Earth Science @ MindSay 
Swimming is finally over! I'm done with it for a full three weeks, and I have normal gym during that time. Then I have another three weeks of swimming...but oh well. It's still really hard and I can't really do it at all.
My Christmas was good. School related stuff I got was a new office chair, so I can actually work at my desk now. (My last one was missing a wheel and had no back - it fell off.) My family also got a family membership to the YMCA, so I can go practice swimming whenever I want, as well as exercise and play pool and basketball and stuff. I'm excited about that.
I'm starting to kind of understand the Weather unit of Earth Science. My dad helped me with it a little bit one night, and I'm starting to get the hang of it. It's the longest unit we are going to do in that class. I'm learning about clouds and humidity and stuff. Pretty much everyone hates that class, but I actually like it sometimes. Yes, I do get pissed off at Mr. Yatsko at times, but he really is a cool guy, just a little strict. And he definitely knows his Earth Science. My grade is still at 83 in his class, which I'm happy with. He, Mr. Yatsko, was passing out papers to everyone who was failing, and I saw about 7 or 8. If you really put your mind to it, it's easy to get good grades. Just take ten minutes to look over your notes and read the pages of the textbook that you're supposed to.
Math is going really well. I'm starting to get really paranoid every time I enter his classroom, because I don't know what to expect. Sometimes he's in the most cheery mood, and the next day he's screaming at the class for not getting good test grades.
While I'm on the topic of math and science, my Regents midterms exams are in a couple of weeks. The first big tests I've ever had! I'm really nervous, but excited too. I don't know much about the math one, but I've heard from several people that the Earth Science Regents tests are really easy. People who got 80's like I do got 95's on the regents test. It's a three-hour exam, which is a little intimidating - I'm hoping it won't be too hard to plan out my time. It's already hard enough with a 45-minute exam to figure out how much time I can spend on each problem. I'll be sure to post how it goes. The nice thing is I don't have school Regents week, except for my two exams (maybe more, I'm not sure) for which I have to come on certain days. For Earth Science it's wednesday the 24th at noon.
In orchestra, the conductor wants to play the Barber Adagio. If you're not a string musician you probably haven't heard of it - it's probably one of the most beautiful pieces ever written for string orchestra. It's very slow, with 5 flats in the key signature, changing times, basically a site reader's nightmare. I'm not sure if I've said yet, but my orchestra is NOT very good. The symphony orchestra is pretty good because the winds and percussion just drown out the strings, but the string orchestra is mostly hell to listen to. The cellos don't have a clue how to play those big blocks of wood. The violas are almost as bad, but that might be because there are ELEVEN VIOLAS. (Which is insane by the way.) However, it's not my place to talk to Ms. Weil and say "what the hell is wrong with you??? we can't play this piece you moron!!" so I guess I'll just go along with it and make a fool of myself onstage. Oh, and don't say I should have confidence. There's a fine line between pushing it a little and completely outrageous. This is outrageous. We CANNOT play this piece.
Hey world -I have a real Teaching position now. I teach 7th and 9th grade Science! Earth Science and Physical Science, both two of my favorites. I was called on Sept. 5th shortly after that Marty Robbins thing. Luck or Blessing, I don't guess. I know. It is God. Only He could tailor fit a position to me such as this. So I've been teaching since September 11th, and loving every minute of it. I love my School, I have good students and the Staff is Outstanding! So I am busy, too busy to blog, too busy to clean my own house it seems... I've always wanted a house keeper, hmm....
Sorry, I'll just check in here as comments are emailed to me. There's papers to grade, tests and study guides to formulate, grade quick to set up, Rock and Mineral labs to look over, etc.
Next time I'll just have to concentrate I guess. It's really annoying when you know the answers but you miss them anyway.
My test scores are sinking for other subjects too. 70 on earth science, and 68 on spanish. Ouch. I was so confused in Spanish because since I'm not taking english I didn't know what some of the stuff was that they were talking about. For those of you who take / took Spanish, I'm doing things with the verbs Ser, Estar and Tener. We have to contregate them to the proper form, and I had no clue when we started out what we were doing. I talked with my parents for a while and got a basic understanding of it, but it's still a little confusing. I actually met with the Spanish teacher this morning for 5 minutes before school started and she helped me with the homework she had assigned. She said that since I haven't taken Spanish before unlike most of the other kids, I might need a little extra help, which is fine with me.
I realized after the first few tests that studying really does make a difference. I didn't do any for Earth Science because the practice tests we had taken before were mostly reading graphs and looking things up on reference tables. I've started being a lot more organized with my homework. I have my 3-ring binder tabbed with all the subjects, and each subject has it's own "homework" section. I've also started taking notes when I read textbook assignments so I can review them before tests. I have yet to see how this works out, but I have 2 tests tomorrow and one on friday.
Earth science lab is really fun now that we've started doing actual lab tests and not making diagrams of the classroom. We've been measuring mass, width, volume and density of certain objects, which is more fun than it sounds.
Today I had to fill out 3 different worksheets for Algebra, read 5 pages or so in the textbook for Science, and study for every subject. I still wonder if this is only the beginning of Homework Hell.
I've had a productive day. I didn't screw up at school like I did yesterday thinking it was a B day and going to lunch instead of orchestra...I went for a run to try to whip my bad self into shape for soccer, and I'm going to practice violin in a bit. I'll be writing again soon.
.... let's cut a deal, lets make a plan, who's your daddy? Who's your buddy?Who's your man...
Soo.... my grades arrived in the mail. :D
Chemistry: B+
US History: B+
Poetry: A-
Earth Science: A
Fasion Design: A
Word and Powerpoint: A+
Career Internship: A+
Total GPA: 3.715
Go Elle. <3
T and I went and looked at the two gyms in town. We are going to sign up for Total Fitness. I'm happy about this, so this week I have made two big life changes:
1. Started therapy
2. Joined a gym
Maybe being sick will go away.
.... we were brave like soldiers falling down in the pale moonlight...
Rundown of NEW classes! Woo hoo!
Chemistry- notes
US History- video
Western English- Started reading a River Runs Through It.
Intermediate Comp2- Reviewed other letters and graded them
Government- Looked at political cartoons, talked about politcal events, and kinda goofed off.
Creative Writing- Had an open interview where we sit in front of the class and he asks questions
Earth Science- Earth Science turned into an independent study, I did a summary of what I would do, typed it up, showed it to the VP, and turned it in. :D
So now that I look at my schedual... I'm taking two sciences, two social sciences, and 3 englishes. You gotta be joking! I think I'll do fine. I like the new teachers, 3rd and 4th period are the same teacher, she seems understanding. I'm glad Earth Science turned into an independent study, I really hated Earth Science and it was sooo boring.
After school before I dropped my car off at Honda, I called the lady that my dietician recomended to me for therapy. She's a psychotherapist. I've held onto the car for months, and I finally called her. She seemed very nice, she said she would call me back when she knows what her open dates will be. I'm nervous. I've never seen anyone beyond a school counselor, and there's so much stuff. I've kept a lot of things bottled up inside. The two main things being sexually whatever it was when I was little, and my Moms death.
So I dropped my car off at Honda, went to Staples and picked up a few binders. After that I headed home, took a shower, and ate dinner. My dad called, and I talked to him for a bit, I mentioned the therapy thing and he said to go, if I get something out of it keep going, if I don't then find someone else. All in all a pretty good day.
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