Siesta Valley Ranch Walk - Sat., Oct. 10

JOHN - On October 10, Jayma and I went with Lynn and Irene on a ranch walk. What exactly is a ranch walk, you ask? Well, a ranch walk is just that. We went to a real-life Texas ranch about an hour west of San Antonio, located in the middle of Texas hills country. Anyway, every year, SAS Shoes (a locally-0wned shoe company) sponsors this walk at the Siesta Valley Ranch. Were there longhorns and buffalo there? CHECK! Were there real-life cowboys? CHECK!! Was the land beautiful and spacious? CHECK!!! Basically, we had the opportunity to walk around the entire ranch, which is about 6 miles around.

The morning started off a little chilly. Chilly for San Antonio is around 70 and cloudy. We got registered and off we went. The first thing we came across were some buffalo which I immediately needed a picture of. After that, we continued to walk and getting pictures of the beautiful valley in which we were hiking. This is one area of Texas we haven't really seen yet and it was pretty exciting to finally have seen it. With all of the recent rain, the grass was beginning to look green again and the trees were full.

It only took us a few hours to walk the six miles around the ranch. Granted, Jayma and I goofed around a little and took pictures when the time was right. Which, for us, is almost every five minutes. Once we completed the 6-mile hike, we stopped at one of the tents where we collected our t-shirt and had a chance to "roll the dice". If you roll the number you predicted, you win a gift certificate for a free pair of shoes or handbag. Well, I guessed 8 but rolled a 7. However, both Lynn and Jayma both predicted and rolled 7's. After that, we grabbed a delicious cowboy-style meal consisting of BBQ chicken, sausage, potato salad, bread all with a touch of hot sauce. Plus, they were serving glass-bottled Coke!! After our delicious meal, we headed out. But before we left, Jayma and I made sure we got pics of the longhorns (WOW, they are huge!).

I also wanted to mention that this entire event didn't cost us a dollar! No, Irene and Lynn didn't pay for it! Rather, this was all sponsored and paid for by SAS Shoes. The food, the shirt, the gift certificates...everything!! What a great event and I highly recommend someone doing it whenever they have a chance!

After our walk, Lynn and Irene wanted to show us Bandera, which is affectionately known as the "Cowboy Capital of the World". Never have I seen someone ride there horse and "park" it at a bar until now. But you can see that in Bandera, Texas!! There was store after store of cowboy-themed items from clothing to souvenirs. We saw cowboys riding their horses down the street like something you'd see out of a movie. We stopped and had a drink at a bar called 11th Street which is probably the biggest cowboy bar I have ever seen. In the original and smallest part of the part, there were bra's hanging everywhere! And I mean, everywhere. I asked the bartender why were bra's all over the placed and they said it's just become a tradition. Ironically enough, Jayma and I agreed that we wanted to bring Sara and Leann there when they come to visit in a few weeks. It looks like it'd be a rowdy good time.

After that, Lynn and Irene showed a little more of the Texas countryside. After getting home from a long day, we both needed naps. I ended up not falling asleep because the Cardinals and Longhorns were both playing. Later that night, we were going to go downtown to see the International Accordion Music Festival but we ended up missing it due to my bad scheduling. We ended up having a drink on the Riverwalk and then went home because we were beat. The day was a great one and we really got to see many different parts of Texas. I definitely want to hit a ranch again and this time ride one of the buffalo!! Not those longhorns, though. They'd hook me!!

A Laid Back Weekend - Oct. 2 - 4

JOHN - Jayma's boyfriend, Billy, came into San Antonio on Friday and this gave her the opportunity to finally see him after two months. I knew they were going to go have some alone time that night and go out to dinner on their own. Which worked out well for me because Mrs. Schiebel and I stayed late at school, rearranging it and getting things ready for Monday. Lisa texted me and asked if we wanted to meet out for a drink so Mrs. S and I agreed. We decided to meet at this hole-in-the-wall called Hills & Dales, aka "The Center of the Universe". It's more of a biker bar than anything, nothing special. It was a beautiful evening and it was a lot of fun to just relax after a long week. Later that night, Don, Lisa and I went out to Stone Werks for dinner and to continue enjoying the start of my laid back weekend.

