What Teaching Feels Like

I haven't talked much about my time here as an educator because I write weekly reflections, lesson reflections, discuss it at school, and well let's face it, most of you really REALLY couldn't care less about the day to day classroom life of Miss Vincent.  But today was an awesome day for me, so I thought I would share.

The past three weeks I have been teaching full time and by the end of all of it I had this lingering headache.  Going on three days of what I am now affectionately calling, my teaching hangover.  I have been working hard to prove myself as an educator, and to be the best teacher I possibly can for my students.  Most lessons I know I could bring a little more, do a little better.  Some lessons I completely fail, but every now and then there is a day that makes me grateful to be a teacher.

Today my students gave speeches to finish out a unit we have been doing for a month.  I have taught and planned the entire thing on my own.  Of course checking in with the department for help and clarification along the way.  Half of them had been in after school at some point to work with me and I have spent weeks working with each of them to help them clarify and articulate their ideas.  My students got up in front of their peers today and spoke about personal and difficult issues.  The spoke about the expectations of not showing emotion that young men face, the difficulties of being an introvert, growing up facing racial injustices and low expectations, abortions, judgments,  the struggles and confusion of teenage years, and a slew of other topics important to them.  It was clear to me that the way our classroom culture developed created a space where they felt safe to speak about things that were important to them, and share a part of themselves.  During the process of these speeches I have gotten to have wonderful and meaningful conversations with them about life, and what they thought and valued.  It was incredible to finally feel like the things that drew me to teaching English were actually possible in the classroom.

For so long I have been frustrated with the lack of connection I was feeling with students.  I love working with youth, and helping kids grow and be more confident in themselves.  I have had amazing opportunities to do this kind of work at camps and in after-school programs, but I have always longed for it in the classroom.  Today was amazing for me.  This is what I am meant to do.  I am a teacher!

Easter Weekend

This weekend we had five days off of school for Easter.  I decided to take myself on an adventure and finally venture beyond the Wellington area.  I had a lot to think about, but I'll get to that later.  I left on Friday morning on a bus 6 hour bus trip toward Lake Taupo.  I slept most of the way and chatted with my seat-mate.  When she got on the bus I assumed from her Stitch hat and size she was a visiting teenage tourist, but she turned out to be a Chinese student working on her Masters in Law.  Teach me to make assumptions based on Disney apparel.

I got into Taupo and found the YHA with no issue.  Not being accustomed to hostel life I didn't realize that as a girl you ALWAYS....ALWAYS...request an all girls room, but I'll get to that later too.  My first move was to introduce myself to all of my roommates.  A travel from Scotland, one from England, and one from North Carolina.  I really enjoyed chatting with all of these guys about the adventures they had been on in New Zealand and other places.  I realized that my experience here has been so different than a three week sightseeing tour.  I am not a traveler, I am a visitor.

That afternoon I set out with Stuart, my new North Carolina friend, toward Huka Falls and the hot-springs   We ended up on a 6 hour hike and then had some killer Indian food.

The next day I woke up at 5 am to hike the Tongoriro Crossing.  It was WAY different than anything I have seen or experienced hiking in the past.  There was a constant stream of people hiking up at the same time.  In places the track felt like waiting in rush hour traffic.  I realized how lucky I have been in the past to feel like I had entire mountains to myself.  To be fair I went on one of the busiest days of the year, they estimated that 2,000 people hiked the crossing that day.  I was incredibly grumpy for the first two hours on the mountain, but the volcanoes snapped me out of it pretty quickly.  The volcanic surroundings were so foreign and vast that I feel like I can only really describe them as epic, not beautiful, just amazingly large and powerful.

In the morning I couldn't see much above the cloud line.  As I ate breakfast the clouds began to role over the hills around me.  

 The crater you walk through before the second large stint of uphill climbing.  

Woman who took this, "You are making me really nervous standing like that"

Her friend, "That's the mother coming out in her"

Me, "Don't worry I am sure my mom will back you up on that one" 

An idea of the number of people on the track.  This is a ROUGH climb, I was amazed at how many people did it.  

The Emerald Lakes on the other side of the summit.  Again, really different beauty from the alpine lakes I am used to.  

The red crater 

Mount Ngauruhoe, Mt. Doom for my LOTR fans.  The clouds cleared and all of a sudden this MASSIVE volcano was there.  

That night I came back to the YHA to find a letter from Stuart inviting me to dinner at his friend's house in town.  I went and spent the night hanging out with the lovely company of two new NC camp oriented friends and a French roommate.  They really reminded me of my lovely Orkila adventure minded friends.  It was wonderful to encounter genuine and friendly people on the other side of the planet.  They made an Easter Feast and I had my first Speights.  Overall a nice relaxing end to a very busy and awe inspiring day.

Now imagine this.  I am asleep, snug as a bug in my YHA comforter and completely zonked out.  2:30 AM enter drunken Kiwi roommates.  Four of them, all completely and utterly wasted.  So to set the scene a little more, I am one female in a room with 7 men.  No big deal, except the bro to normal human ratio got far to high.  The guy next to me decides he would rather have his misadventure sans clothes.  So now there is a very naked very drunken Kiwi who is really struggling to make his bed about 3 feet from me.  I decided to help him out rather than listen to him struggle for another 20 minutes.  2:30 am Ashley is evidently much less of a prude than 7 am Ashley, and lucky for me YHA doesn't believe in nighlights.  Anyway helped him with his pillowcase and just kept saying, "yep, yep, ok, just go to sleep".  Around 20 minutes of conversations I wish I could unhear about tattoos in unheard of places and sex and all sorts of sillyness ensued and then the whole lot of them were snoring.  I would sincerely like to thank the drunken escapades of NWICSA sailors over the years for getting me through through that experience.  

Easter morning I went out for a walk around Taupo to avoid the parade of hungover naked men that I expected my room was about to become.  Had a lovely coffee and walk along the shore.  It had that feeling a place has before people really start moving.  It feels like the world isn't quite awake yet.  

I checked out, accepted apologies from my roommates, and spent the rest of the morning writing postcards and poking around the shops.  Then it was back to Wellington and dinner with Nikki and Cam.  Getting so excited to go on our trip in a few weeks!

Sailing

SAILING!  

Last weekend I got to go out sailing on Prime Mover, a 36' Farr 1104.  Really awesome day out on the water.  We did a race around the entire harbor.  It is wonderful to connect with people through the sport I have come to realize I am never going to give up.  It was beautiful and we had a fair amount of breeze.  I feel so much more connected to a place after spending time out on the water.  

I got there first and the owner, Sean, told me where the keys were and said I could get things started.  Really trusting considering he only knew me from a few email messages.  

Upwind!  I did the keys downwind so I was too busy to get any shots of the spin.  

The crew!  Notice anything, yep dudes...glad to represent the lady sailors out there.  I am determined to learn a ton about keel-boat racing and get my fellow ladies into the big boat game.  Also these guys were REALLY cool about me being on board.  In retrospect they were probably expecting a young fit guy, Ashley is a unisex name here!  

Another boat out on the water, just to make the sailing folk jealous of the breeze and sunshine :)