I have been a bad Blogger

Somehow almost a month has disappeared since the last time I updated.  I keep meaning to post, but then somehow I get distracted.  So today I am not allowed to go to bed, before I finish updating.  Then I can cross one more thing off the overly long list of things to complete before Christmas.  Side note, how did Christmas go from being a long ways off to under 2 weeks away?

In the life of Suz things have been going pretty good.  School has being going well.  I am currently reusing many of my lessons, which means that overall I don't have that much preping to do.  My current topics are Swearing, Ugliness, Bike and Build, Civil Rights, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.  Ugliness has been a really interesting topic to do.  I have the students define beauty and ugly for me, and each class has approached the topic differently.  One class had no trouble defining an ugly person, but a lot of difficulty defining ugly clothing, while another younger class said "we can't define an ugly person because that would be mean."  I decided to do this topic because of the New York Times article http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/30/fashion/30ugly.html?pagewanted=all.  I had to shorten it alot to use it in class.  The problem with the NY Times is although there are often very interesting article its level of English is too hard for my students.  I must also admit that I have been kind of bad with copy right laws.  I do change my articles so that my students will be able to understand them with out properly documenting it.   Ooops.  Please don't arrest me. 

I have spent the past week being pensive, because if I want to do a second year in Austria as a teaching assistant, I need to complete my application by January 10th.  That is not far away.  I am not ready to make such decisions.  I have decided to apply for a second year, and then see if I get accepted.  The other decision that I need to make is whether or not I want to stay in Bad Ischl or try and move to a city where I could study.  I started to look into what I would need to do to teach Math in Austria, and I would practically have to start studying all over again aka another 3-4 years on the university in Austria vs. 1-2 years in the USA.  So pretty much I have spent a lot of time thinking about the future, and haven't come to any decisions yet.   I mean I might win the lottery, and never have to work again...Ok I would actually have to buy a lottery ticket, but even so this probablity is not equal to zero since I could find the winning lottery ticket on the street.  One must keep all options open.

I have also spent a lot of time reflecting on the last 2 months.  I feel like in I have made progress.  One thing I am much better at is working with text in the classroom.  I am getting better at realizing that the blank stares from a class means that what I just said made no sense.  I am working on getting better at rephrasing questions in simpler terms.  I need to work on having more discussion questions prepared for classes that don't speak.  I have some classes, that you introduce a topic, and 50 minutes later you have to figure out how to bring the discussion to an end.  Other classes you ask them one question after next and get only yes/no responses.  These classes are much harder to teach.  I also need to work on making sure that everyone in a class joins in a discussion, not just 3 or 4 people.  This week in some ways has been really good for me because it has made me reassess my goals for this year.  It has made me think about what I could do better, and what I do well.  The problem is for my application I have to write the reasons that I want to be a TA again next year.  It is hard to find reasons that aren't cliches.  I want to stay cause it is fun, and I don't know what else to do with my life next year.  I HATE writing applications, but I am starting to get somewhere on it. 

Other then school life has been going pretty good.   I have been keeping myself occupied with running, reading book/news paper, meeting up with Heather and Florent the other TAs in Bad Ischl, visiting Weihnachts marken (christmas markets), baking bread, eating cake, traveling...  Two weeks ago I went to Vienna to celebrate Thanksgiving with Alison, Francis and other Grinnellians who are in Austria, Germany, and France as TAs.  I know Alison, and Francis from my year in Freiburg.  It was great to see them, and we made an amazing Turkey day meal.  I ate WAY too much.  My tummy hated me.  Last weekend I went to visit Peter in Pforzheim, Germany.  This weekend I am staying in Bad Ischl, kind of.  Tomorrow I am headed with another TA to Salzburg to visit their Christmas Market.  We shall look at kitschig(tacky) Christmas things, and enjoy Glühwein (hot mulled wine).  It should be a good day.  My first land lady has also taken me under her wing.  We have English lessons.  Which means she invites me out to eat lunch, or takes me to amazing places in Salzkammergut (the region of Austria I am in), and as payment we speak English.  I think I get the better end of this deal.  I just have to speak my native language. So overall I have been able to keep myself pretty busy. After Christmas I am hoping to start skiing, either cross country or down hill. The mountains opened up 2 weeks ago, but here in the valley we've only gotten a rain snow mixture. I have hope for snow when I return after Christmas.

My Christmas vacation starts next Thursday. I have 2 classes in the Morning, then jump on a train for 8.5hrs to Freiburg. I am super excited. Then I head to Pforzheim to see Peter. Then I am going back to Munich/Murau/Triol to celebrate Christmas with my German host Family. I am again super excited. The only problem is I've only bought 3 Christmas gifts so far. Hmm...

Ok I think it is time for me to head to bed, but I get to check off one more thing on my list of things to do.  I love doing that the only problem is usually I don't get around to making the to do list.  This time I have 3 different ones going.  Oops, probably not the best organization idea. But three is greater the one, so three list have be better then one.  Happy holidays if there is anyone out there that is still reading my blog.