13 Miracles of 2013 to Be…for Me

My life in 2013.

I enjoy a balanced life.

I maintain organized and manageable email accounts.

I eliminate paper files and keep digital copies.

I enjoy each day as a gift.

I stop trying to do “more” when it is to my detriment.

I worry less about my appearance and enjoy who I am.

I accept getting older gracefully instead of with a snarl.

I wake up feeling refreshed.

I read novels again instead of only work-related journals.

I play physical games just for fun.

I breathe in the clean, fresh air a few minutes each day.

I remember to be thankful for what I have.

I look forward to the future instead of fearing it.

These are the 13 miracles of 2013 yet to be…for me.

Thanks to Hugh @gapingvoid

Al Gore’s, “An Inconvenient Truth” Listening Exercise

Hurricanes, floods, blizzards, earthquakes, tsunami warnings, all in one week!  What’s next?

Is all this severe weather coincidental?  What do the expert meteorologists say?  The politicians and others debate the validity of Gore’s findings.  Watch the trailer of Al Gore’s movie, “An Inconvenient Truth.”  What do you believe?

After you watch the trailer,  fill in the words that are missing from the script on the Google Docs form.

Don’t forget to follow up this exercise by watching the entire movie, “An Inconvenient Truth,” and discussing it with your family and friends.  What do you believe the truth is?  What do you base your beliefs on?

.”

Thanks to Teach Me An English Lesson for getting me started
on this exercise!

Time to Put Love into Action

This cartoon by GapingVoid reminds us that whether we are students or teachers, it’s time to put our love into action…love of learning, love of teaching, love of life, love of humanity.

Last Sunday, nine people were gunned down at the Sikh Temple about a mile down the street from my school in Oak Creek, Wisconsin.  Six of those people have died. These were people who had come to the U.S. from India to improve their lives; they had come to school to learn English so that they could actively participate in American society and live their American dream.  But, some crazy, white supremacist decided to end their dreams and the dreams of their families (and his own) and take them down–children watching from the temple parking lot. Those children will never be the same.  Most of us will never be the same. ABC News

There is healing to do in the immigrant communities, in our cities, and in our country.  It is time to put our love into action. Our job teaching adult ESL is so much more than teaching words or language.  It is empowering the immigrants in this, their new world, to find their voices in learning, working, and raising families.  It’s loving and helping them learn to love and believe in themselves and in us Americans with all of our faults and failures.  This is no easy task given the volatile political climate these days in which we live.

So, as our ESL family reunites for our fall classes, our sense of security is shaken but our love of teaching and learning, and even more so, our love for our students and new found friends, remains strong.  We, the school community, will provide the security for the students to keep moving forward in their academic pursuits, and we will provide a  forum for them to use their English voices to ask the questions and express the concerns that are so heavily on their minds.

It’s time to go to work doing what we do best.  It’s time to show our students what we are made of, what most of our population is made of, and help them get on with their lives.  We learn to be watchful and wary but without living in fear.  We learn, we communicate, we battle the ignorance around us by educating ourselves and each other.  It’s time to put the love of our students, of humanity, into action.

Thank you to Hugh at GapingVoid for this cartoon.  
Their email address is: director@gapingvoidgallery.com

For Better or For Worse by Lynn Johnston

Boning up for my annual error correction conversation!  Enjoy!

Passing it on…

From ProfHacker -

A Day of Rest
Where does a day of rest—a sabbath—fit in a busy academic life? Various members of the team (and friends) reflect on what sabbath means for them.

Using Google Calendar to Help Students Minimize Stress and Meet Deadlines

Our adult ESL students (and yes, teachers, too) have such busy lives that between managing classes, full-time jobs, and family responsibilities, they rarely take a moment to schedule study time or any other personal time on our college campuses.  Finding a way to fit in some of these activities not only helps the students achieve more academically, it also helps them find time for enjoyment and enrichment with their friends on campus without feeling guilty or that they’re stealing moments away from their families.  It’s all scheduled!

Google Calendar is a great site to help our students manage all that and more.  This semester my students will be using it to keep track of their assignment due dates, the smaller tasks they need to finish to complete their assignments, and their study dates in conjunction with their outside-of-school responsibilities.  They’ll learn how to schedule and prioritize tasks, crossing them off their list as they finish them up.  (What a great feeling that is!) They’ll also be using their calendar to make appointments with me throughout the  semester.  By scheduling their appointments with me through their Google Calendars, they’ll be able to view their scheduled personal activities to be sure that the appointments don’t conflict with other commitments they’ve already scheduled, and the appointment then gets scheduled automatically on their calendar.  On my end, their appointments show up on my calendar only at times I have set aside for these appointments, and I am able to see on my calendar who is scheduled to come in and at what time.

Google Calendar can also be set up to send out a daily email with the day’s agenda on it so there is no excuse for missing an assignment due date or forgetting an appointment.  It syncs automatically with the Google Calendar on smart phones as well.  Additionally, Google Calendar links easily to my Blackboard course menu so it’s easily accessible for all of us–almost like having a personal secretary!  What a great tool!

Teaching our students (and faculty) to take advantage of free online tools to organize their lives and plan ahead for important activities helps minimize the stress in their already hectic lives and keep them on the path to success both personally, professionally, and academically.  For those of you who might be interested in using Google Calendar with your students, here are some tutorials that may be helpful to you in getting started:

Google Calendar Essential Training

How to Use Google Calendar Appointment Slots

CLF’s Expanded Learning Opportunities Initiative

This is an impassioned plea to get teachers to develop a new teaching paradigm, one that allows our students to learn at a time and in a place and way that best meets their needs. The tools are there. What are we waiting for?