Still got it

I just got back from a week of intensive classes at TCU, and I am STOKED to get started planning AP English for you guys. It's going to be different than your usual English class experience, but you trust me, right?

Anyway, I thought you might find it amusing that yesterday morning, I found myself a bit bored in a class (I was expecting to learn something new about how to implement Independent Reading, but no). And so I began listing all 89 of you from memory on a scratch piece of paper.

I got to 88 while sitting in class. Impressive, yes?

And then, about an hour into my drive back to Houston, it occurred to me whom I'd left out. (And no, I won't say whom, but it was someone in Beller's class this year, so that made things a little harder. It is no measure of how much I like this person.) I screamed the name at the top of my lungs, so glad to have gotten everyone.

I'm about to go up to school in a little bit to make some copies and stuff, and I'll take the camera so I can document the garden's growth. It's gonna shock you!

I'm outta here

Well, kids, I'm off to Fort Worth for the week -- I'll be at a training at TCU, learning how to torture you guys more effectively. Hope you're all doing well.

Lots of luv,
LAR

P.S. Happy early birthday to Priscila Canales and Patrick Sanchez (26th and 27th, respectively).

Some things never change

I'm taking a writing class each Wednesday evening, and we are usually assigned two essays to read each week by published authors, as well as two manuscripts written by students of the class. It's a lot of reading on top of what I'm already trying to do, but I'm honestly not complaining.

Last night, the teacher passed out the reading for this week, and it was a fairly sizeable packet. She said, "Please read this piece by Joan Didion for next week," and I thought, "SCORE! I've already read every piece in Slouching Towards Bethlehem, so I'm golden." Except it's a huge essay that's not included in there. Bummer.

That said, if you need a copy of the summer reading, you'll find it right here!

Oops

I missed saying Happy Birthday to Yessenia Coto on Tuesday, but I am thinking that she is off in some exotic country right now, so let's just chalk it up to the time difference. The only picture I have of Yessenia that's really good is her standing on the beach in seventh grade, and she would probably shoot me for putting it up here. I'll save it for the slideshow next spring...

Birthdays

Happy birthday today to Eric Deleon and Laura Zamarripa!



Or as I like to call them, Happy and Lali.

Be good to your dads today.

Leslie

Happy birthday today to Leslie Salazar! For some reason, I have no photos featuring her.

Why do you run from me, Leslie?!

I will find you....

The sweet taste of success

Guess what I ate today.

Two cherry tomatoes.

THAT WE GREW!

Yep, two of them were ready to come off the vine today, and they were tasty. I don't think I've ever eaten anything I've grown before (other than herbs), so I am impressed with our efforts.

The cilantro is looking pretty sad, but the beans, squash, and okra are going crazy. The last two are over a foot tall already.

I'll be sure to take some pictures next time I'm up there to water.

The speech I didn't get to give

Okay, so I won this award at graduation.

And it means a lot to me, truly. The staff had nine nominees to vote for, and I came away with this year's "Whatever it Takes" award. Which, if you're a teacher, is about as close as you're going to get to winning an Oscar or a Nobel prize. It's flattering, and it's nice to be recognized for the hard work I do. (That being said, everyone at YES does a ton of hard work. A TON. You know this. I mean you guys do it, too.)

But y'all know how I love to hear myself talk, and I wish I could have at least said a little thank you when Mr. D gave me this thing. It would have gone a little something like this.

I need to thank two people first and foremost. The first person is the best teacher I ever had, and that is my mom. The second is the person I love most on this planet, who puts up with my absence almost seven days a week, and that is my husband.

But I absolutely could not and would not get up early each morning and stay up late each night if it weren't for the kids I see in my classroom and on the sidewalk each day. The kids who greet me with humor, affection, and a willingness to learn whatever I've decided to teach them that day. I hear adults grumbling about "kids today," and how they're all thugs or have no manners or whatever. But I know differently.

When *I* was in high school, I never let me teachers know how much I liked them or valued what they did. I barely thought of them after I left their classroom. I am blessed to have not just one or two students, but dozens, who are kind, respectful, gracious and thoughtful to me every day of the week. I go to work and feel loved, and that is something nobody out in the corporate world gets at all.

You see, when you guys left Room 7 last week, although I was ready for a break, I was sad to see you go. There was never a single day this year when I thought to myself, "I don't want to see this class." Never. In fact, when I am stressed about all my grown-up responsibilities, I just dissolve into class and find a peacefulness. Every single one of you is a joy in my day, and I thank you for that.

