like I can't....people in the piedmont don't take care of the roads like Boone always has....so I don't know what will happen tomorrow. I would love to be able to sleep late on Monday.
I tried to take a nap today...because I woke up early to go get my hair did :) So I had been sound asleep for maybe ten minutes and I hear dad go "Do you want me to bring you any of this?"....he had popped some popcorn and was wondering if I wanted any. I couldn't figure out why you would ask someone that's dead to the world if they want some blessed popcorn....I was not amused at all. I was like...uhmmmm...no thanks. I think he thought I was laying there watching tv.
It's Saturday night at 9pm and I am totally ready for bed. Annnnnnd I'm still getting gray hairs...I'm 21, going gray, and get excited if I have the opportunity to go to bed before 10pm....This isn't right. Anyway, I think I'm going to close and go experiment with some ways to fix my newly CHOPPED hair. I don't want the folks at church tomorrow to see a human Pom-Pom sitting in the choir loft.
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Sunday, January 18, 2009
I'm back :)
Ok, I admit it....I have become the most slack at blogging than anyone on my list! My life has changed in so many ways over the past few months. I finished up my fall semester and somehow managed a spot on the Deans list and Chancellor's list on top of doing my senior recital. That explains the gray hair (I'm really not kidding...I have gray hair). Anyway, I said a lot of goodbyes in December. To the music faculty, to my singer friends, the choir members at Boone UMC, etc. By the time I moved to Gastonia, I was totally out of goodbyes! One of the hardest things I did was sing my last concert there at App. We have a Holiday Concert every year and the last number is the Hallelujah Chorus....when that was over I came to the sad realization that it was my last time on stage singing in a choir as a student....and a choir of that caliber...filled with my closest friends. I was really sad, but sucked it up in time for a great reception and an even better late night dinner at Macado's with some awesome people :)
I've started student teaching. This past week was my first official week...I'm pretty much observing right now. I'll start this coming week with vocal warm-ups for the 6th grade chorus. With music we ease into it slowly so we're not so overwhelmed. It truly is different from teaching another subject. We can't teach a lesson, hand out a work sheet, and sit at our desk working on things while our students work. We're in front of the class for the entire instructional time....keeping things moving and the singers engaged...it really is a song and dance...and it makes for a really tired teacher at the end of the day. My cooperating teacher (the person I'm teaching with) is the lady that inspired me to go into music. It's the greatest opportunity to be with her and watch what she does every day...I truly am learning from the very best.
I'm starting to think about Masters programs. At this point, I really am tired of school. College for me wasn't 1-3 classes a day. Sometimes I would have 7 or 8 classes in a day. I think my worst semester I had a total of 12 or 13 classes. There are only 3 vocal music education students graduating on time....I'm glad that I'm one of them. It's amazing...the people that you go in with...and how many of us either end up quitting or falling behind. Anyway, I have thought about a masters in Choral Conducting, but also about one in Music Education. The Mus. Ed one is looking more appealing because it provides more of a pay raise for public school teachers. Anyway, I'm going to concentrate on finding a teaching job first...then perhaps a Masters program over the summers. Who knows, if I find a place that will give me an Assistantship, I'll be off to school full time again!
I've been cleaning my apartment today. Everything looks great except for my spare room....It's my music room/ office. I put my piano, and my desk with a book shelf in there. In the midst of all of this are stacks of I dont know how many hundred pieces of choral music sorted according to voice type. I'm currently in the process of hole punching them and putting them into notebooks so I can access them more quickly and keep up with them a little better. So right now the floor is covered in music and all of those little annoying holes that falls out of the hole puncher.
I sang my first Sunday in the choir at Myers Memorial UMC here in Gastonia. My cooperating teacher is the director. It was nice...beautiful church, and the same Methodist service that I've become used to from being at Boone UMC. I loved it. I got cornered by a few of the choir members...talking...A LOT. I honestly couldn't tell you what this one lady said to me. She randomly walked up and started telling me her life story...but she was jumping around so much that I couldn't follow. I just smile and nod..whoo!
I hope to be better at this blogging thing now that I'm settled...but we'll see :)
I've started student teaching. This past week was my first official week...I'm pretty much observing right now. I'll start this coming week with vocal warm-ups for the 6th grade chorus. With music we ease into it slowly so we're not so overwhelmed. It truly is different from teaching another subject. We can't teach a lesson, hand out a work sheet, and sit at our desk working on things while our students work. We're in front of the class for the entire instructional time....keeping things moving and the singers engaged...it really is a song and dance...and it makes for a really tired teacher at the end of the day. My cooperating teacher (the person I'm teaching with) is the lady that inspired me to go into music. It's the greatest opportunity to be with her and watch what she does every day...I truly am learning from the very best.
I'm starting to think about Masters programs. At this point, I really am tired of school. College for me wasn't 1-3 classes a day. Sometimes I would have 7 or 8 classes in a day. I think my worst semester I had a total of 12 or 13 classes. There are only 3 vocal music education students graduating on time....I'm glad that I'm one of them. It's amazing...the people that you go in with...and how many of us either end up quitting or falling behind. Anyway, I have thought about a masters in Choral Conducting, but also about one in Music Education. The Mus. Ed one is looking more appealing because it provides more of a pay raise for public school teachers. Anyway, I'm going to concentrate on finding a teaching job first...then perhaps a Masters program over the summers. Who knows, if I find a place that will give me an Assistantship, I'll be off to school full time again!
I've been cleaning my apartment today. Everything looks great except for my spare room....It's my music room/ office. I put my piano, and my desk with a book shelf in there. In the midst of all of this are stacks of I dont know how many hundred pieces of choral music sorted according to voice type. I'm currently in the process of hole punching them and putting them into notebooks so I can access them more quickly and keep up with them a little better. So right now the floor is covered in music and all of those little annoying holes that falls out of the hole puncher.
I sang my first Sunday in the choir at Myers Memorial UMC here in Gastonia. My cooperating teacher is the director. It was nice...beautiful church, and the same Methodist service that I've become used to from being at Boone UMC. I loved it. I got cornered by a few of the choir members...talking...A LOT. I honestly couldn't tell you what this one lady said to me. She randomly walked up and started telling me her life story...but she was jumping around so much that I couldn't follow. I just smile and nod..whoo!
I hope to be better at this blogging thing now that I'm settled...but we'll see :)
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