Why can't I sleep???

My school operates on alternating shifts. Ninth and tenth grade meet in the morning, and eleventh and twelfth grade meet in the afternoon. Every month, the shifts switch (9 and 10 switch to afternoons, 11 and 12 to mornings). Problematically, I teach ninth grade, eleventh grade, and twelfth grade. So, on Mondays and Wednesdays, I have class at 7:30am, and on Tuesdays and Thursdays, I don't have class until 1:30pm. As a result, my sleep schedule is completely screwy. Actually, I can't really blame the schedule. In theory, I could just wake up every day at 6:30am (AKA the crack of dawn), and then my schedule would be fine. The problem is that I'm a night owl. And I don't like falling asleep until 1am at the earliest and sleeping in till at least 10am. Why did I decide to become a teacher again?.... Anyway, I've been alternating my sleep schedule in all sorts of screwy ways. I don't have a consistent bedtime or waking time. So now, I can't sleep. And I need to wake up by 6:30am tomorrow to catch my bus to Veliko Turnovo. Oh, ps. I'm going to Veliko Turnovo for the weekend to attend a Halloween Party thrown by the Peace Corps Volunteers to Bulgaria. I shall be dressed as Pippi Longstocking. And it shall be a grand, grand time. If I can fall asleep sometime in the near future... I've lost track of my point. Sorry. There was a point to this post, I think. Maybe. Okay, probably not. Which is a sign that sleep needs to happen. Night y'all!

They're not fang marks. I poked myself with knitting needles.

I went to Romania this past weekend with my lovely friend, Ellen, her roommate, Kristin, and our friend Byeong-Hun. Romania has been my dream for years. As some of you may recall, I initially applied for a Fulbright in Romania. When they called and asked me to switch to Bulgaria, I was completely fine with the change, but I still wanted to make it to Romania while I was here. And I have. And it was more than I had ever hoped for.

Breakfast in Bucharest

I took a bus to Sofia Thursday evening, and then we all boarded the bus to Bucharest at midnight. At 7:30am, the bus driver pulled over on the side of a random road in Bucharest and told us that this was the last stop for Bucharest and everyone had to get out. Needless to say, we were extremely unprepared for this outcome since we had expected to arrive at an actual bus station. Luckily, an English-speaking Moldovian boy around our age befriended us and helped us navigate the city a bit. With his help, we managed to make our way to Gara de Nord, the train station. From there, we caught a train to Brasov and then a bus to Bran, where we visited Bran Castle.

Our first view of Bran Castle as we got off the bus. I made it!

More than a little excited to see the castle...

Bran Castle is the castle on which Bram Stoker is said to have based Castle Dracula even though Stoker never saw Bran Castle, and it is possible that he did not really know anything about Bran Castle. While Bran Castle was not the primary home of Vlad Tepes (the man that the Dracula legend is based on), there is evidence that he used the fortress during his raids into Transylvania. Contrary to legend, Dracula (Vlad Tepes) is not from Transylvania. Vlad Tepes lived in and was the prince of Wallachia, but he frequently made forays into Transylvania. The castle is now set up primarily to display the furniture of King Ferdinand and Queen Marie of Romania, the rulers during the start of the 20^th century, but you can also see some of the older pieces of furniture and remnants of its previous owners.

Awesome view of the castle on its cliff. You can tell it was a fortress.

One of the rooms inside the castle. Check out the bear!

After our amazing day at Bran Castle, we returned to Brasov to spend the night at the Rolling Stone Hostel. It is by far the best hostel I have ever stayed in. We had two private double rooms for the night, and the owner of the hostel, Diana, helped arrange a driver for us for the next day. The driver took us to Sinaia to see Peles Castle, and then he returned us to Bucharest in order to take the bus home to Sofia.

