#Fashionista

Good evening everyone! I apologize again from deviating from my usual Sunday posts but have no fear - I am still alive, which in itself is a minor miracle considering the number of times I have wiped out in the snow. Many of these wipeouts have occurred on my own street but no major injuries have occurred yet. Despite the constant battle for winter survival, it was another great week here in Lennoxville and I can't wait to tell you all about it. 

Alright, I left you hanging last Tuesday without talking about my Monday and Tuesday, so to rewind to last Monday, I had my practicum and I taught a really great lesson! At the start of the month, my grade 3/4 students had decided that they wanted to raise money for the WWF and sponsor two animals: the African tiger and the snow leopard. To raise money, they held a bake sale on Valentine's Day. I wanted to incorporate this into my lesson, so my activity centred around making informational brochures about the animals that my students could put out at their bake sale in order to teach their peers about the animals they were supporting. I started my lesson by putting my students into pairs and setting them up with laptops. They were given half the period to research their animals and then the other half to complete their brochures. The brochure template specified what information to look for and most students were able to get all the required info. Some even got to drawing pictures of their animal! They were not all able to finish so I left the brochures with my associate teacher so that they could work on them throughout the week. My students gave me some really great feedback and said that they had a lot of fun doing the lesson, which was really special to hear. It reminded me of the importance of making class activities relevant to my students' lives outside the classroom. 

Following practicum, I had one afternoon class and then went to the gym, to a Golden Key Meeting and to Provigo with Jocelyn. At Golden Key, we spent majority of the meeting discussing our upcoming fundraiser for Jump Rope for Heart which will take place at Happy Hour this week. I came home and had dinner with my housemates and then spent the rest of the night doing homework and studying for my midterm. Tuesday, I got up and did some more work while watching the Olympic Figure Skating pairs' short program event. I then went for a swim and to my psych class, as Reading Process was cancelled. We were supposed to have a Virtual Child Discussion in psych but our prof forgot the discussion questions so she gave us all 100% participation and we did a midterm review instead. I then had a study session in the Gait with my friends Sarah, Sarah and Katelyn to review for our psych midterm later in the week. Following that, I met Gaby and Elizabeth at the student ministry dinner, which was tacos- YUM - with fun Valentine treats for dessert. I then had my night class, where I first met with my Reading Circle group to discuss our Alice in Wonderland presentation. I am going to be playing the Queen of Hearts, which I am really excited about. I am going to be running a station focusing on the symbols in the story. Alice, the White Rabbit, the Mad Hatter, the Cheshire Cat, the Caterpillar and Lewis Carroll will also be making an appearance on the night of our presentation. We had a lecture and then I went to the library to write my blog, watch the Olympics and pretend to study. 

On Wednesday. I got up to study, study, study for my psych midterm the next day. Jocelyn and I then went to the gym together, but while I was there, I got an email from the library that the book I had requested had been returned and I had only two hours to pick it up. Unfortunately, my detour to the library made me late to class but I was happy to have the Developmental Psychology to take home that night (since I was cheap and did not purchase the book). After class, I helped empty a book donation bin for Golden Key and then worked in the Education lounge until Jocelyn finished class. We went to the Gait to study and watch the Olympics for a bit before heading home for the night. It was my night to cook dinner and I wanted to try something different so I made portobello mushroom burgers. I served them on buns with mozzarella cheese, Dijon mustard and baked onions and they were delicious (not to mention super easy to make). I will definitely be making those again. Following dinner, I locked myself in my room to study the night away.

Thursday I went on a field trip for my EDU 216 class to Sherbrooke Elementary School to see their engine room. The engine room is a renovated classroom that has mats covering the floors and walls, ladders and trapeze swings hanging from the ceiling, punching bags, chin up bars and tons of athletic equipment. Its purpose is to be a place where kids who have a "low" or "high" engine can go to make their engine "just right." We observed three half hour sessions of kids in the engine room and it was so cool! Each group had between 8 and 12 students and throughout the half hour, they rotated around the room spending about 2 minutes at each station. One might think that it was only for students who were overly energetic but there were also students there who needed to boost their energy. The whole premise of the room is that your "engine" needs to be in a good place to learn; you cannot learn if it is too high or too low. We talked with two teachers, many students and the vice-principal and all said that the engine room really does make a difference. The engine room is a part of the ALERT program which was developed in the States by two occupational therapists who saw the importance of teaching kids to manage their alertness throughout the day. Other classrooms in the school have aspects of the program in place, such as pacing lanes, one legged stools, fidgets (which we have at PEES), hand weights, etc. Personally, I was so impressed with this program and hope that one day I will be able to incorporate some of it into my future classroom. 

After the field trip, I did a final review for my midterm and went for a swim. I went to Reading Process, where talked about reading comprehension (which I actually find super interesting) and then I had my midterm. Overall, I think it went really well but I will confirm when I (hopefully) get it back tomorrow. Following my midterm, I had this whole grand plan to come home and take a nap before work but instead I ended up going into town to do buy some Valentine's chocolate for my students and signing up for a library card at the local library. I came home, took a shower, packed my bag and headed to Mackinnon for the night. Overall, it was a fairly quiet night in residence with the highlight of the night being a visit from my housemates after happy hour (who then ordered Domino's pizza and ate it in the common room with me). I was able to watch some of the Olympics and get some knitting done as well. We also got a TON OF SNOW on Thursday night!! Every time I looked at the window, the snow mounds were taller and taller. The other RAs on duty were planning a sledding party after duty but since I was supposed to be going to practicum, I opted to go to bed after work instead. 

