The Joys of Squash Soup, Russians and Farts

Today is a national holiday, which means I can sleep in! But this morning, I automatically woke up right at 6:15 am and couldn't fall back to sleep. Why does it always happen that I want to sleep in, I can't, but on the days I need to get up for work, I can? Ahh...the torture! =p I guess it doesn't help when the first thing I woke up this morning were all these things I have on my "To-Do" lists. Sometimes, I see my mind as this bag gigantic ball of colourful post-it notes with reminders and action items. It's quite sad picture actually. Haha. But anyways, one of the mental post-its reminds me to 'blog.'  So, here I am!

Yummy! Taste like mom's

This week, my sister made soup for me and it was oh, so good! She made pumpkin and fish soup. (Mom and dad, aren't you proud?) She also made soy sauce chicken wings with mushrooms and this broccoli with minced meat and tofu. The photo doesn't do it justice, but trust me, they were good. I was just grateful to come home with home-cooked food!

At school, my grade 4s have been a lot of fun to teach! We got to do some fun activities in class. Just yesterday, for our Science unit on "Waste and Our World," our librarian dressed up as a Russian who barged in with a huge bag of garbage. He walked up to a student's desk and plopped it right in front of him. He told the class he was sent by the Russian government to distribute garbage to our class. The scene provoked the class to ask many questions, which was what we wanted! "Why here? Why this class?" many students asked. Hopefully, it will provoke them to think deeper about the politics in our global system of waste 'management.'

So, teaching has been quite enjoyable. And I am learning how to be more strict when necessary. At the end of the day, I am not their friend. I am their teacher, someone whom they should respect. I can be friendly, but I am not their friend. On the note of discipline, there is a story to tell. One morning after recess, I decided to have them practice lining up in front of the class. They lined up and sat down at least 3-4 times. On the last time, some kids started to squirm a bit. Several had their hands cupping their nose and mouth. I had no idea what's going on, until one student came up to me and said, "Miss Koo.... 'Bob' farted and it really stinks. He farts when he gets nervous or scared. That's why we were all covering our mouths." I had to keep a straight face, but inside I couldn't help but laugh a little. It was pretty funny. I was surprised I had the power to cause a kid to be that nervous of me. I felt pity for him for having an uncontrollable flatulence condition. I really hope that it doesn't continue as he gets older. But I guess everyone has a different way of reacting when they get nervous. I learned in my Language Arts unit, that when a puff adder snake gets nervous, his head puffs up to the size of an orange! Crazy, eh? Imagine if we all had puffed up faces when we get scared, wouldn't that be a funny sight?!

Anyways, apologies if my updates are all about teaching, because in actual fact, teaching does consume a lot of my time and headspace. Alright, time to go.  For those who are interested, I will leave you with a video tour of how my classroom looks like.