Peles Castle

Peles Castle was an absolutely amazing place to visit. It was built in the 1880’s as a summer home to the royal family, and each room is decorated to the theme of different countries. There is a Turkish room, a Florentine room, a French room, etc. Each is magnificently decorated with items from those countries as well as replicas made by master artists. And the best part of all is that the entire castle is covered in hand carved wood. The walls are all works of art as the wood is shaped into statues and designs. The entire castle was one of the most beautiful and intricate pieces of art that I have ever seen. Only one of us could take pictures inside (you have to pay to take photos). So, I can’t show you photos of the interior until I get a copy from Ellen. But you can see just from the outside how intricate and amazing the whole place is.

A view of the gardens

The inner courtyard with amazing wood detailing

Ellen and I at Peles Castle

After Peles Castle, we returned to Bucharest and caught the 4:00pm bus home. That’s right. We spent only 33 hours in Romania. But it was an amazing 33 hours filled with beautiful fall leaves, amazing castles, and great company. I can’t wait till our return trip in the spring!!

Kicking students out of class

I am going to write several blogs today to try to catch you up on the past two weeks!

As a teacher, I generally believe that removing a disruptive student from class is a mistake. It teaches them that when they act up, they get to leave and not have to sit in class anymore. Basically, it makes life easier for the teacher but does very little to change the behavior of the student since, in some ways, it is a reward for them. Generally, it is far more worthwhile to figure out what it is causing them to act up and then deal directly with that issue. Unfortunately, I have learned, that is not always an easy thing to achieve. My ninth graders are currently giving presentations, and I have one particular class that likes to give presentations but does not like to listen to presentations. I also have a slightly nerdy girl in that class who gets picked on a lot because she is always the first one to have a comment or answer to my questions. Her group presented last Monday. I have a boy who sits in the back of the classroom and continually shouts out comments in a mix of Bulgarian and English. As long as he is not disrupting other students too much (I know, how much is too much?), I ignore him and let him blow off steam since he generally directs his comments at the presentation instead of just talking to other students about something else.

During this girl's presentation, however, he was more disruptive than normal. The presenters were talking about men vs. women, and they had written men on one side of the board and women on the other. The boy ran up to the board and wrote "and (the girl's name)" next to the women side of the board, implying that the girl did not naturally fall into that category. Standing nearby, I quickly erased the phrase and told the boy to head back to his seat. He sat down but continued to shout out comments. Since most were somewhat relevant to the presentations (he mostly shouted out a defense for men), I let them slide. Then the girl made a comment about men being prejudiced against women and trying to hold them back in society, and the boy yelled out, "You just say that because you're a stuck up bitch." While I normally do not believe in removing students, I think that this case was an exception. I refuse to ignore a terrible insult directed at a girl who is already the subject of insults. While this would be what one of my college professors called a teachable moment in which I could begin a discussion of why the boys feel the need to talk in that way and why society believes that this is acceptable male behavior and the inherent irony of the boy insulting the girl while she was talking about society trying to hold back women, but I only had 8 minutes left in class, and the student presentation was not finished. So, I very calmly stood up (the same college professor would note that standing while the student is sitting is an assumption of a position of power and authority), turned to the boy, and told him to leave my classroom. He apologized and asked to stay, but I told him that he had crossed the line and needed to leave for the rest of the period. I have mixed feelings. I hate having to remove a student, but I can't really see what other options I had in this situation. I refuse to yell at a student because it is ineffective and a waste of class time. What should I have done?

Worst Blogger Ever

So, I'm officially the worst blogger ever. Sorry guys! Every week, I make a resolution to do better and blog more, but so far, it hasn't been happening... But as the week begins yet again, I resolve to do better and blog more. :)

