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Valentine’s Day

This past week was tech week on VUT’s new show, the Good Person of Setzuan, so I was insanely busy. That still was not able to stop me from finding time to celebrate one of my favorite holidays—Valentine’s Day!

Here are some of our lollipops before we attached the Valentine stickers.

Of course, the day was full of cookies, cupcakes, and candy that everyone was passing out in droves. One of the happiest moments for me, though, was at my practicum placement. I got to participate in the second graders’ Valentine’s Day party!! It took me back to elementary school, buying little cartoon valentines and slipping them into each classmate’s hand-crafted pink bag. My teaching partner George and I even bought valentine-labeled lollipops for the kids that we handed out. It was so much fun to facilitate an experience I know those students will remember for the rest of their lives (I sure do!). This setting even prompted us to interact with the students on a more profound level than we’d been able to do beforehand. We discussed their home experiences and what they love most in this world, which illuminated a lot about their personalities and characters. This knowledge could then be translated into how better to teach those students, and to support their development as human beings. The party was an incredibly enjoyable experience that I can’t wait to relive each year as an elementary school teacher.

Here's the rose my boyfriend got me after I put it into the vase he made me last year. :)

That night my boyfriend also surprised me by coming to Neely auditorium in a suit with a pink rose for when I walked out of practice. We exchanged gifts and spent a few hours catching up because I’d been M.I.A. doing play stuff. He was also there as I did my science experiments for my elementary science content class. That was a lot of fun—I got to practice the different experiments I would use with my students to teach them about static electricity, atom cohesion, pitch, etc. Kase joked about how I was attending a great school like Vanderbilt in order to rub a balloon with some wool and stick it to the wall. However, I feel that those experiences are a valuable part of learning to be a teacher: learning how best to appeal to your students’ learning styles and then seeing what could go wrong with them. I definitely love being a Peabody student, even if it means I am doing elementary-level science experiments at midnight on Valentine’s Day. :) I think it is so fulfilling.

…Until next time!