Oh, the hardest part is jumping off the board...

This entry is excerpted from, "Eight Lessons Becoming the Great Teacher You Already Are":

3. It’s not the dive that gets you, it’s the diving board.

Years ago, I was watching the Olympic high diving finals. One diver launched himself into the air and twisted, turned, and somersaulted in an incredible series of mid-air gyrations before settling into the water like it was butter. Not a ripple. Afterward, in an interview, he was asked to comment on what he thought was the hardest element in his long, complex, dangerous dive. Without hesitation he said, “Oh, the hardest part is jumping off the board.”

Students notice when you dare to jump off the board. They know the difference between “live” teaching and teaching that feels distinctly like it was “recorded at an earlier time.” Students know when you are present and engaged, willing to take on the unexpected; they also know when you have checked out and when you are playing it safe. What makes great teaching scary is leaping off into space and not being sure that things will fall (or you will fall) quite the way you hoped.

I believe that is why there is an element of courage in the finest teaching, a required particle of risk, an earnest hope that you will be able to execute everything you need to do to reach the end of class effectively, arrive at your goals successfully, and exit the classroom in one pedagogical piece. An instinctive awareness of this risk-taking is reflected in the tiny flicker of apprehension that often accompanies the most experienced (and, often, the best) teachers on the first day of a new class.

This nervousness is a gut recognition that, if we want to do well, we will probably have to take a chance, and that we will have to make the running leap we have made so often before. Of course, this sense of risk is accompanied and heightened by our memories of the belly flops and unintentional cannonballs in the past. But once we are in the air, if we know what we are doing and luck is on our side, for a minute or two we fly—and it is our courage that enables our flight.

Boy. Isn't that the truth!? As I can say, I've officially taught for 20 weeks (including observation and the sweat-producing act of teaching), I have been noticing that basically ANYONE can be a teacher.

However, it takes a little more gusto, nerve of steel, gall, vigor... to be THE teacher. Kiss a worksheet goodbye, and find yourself asking your students to pull out a blank notebook, and trying to juice up a discussion according to Bloom's Taxonomy.

Easy?

Try doing that with seventeen 11 and 12 years olds.

They seemed to lose their vocal chords, despite the fact that they HAD it when they were putting their winter wear away in the coatroom, rather loudly.

"OK, students, please think of ways you can continue the discussion between yourself and your peer, I want you to continue the discussion and keep it engaging."

*distant thudding* You can HEAR their vocal cords dropping down to their stomachs. Not willing to participate.

Oh, the hardest part is jumping off the board.... to make the students think critically, applying the 21st century style.

Christmas Card 2009

December 2009

Merry Christmas to you and yours from the Paulsons!

Quoted from newspaper, “From home to home and heart to heart, from one place to another, the warmth and joy of Christmas brings us closer to each other.” It got me feeling inspired to write a Christmas greetings from the newlyweds. However, this new bride of Jared’s has been trying to figure out how to write the very first Christmas letter as a Mrs. Paulson. Here goes…

A Christmas letter is quite the tedious task,

But, nothing this new bride can do,

After all, she burned a meatloaf,

Couldn’t boil eggs decently,

Yet, her husband still appreciates her.

As they have years yet to come,

To master cooking, of make choices together,

It is quite the tedious task.

As you may notice, this impromptu poem does not rhyme. Please don’t show this to my fifth graders, as we were discussing poetry everyday during reading period. I teach seventeen fifth graders at Hawthrone Elementary in Sioux Falls at the time of this writing as a part of my internship from Augustana College. I also taught at Metro Deaf School-Minnesota North Star Academy in St. Paul for the first part of the Fall semester. I will complete my student teaching on January 22^nd, then the job searching begins! Jared has been keeping busy with being technical support representative at Knology full time, and picking up part time at Best Buy in Sioux Falls. During some of our downtime, we enjoy meeting up with our friends, reading books, and watching movies (courtesy of Netflix and RedBox).

This Christmas season has come and we send our prayers and thoughts to our family and friends across the country.

Blessings,

Jared & Chelsea Paulson

Jared: paulsja@gmail.com, 605-929-9650 (cell)

Chelsea: chelsea.paulson@gmail.com, 605-370-8264 (cell/text)

English... have anyone been befuddled by English before?

Me... I have.

Just see my IEP goal while I was in high school, the goal that remained written until I graduated.