So as I mentioned, I had hoped to go to practicum on Friday as I wanted to spend Valentine's Day with my students and help them with their bake sale but my friend Kirsten and I made the decision not to go as the roads were absolutely awful after all the snow we got during the night. My associate teacher even sent me an email saying not to come as she was not even able to leave her house herself. Strangely enough, it was not a snow day though. I was able to have a nice sleep in though and I enjoyed my breakfast in the Mackinnon common room while making Valentine's for my friends. I then went to Provigo to return the chocolate I had bought the day before and pick up some food items for our dinner party that night. Each of my housemates made an individual trip to Prov on Friday and we all left with bags full of red, white, pink and chocolate. I came home and watched the men's figure skating and cheered Patrick Chan on as he won the silver medal for Canada, which was very exciting. Following the skating and some homework, I went to the gym and then came home to begin party prep. I (and my housemates) hosted a red, white and pink themed Valentine's Day dinner party for the 5 of us and our two friends Gaby and Vicki. My rules were: 1. You must bring a red, white or pink food item (no other colours); 2. You must wear red, white or pink (no other colours, only neutrals), 3. No boys and I can't remember the fourth rule anymore. It ended up being my best Valentine's day to date! We set our long table up in the living room with a red table cloth and candles and put all of our food on it. Food included: bruschetta (me), tomatoes and bonicelli cheese (Elizabeth), stuffed peppers (Jocelyn), pizza with heart shaped pepperoni (Elizabeth), raspberries and white chocolate chips (me, thank you Pinterest), orzo salad (Hannah) and bacon wrapped scallops (Hannah). Desserts included: dark chocolate and red wine cake (Sarah) and chocolate pie with raspberry sauce and coconut whipped cream (Gaby). Beverages included: pink lemonade punch (me), strawberry daiquiris (Vicki) and white wine (Gaby). We ate, chatted, took a lot of pictures and played Apples to Apples - pretty much your typical girls night minus a chick flick. I couldn't have asked for a better group to spend the day with. <3

Handmade Valentine's! 

Me with the package my mother sent me!  

Red, White and Pink &hearts;

The feast!

Cutting the cake! 

Saturday I got up and went to the gym with Jocelyn and then went to a focus group for the School of Education to discuss the program and the different courses. Following that, our friend Sara and her housemates, Gaby, Ariane and Ellen hosted Lennoxville's first ever Chili-fest. Each house group invited had to make a chili and bring it over and then we voted on the best one. Each team also had to donate a prize to the winner's basket. Hannah made our chill, which was absolutely delicious. Sara's team made a vegan quinoa chili, our friend Tim made a spicy, beer chili and a group of RAs made a chili as well. The event was Leonardo Dicaprio themed and each chili was named after one of his movies in order to have anonymity when sampling and voting. Tim's chili was the overall champion, made evident from the votes and the licked-clean pot, so congratulations Tim! As the winner, he received a prize bag consisting of a signed picture of himself, a disposable camera, two beers, some mini eggs, purple hair spray and many other fun things. 

The 4 different chilis! 

The champion! 

Following chili-fest, I came home and tried to do my lesson plan, but was just not feeling inspired so I did a reading instead. Then, it was time to get ready for the Fashion Show! We had all been looking forward to it for weeks and the night was finally here! The show did not start until 8 but the doors opened at 7 so we needed to be there early to secure our seats. Luckily, our friends Gaby and Ellen were there and able to save us some seats. It was so much fun to get all dressed up, though maybe chili was not the best food option to choose before donning a form-fitting dress. Centennial Theatre was packed and the show was awesome! The MCs were hilarious and the dance team performed several times in between the different clothing lines. The DJ was great and the models all did such a great job. Following the show, we went to see our friends Mike, Tim and Taylor at their apartment before going to the Fashion Show after party at the Gait. The Gait was so packed that they opened up the grill side to make more space. The DJ was pretty good, which was a nice change for the Gait and we stayed right until closing time. It was a pain getting through the coat check line but I was able to skillfully manoeuvre my way to the front. I got separated from my housemates but a friend walked home with me so that I did not have to do the walk alone. After a long but fun day and night, it was nice to finally curl up in my bed. 

Sunday, after a housemate morning cuddle session, Hannah and I went to public skating and then stopped by Mackinnon where an "anonymous sender" aka Vicki had sent me a Valentine's rose (Thanks Vicki! <3). We then came home, ate some lunch and spent the rest of the day doing homework and for me, lesson planning. I ended up scrapping my lesson from Saturday and designing an Olympic themed lesson, which was a lot more fun to create. We had lots of leftovers from Friday to enjoy for dinner and we enjoyed a nice, quiet end to a very exciting week. 

So similar to last week, I will leave the past three days to my post for next week, but it was Jocelyn's birthday on Monday so here's a big birthday shoutout to the best friend a girl could ask for! We had a small house celebration on Monday night and are having a bigger party here this weekend. I got to go to practicum twice this week, which was amazing so will talk all about that next time. I have been watching the Olympics non-stop and am sad that tomorrow is the end of figure skating. :( I am working tomorrow night, going to the mall Friday and have Big Buddies on Saturday and must also motivate myself to start at least some of my term projects before reading week gets here. It's scary how fast February is flying by! As for now, it is time to get back to the books so I wish you all a wonderful week! 

All my love, Erica xoxoxoxoxoxoxxo

PS Go Canada! #WeAreWinter  

PPS Good luck to all of the Nexxice teams who are currently in British Columbia for the Synchro National Championships! I know you will all be amazing! <3