I have mixed feelings about the week I just finished. I am working with my students on a number of different projects. My ninth graders are giving oral presentations, my eleventh graders are studying American poetry, and my twelfth graders are holding a debate to sentence a murderer either to execution or life in prison. So far, eleventh grade is my favorite. This is probably due to the fact that I love literature, and it is my favorite thing to teach. Or it could be due to the fact that my eleventh graders are always open to whatever I bring to class. I have a theory on this. My students seemed to have been raised in an environment where the teacher teaches and the students take notes and occasionally participate. My eleventh grade classes are the closest I have to this system. I don't teach while they take notes, but I am working with tangible "knowledge" that they can acquire. They think that learning the names of poets and working to interpret poetry is a worthwhile task for an English class. It is "facts" instead of just discussion, and they can use their skills in interpreting poems on tests that they will take. My ninth and twelfth graders are a little freer. Both are supposed to be discussion classes, but I rarely bring to class discussions based on tangible knowledge that students perceive as school worthy. My ninth graders seemed to be confused as to why we would spend two weeks holding discussions on the various types of stereotypes and the way stereotypes are used in the media, and my twelfth graders told me that school policy doesn't affect them after this year, and so, they don't need to talk about it. Students are taught that school is a place to learn certain types of information. They rarely think of it in terms of skills that they learn or new ways of approaching material. Instead, they think primarily in terms of what knowledge they are picking up.

So, I've been trying to find ways to engage my students in the discussion classes. The problem so far is that one subject engages some of my students while others are left completely bored. And I have far too many students who never attempt to participate, whether that is because they are bored or because they see no need to participate unless forced or extremely interested. Unfortunately, those who do not participate are often the ones with the weakest language skills (probably another reason they don't participate). They could benefit from practice in the language. I think I'm going to have to move to small group projects. The ninth graders are doing presentations, which they seem to like (although they don't always pay attention to other peoples' presentations). They like the form of it, though. It is something they have done before, and they understand it. I think that my twelfth graders will be moving into a project on the concept of utopia. The idea is to talk about the meaning of utopia, possibly read part of Sir Thomas More's Utopia, and then have them work in groups to design a utopia. It might be something they actually become interested in and invested in. At least, I hope they do. When you only see your students once a week for forty minutes, what is the best course of action? Try to engage those who are least engaged, or just try to engage a majority of the active students and continually move forward, leaving those who are reluctant behind? What is the third option?? It is a difficult question and a difficult situation. It is times like these when I wish I saw my students every day. Actually, I wish that often. Especially when they continually forget assignments because they haven't seen me in a week or two...

Ten Lessons from Bulgaria

I've been here for over two months now, and I'll be home for Christmas in a little over two more months. The time seems to be flying right past me. Luckily, I made the decision on to take in as much of Bulgaria as I could. Here's what I've taken in so far, and the advice I give myself on a daily basis. Some of it is lessons I've learned the hard way, and others are lessons that I've learned via my Fulbright family. Thanks, fam!

1) It is probably inappropriate to laugh out loud when you overhear one of your students making fun of another teacher. Even when you think their assessment is dead on. It is apparently not inappropriate, however, to teach in four inch heels and a leather miniskirt.

2) More often than not, people will forget to tell you to do certain essential things because they take it for granted that you would know to do them. For example, all the teachers at my school have to fill in information for each class they teach in a giant log book every single day. Since it's part of their daily routine, they didn't think about the fact that I wouldn't know to do that. Until I finally asked what the book was. Always ask questions! Otherwise, people just assume you know the answer.

3) Always give yourself three hours to do a task you think will take one hour. Sometimes, it will only take you thirty minutes. Other times, it will take you six hours.

4) Always remember to laugh at a difficult situation. It's way more fun than crying.

5) Everyone knows you're a foreigner. It's okay. Don't worry about it. Just don't make it worse by being an obnoxious foreigner.

6) Miming is an art form that living in Bulgaria will allow you to perfect.

7) When buying meat, don't be cheap. The cheap stuff? Not always actual meat.

8) Buy sturdy shoes. Walking happens. A lot.

9) Always pack an umbrella, a sweater, and some extra toilet paper when going to teach. You never know when (or why) you'll need them.

10) Never forget to relax and enjoy the scenery. How often do you get the opportunity to live for a year in Bulgaria? That's what I thought. Enjoy it.

'Tis the Season...