On Saturday, I pretty much did nothing except school-related work and run errands. It was nice to have a lazy Saturday. That night, Jared and I were going to go to Smitty's. Jayma and Billy decided to tag along and we later met up with Don and Lisa there. We played some pool and darts and had a pretty good time. It's funny but I noticed that there were 5 ISU grads (Lisa, Billy, Jared, me and soon Jayma) hanging out in San Antonio, Texas. Just kind of ironic. Regardless, it was a good night and it's good to see our little posse growing. BTW, we made plans for a fun Halloween party so who knows how that will turn out.

On Sunday, it was back to more school work and watching some football. I was going to meet Lisa and Don at Boston's but they overslept and so I decided to stay at home and watch my Raiders lose miserably. Oh well. Billy and Jayma went out and did a few things and I just chillaxed at home. It was everything I dreamt it would be!!

6th & 7th Weeks of School

JOHN - Over the past few weeks, I have increased my responsibility at school. I have taken on yet another class period. That leaves only two class periods left to inherit from Mrs. Schiebel, 2nd hour and 1st hour A.P. It's now the half-way point of the semester and mid-term papers are due this week. Everything is becoming busy, bizzy, etc.

So, here's what's been happening over at Rawlinson for the past couple of weeks. The students had a big test last week on fractions (addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division of). I was a little worried how the students were going to perform. For the most part, most of them passed and anyone who didn't is given the opportunity to make corrections and bring part of the grade up. I was amazed by some of the little mistakes the students made. I would say 90% of the students understood the concepts. What hurt some of the students were simple things like addition or even multiplication.

On Friday, I brought back Tribal Trivia to help prepare the students for their upcoming benchmark. Down here in Texas, all grade and middle school students are required to take the TAKS test. This math test very important to the school districts and is highly emphasized throughout NISD. So important that Northside requires each middle school to have the students complete a benchmark test every six weeks. This benchmark is not required by the state but Northside uses it to better prepare the students for the TAKS test, which is taken in the spring. Anyway, I built Tribal Trivia 2 based on a little bit of everything that was covered since the beginning of the school year. The students, when finding out that they were playing TT again, were pretty excited. This time, Mrs. Schiebel was there to participate and she seemed to get a kick out of it. In fact, we will probably do it one more time before I leave, just with a few changes and suggestions that she gave me.

Our classroom is forever changing. I created an "Absent" board to help keep the make-up organized for all the students. It helps considering the number of students who have been absent this school year. In fact, there was one class period where nine students were out one day. The swine flu is spreading throughout San Antonio. Not as severe as the media seems to make it and no one is dying but it is hitting a lot of students. In fact, it probably isn't even the flu, maybe just a case of the students getting sick because that's what they do at the start of the school year.

Mrs. Schiebel and I are also incorporating some Halloween decorations inside the classroom. There's now cobwebs and spiders, ghosts and even some skeletons. It's Survivor, with a haunted-touch added. On top of all of that, Maurice (the monkey) has his own Cardinals jersey and hat. Mrs. Schiebel is letting him wear it while the Cards are in the playoffs. GO CARDINALS!! I have also attached pictures of the classroom for you to see all new additions.

After getting approval from Mrs. Schiebel and Margie, I have decided to become the assistant tennis coach at RMS. Granted, it's only the intramural tennis since the team tennis doesn't start until the spring, but it's still a school activity and I am excited to be helping out. It's starts next week and I am not sure how many students will actually be playing but I am quite excited to help out and do something outside of the classroom with the kids.

As for my student teaching, I feel that I am improving every day. Mrs. Schiebel continues to give me invaluable advice and constructive criticism. I have been working on using more transitions, focusing and stating objectives and just leaving enough time to end the class period. Plus, we are really getting deep in to the Survivor stuff. In fact, we just had our first tribal winners. This week, the students were randomly selected and new tribes were created.
I cannot believe that we are at the halfway point. In less than two months, we will be leaving San Antonio. We will be heading back to Illinois, graduating and finally moving back into the real world. No more school (well, at least for now). It's hard to imagine that everything is quickly coming to an end. But that's ok, I am ready to move forward. Plus, student teaching is making everything seem to move pretty quickly. And before you know, I may just be blogging about my very own classroom.