Burning down the house...or at least the garage

I posted this on my personal blog today, the one that you guys don't have access to just yet (but in about 11 1/2 more months, you'll be golden). Anyway, it's a harmless little anecdote I thought I'd share. You know, to prove that I write every day; it's not just something I make y'all do. You won't necessarily know all my references, but you get the gist.


Not unlike many people I know, I am crazily phobic of cockroaches. That and my hatred for heat make me doubt why I live in Texas for at least five months of each year.

Yesterday, whilst rearranging furniture and setting up my new office, I decided it was time to change the family photo on my desk from Christmas 2001 to Christmas 2008. (We didn't do Christmas until MLK weekend this year, so I guess we will have two Christmas 2008s.) Anyway, it only makes sense as the topography of my family has changed quite a bit in the past seven years: people have died, been born, married in, or exited by way of divorce. Okay, only one of those last ones. Sorry, Kev, you're out of the frame. It's time.

So as I'm making the switch, I realize that Christmas 2001 is a litte stuck, and I have to tug. One corner is glued down to the glass for some reason, and I accidentally ripped Glenna's head off (sorry, Glenna). I don't fret too much, as I have another copy of the picture somewhere. But I go in search for the Goo-Gone, which Chris tells me is in the garage.

I head to the garage.

I open the garage door.

And then I see something shoot across the floor that reminds me of this:


But it is a cockroach. Ralph S. Cockroach. And no amount of exaggerating his size would be inappropriate, and judging by his speed, he had some sort of miniature motorized vehicle under him. Momentarily I wondered if it was a mouse because of his bulk, but the instant replay in my brain informed me that no, it was a roach.

And if you know me well enough, this next part of the story will confirm to you just how much I hate roaches. I abandoned any notion of Goo-Gone, went inside and pulled out Chris's peanut butter (because my Crazy Grandma taught me that it's the next best thing), and scraped Glenna's head off the glass with some Extra Crunchy Jif.

Birthdays this week

Happy birthday to Megan (6/3), Illiana (6/7) and Terra (6/7)!

A peek inside

Today my husband and I moved some furniture around and turned our extra bedroom into an office space for me. Kids, I'm so nerdy. I have spent all day in this room, reading mostly. Oh, and you know it was English IV stuff I was reading, no lie.

I realized that I haven't had a room of my very own since I was in high school (so that's 16 years). I was so giddy about this new space that Hub started teasing me, saying I probably would start sleeping in here, too.

You know you're old when you get happy about the absence of a television.


I hope you're all enjoying your summers so far. I've had a hard time adjusting to all this free time. I've made daily trips to school, pretty much just to water the garden, which is looking great. The beans went crazy over the weekend and are starting to vine up the lattice like we hoped. And the tomatoes are red and pretty, just not quite big enough yet. I'll take some pictures in a few days and put them up here.

Lurv,
LAR

Summer recommendations

If you're bored or just want to enlighten yourself a little:

Books
The Poisonwood Bible, Barbara Kingsolver
A Prayer for Owen Meany, John Irving
A Thousand Splendid Suns, Khaled Hosseini
The Devil in the White City, Erik Larson
Fall On Your Knees, Anne-Marie McDonald
Jitterbug Perfume, Tom Robbins
The Bonesetter’s Daughter, Amy Tan
The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, Anne Fadiman
Never in a Hurry, Naomi Shihab Nye
The Time Traveler’s Wife, Audrey Niffenegger


Movies
The Godfather trilogy, drama
Better off Dead, comedy
As Good as it Gets, drama/comedy
The Painted Veil, drama
Swimming to Cambodia, monologue
The Shawshank Redemption, drama
Garden State, drama
On Golden Pond, drama/comedy
The Silence of the Lambs, suspense
Atonement, drama
Freaks and Geeks: The Complete Series, comedy / TV series

Music
Automatic for the People, R.E.M.
No. 2 Live Dinner, Robert Earl Keen
Harvest, Neil Young
Led Zeppelin (Four Signs), Led Zeppelin
Nomads, Indians, Saints, Indigo Girls
Greatest Hits, any album, Stevie Wonder
The Best of David Bowie, David Bowie
Mermaid Avenue, Billy Bragg & Wilco
Concert in Central Park, Simon & Garfunkel
Born to Run, Bruce Springsteen

Grades

Email me at larayburn@yesprep.org if you want to know the shakedown of your final grades.

LAR