Welcome to the season where a lot of people catch random viruses. Take a wild guess as to who caught her first virus of the season? No guesses? Come on, guys. I'll give you a hint. Who catches something every fall? That's right! Me! I went to Turkey last weekend, and I had a blast. I was able to see several things I did not see on my last trip, and I took a ferry ride up and down the Bosphorous (way cool!). I taught my classes on Monday, came home, went to sleep, and started to shake and shiver. I woke up Tuesday morning with a fever, and I was out of commission for six days. On Friday, I finally called a fellow teacher for help, and she took me to a doctor. Since viruses aren't supposed to last more than three days, they decided to put me on antibiotics and a couple of other medications to help boost my immune system. With all of the stresses of moving to a new country, my immune system is down, rendering me incapable of fighting off nasty viruses. I kept in touch with my mom through the whole thing, and Doctor Mom helped me a lot. It sucks being sick when your mom is not there. Luckily, Skype let me feel as if my mom was here. Somewhat. At the very least, I didn't feel completely alone. And I'm doing much better today. I still feel like I was hit by a truck. Twice. But I'm no longer feeling super sick. Just worn down. Lots of sleep, lots of tea, and lots of Skype calls to my mom and boyfriend are in order. Hopefully, I'll be back to my chipper self in no time.

In the meantime, what have I been up to? This week is Euroweek at my school. From what I understand, nineteen schools in nineteen different EU countries formed a partnership. Once a year (or every couple years if they can't manage to organize it in time), they get together at a different host school. Each school sends a select group of students to participate in Euroweek. This year, Euroweek is at my school (because we rock), and it is going on this week! So, I've been busy for the past couple of weeks putting my English skills to use. Euroweek participants communicate primarily in English, since they are all from Foreign Language Schools that teach English, and it is a language they have in common. As a result, all of the documents used during Euroweek had to be translated from Bulgarian into English. I don't speak Bulgarian, but I have a flair for English. So, I worked on a couple of different translating teams. The theme of this year's Euroweek is fairytales. Each school sent in a fairytale in their native language as well as an English translation. I was on the team that helped edit all of the English translations and get them ready for the booklet of fairytales. My other team translated the opening ceremony as well as opening play. My school performed a reenactment of the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice (very sad; if you haven't read it, do). The final team I worked with did not translate. I worked with two students who put together a short movie about the meaning of fairytales and why they are important and relevant to the modern world. It was beautifully done, and I refuse to take any of the credit for it. I just sat in between the girls and listened to them bounce ideas back and forth. When they settled on something, I helped them figure out a good way to phrase it and then put it in the movie. They chose all of the photos and music, and they designed the entire concept. I just had the program on my laptop and the patience to sit with them while they worked through their ideas. It turned out quite well, I think. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQm5SY44RvU

I also taught a lesson for Euroweek on Emily Dickinson. I gave four Dickinson poems to four different students ahead of time, and then during the lesson (attended by kids from at least four different countries, possibly more), I split the class into four groups, and one of my kids led each group in a discussion of their poem. At the end of class, each group had to come up and act out their poem. It's a lesson I would normally do over a two day period, but I didn't have two days. Just today. It went well, though, I thought. An Estonian teacher came up to me afterwards to thank me. Apparently, she teaches Dickinson a lot and loves her, and she loved how I taught the lesson. It's nice to have moments like that. :)

In other news, I have now successfully baked an apple crisp with the nutmeg I picked up in Turkey. Unfortunately, I had to throw half of it away after I got sick because it was going to waste. I've been on a limited diet for six days. And apparently apple pie doesn't make the cut (I know, bogus, right?). But I should be able to start slowly adding foods back in over the next few days. Unfortunately, apple pie still doesn't make the cut. Oh, well. Anywho, I'm going to go put some potatoes in the oven to bake. That's right, I'm making baked potatoes in the oven. I had never made them anywhere but the microwave before. The things you learn. It's a marvelous world. Ciao!