Where is Tim???

Alright, I take back everything I have ever said about a principal's weak decisions with detentions.

Tim, our principal, went out with surgery about a week ago. I've been taking over the discipline, and I have to say, it is horrible! On day one, I had a kid written up for problems with a sub and 6 other kids for throwing rocks at each other. Total detention time, 23 days. The next day I had to talk to two of the rock throwers about their attitude in class. I told them I didn't want to see their face in my room again...didn't work. The next day, one of these boys was once again in my room....Oh yeah, and then there was the boy who bonked a girl on the head and got 5 days and 1/2 day ISS. The boy who was cussing on the bus...two days....the girl who slapped a boy across the face.....four days...and the tetherball incident that resulted in three more detentions. Thus far, I've given out all these detentions and I have been "principal" for five days.

So....this has taken up all of my time, preps, and energy. I can't wait for Tim to get back.

May your week be less busy!

(PS...We took 2nd again in our tournament, which makes it two in a row. The greatest part was that we only lost to Blue Ridge by one game, a great accomplishment!)

Yahoo....I Love Chess!

The Holbrook Chess Team took 2nd place in Tuba City last weekend. We took home a large trophy, which is always fun as it shows the school that we are a valuable part of their community. A lot of times, we feel like the red-headed step child...left out and unimportant, so any time we can do something well, we celebrate it.

My second board did a great job on our varsity team. He took fourth place in the region, winning 4 out of 5 games. On JV we took 1st and 3rd place, showing that we have some great talent coming up the ranks. I look forward to our next tournament in two weeks. It will be a team tournament, where we will be playing shorter games and every team. I'm going to put my second board up on first board, allowing him the chance to really gain that experience. This will also help as my first board will have a better shot down on second board...confused yet?

To summarize, we took 2nd! Yeah Chess!!!

Scare the Boy!

Last week I had the pleasure of getting rid of one of my student's hiccups. This is a student who continuously interrupts class, so when he repeatedly shouted out that he had the hiccups, I told him to hold his breath, and if that didn't work we would try something else. So, I kept class going, and waited for the perfect opportunity. I set the entire class to doing a problem and as soon as this boy had turned and put his head down to work, I attacked!

Getting close to someone in a quiet environment and screaming a bloodcurling yelp is quite effective in getting rid of someone's hiccups. This boy, and most of the class, jumped...but not just a startled jump. This boy began his own terrified scream as he began running away, backwards, in his chair. It was hilarious!

So...thoughful, unselfish, caring I was able to help a young man get rid of his hiccups. I love my job!

The Problem with Blogging

I think I figured it out. The problem with blogging is that I feel like I need a picture with everything I blog. Of course, there is also the fact that I just don't feel very interesting sometimes, but hey...maybe I'm underestimating myself. Anywho...Thank you for coming and reading the blog. I hope that I can post a little bit more for you to enjoy.

Lemon Berry Trifle

So, I tried a couple different things last week. On Sunday, we were supposed to bring dessert to family dinner. Rather than have Amy whip up something awesome, as she always does, I decided to give a new recipe a try. Lemon Berry Trifle turned out really well. It was light and delicious. Better yet, you can add whatever fruit you want. We had strawberries, peaches, and blueberries on ours. (Recipe on the internet)

Amy went down to Phoenix on a training and I stayed in the classroom for a long while. There wasn't a lot of food in the fridge...at least not a lot of Eldon food in the fridge, so I had to do something I normally wouldn't. Grandpa Turley is an awesome gardener, and he gave us some zucchini and peppers. I decided to make pepper infused, fried zucchini.











I went ot the cupboard, and couldn't find my Italian bread crumbs. So, I grabbed some crutons and crushed those up in a bowl. I added diced green chili to the crutons and beat eggs into another bowl.

I thought it would work! I dipped the slices of zucchini into the egg mixture, and then into the crutons....nothing stuck. I was so dissapointed. Usually breaded stuff, like my parmesian chicken, take milk, but I thought it wouldn't matter. Even now I don't know if it would have stuck if it had milk....but, I had all the material and didn't want to throw it all away.

So, I improvised. My pan was heating up with just a little bit of oil, enough to fry zucchini slices, but not cover them. I battered all of my zucchini, and then dropped some of the cruton/pepper mix on top. My idea was that the egg would fry, and the otherstuff would stick to that...rather than the zucchini. It worked. I had a nice, golden crust on one side of the zucchini that was really flavorful. The chili added a great heat and taste that I haven't had with zucchini before, and I loved it. (salt and pepper to taste)

Of course, the best thing I ate this week came from the master chef! Amy made some kickin' raisin butter tarts, the best I have ever had. She outdoes herself every time she walks in the kitchen!

Awesome School Idea

Alright, so I was in the middle of class, talking to the students, when an epiphane struck. Every year we start out writing by building better sentences. It basically just means that instead of, "The man went to the store", we say, "The ugly, bearded man slowly sauntered into the dark, dismal store." Well, I was talking and immediately stopped class. My kids looked on in wonder, they don't know me very well yet, as I exclaimed, "Ooooooh! That is awesome!" I went to the board, wrote down Act out BS, turned around, and began class again. The students looked confused, but it won't be the last time! :)

So, my chess kids came in after school, looked at the board, and said, "How do you act out BS?" I didn't even think about the initials I wrote out.

Anyway...the idea is to act out the sentences, rather than just write them out. It should allow for the kinestetic and artistic intelligences to become involved in the activity. Hopefully it works out well.

Two days down...a bunch more to go!

A Treat From My Past...

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Chocolate-Trifle/Detail.aspx

So, this isn't a current recipe, but it was really, really good. I do not recommend it to anyone who cannot handle something sweet. This is raise the blood sugar of twenty elephants, but still very, very good!