"Chelsea needs to improve her English grammar."

Folks, take a look below, of what Mrs. Blair Petersen has sent me:

Download the original attachment

SO, YOU THOUGHT YOU WERE TOUGH ENOUGH TO TRY TO LEARN ENGLISH?

Reasons why the English language is so hard to learn:

1) The bandage was wound around the wound.
2) The farm was used to produce produce.
3) The dump was so full that it had to refuse more refuse.
4) We must polish the Polish furniture.

5) He could lead if he would get the lead out.

6) The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert.
7) Since there is no time like the present, he thought it was time to present the present.
8) A bass was painted on the head of the bass drum.
9) When shot at, the dove dove into the bushes
10) I did not object to the object.
11) The insurance was invalid for the invalid.
12) There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row.
13) They were too close to the door to close it.
14) The buck does funny things when the does are present.
15) A seamstress and a sewer fell down into a sewer line.
16) To help with planting, the farmer taught his sow to sow.
17) The wind was too strong to wind the sail
18) After a number of injections my jaw got number.
19) Upon seeing the tear in the painting I shed a tear.
20) I had to subject the subject to a series of tests.
21) How can I intimate this to my most intimate friend?

Let's face it - English is a crazy language. There is no egg in eggplant nor ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in pineapple.
English muffins weren't invented in England or French fries in France.
Sweetmeats are candies while sweetbreads, which aren't sweet, are meat.

We take English for granted. But if we explore its paradoxes, we find that quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.

If teachers taught, why didn't preachers praught?

If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat?

Sometimes I think all the English speakers should be committed to an asylum for the verbally insane.

In what language do people recite at a play and play at a recital?

How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites?

You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which your house can burn up as it burns down, in which you fill in a form by filling it out and in which, an alarm goes off by going on.

English was invented by people, not computers, and it reflects the creativity of the human race, which, of course, is not a race at all.

That is why, when the stars are out, they are visible, but when the lights are out, they are invisible.

PS. - Why doesn't "Buick" rhyme with "quick"?

I rest my case.

Please excuse me, I need to mind my p and q's, whatever that was.

Made for Heaven

...I heard the news that my sister, Rachel is baptized today. :)

...My roommate's sister-in-law just had a baby girl this morning at 2am.

...A family's friend's mother just passed away last Wednesday evening.

All that makes this person reflect on Isaiah 5 & 6.

My grandmother, Ethel Chell, who passed away in July of 2006, she wrote a note several years ago, inspired by Isaiah 5 & 6, and I still kept the note, "When Jesus comes, then shall the eyes of the blind be open. And the ears of [deaf] Chelsea shall be unstopped. Then shall Ruth and Lila leap as the deer and the dumb shall sing. Isaiah 5 and 6."

I was inspired by that, and I recall the quote I saw last year, "I find in myself desires which nothing in this earth can satisfy, the only logical explanation is that I was made for another world." - C.S. Lewis.

Oddly, on the back of the note from Grandma Ethel, she scribbled, "another time."

With baptism, Rachel is proclaiming her faith right now, a newborn baby will demand all her parents' attention right now, the grieving family and friends will gather right now to remember their loved one, and make memories with each other right now.

Make memories right now, avoid the phrase, "another time".

Teacher-To-Be in Comatose State

You see no brain activity in this picture?

See. Since August 25th, I slipped in comatose state on weekends while teaching for ten weeks in Minnesota.

An actual blog post will follow shortly.

Thank you for tuning in.

Room on the southwest of the Tobins' residence

This bedroom at the farmhouse was there for quite few generations. It used to be Grandpa Jennings' and Great-Uncle Harvey's bedroom. (Of course, it wasn't all yellow and green with flowers back then.) Then, it was Dad's bedroom while he was growing up. Now, it was my bedroom for about 22 years (15 if you want to be exact, it was guest bedroom when Rachel and I slept in Charolette's bedroom, then Shauna came along, so I moved into this bedroom).

The reason why I posted this blog up. It was the only time that my bedroom was actually very clean for 22 years! :)

Armor of God

Just on August 1st and 2nd, Sign Grace for the Deaf Church hosted a Children's Conference. I assisted with Juliet A. Lone's adventure with five kids. These pictures gives you a glimpse of what happened. The entire Saturday consisted of learning about being God's solider with the children.

It was pleasure doing this with the kids earlier this month. :)