News:

I was not offered the position at Lincoln Lutheran. They chose experience over 1st year teacher.
I still have the interview with Zion in Dallas.

2 more weeks.

Did I forget to post something last week? I feel like I did, sorry! I have my doubts about whether anyone is reading these anyway. I’ll keep doing them because well, I only have 2 more weeks, and it is a nice release to think over my week and presumably keep in touch with “many” people.
This week went pretty well. Easter was wonderful, but it was wild because it was really the first Easter that I wasn’t home with my family, but thankfully I was still with family. My aunt and uncle had their family over so I was still somewhere that I “fit.” We had an Easter egg hunt throughout the house because it was muddy outside and we had a blast hiding eggs from the kids. The kids also played so roughly with me that I’m surprised my shirt didn’t rip. They literally clung to me! We had a marvelous meal and hung out and then I went and worked, yes on Easter, the Resurrection of our Savior, I worked. I actually had to break into the school. I have a key but they have these rather large red gates and so I had to jump it. I received permission from my cooperating teacher and her husband, both teachers there (he even said that he’s done it!).
The main event that has happened in my life happened more to my cooperating teacher, Mrs. Foster. Last Friday, her son-in-law fell 7 stories from a parking garage in Austin, TX. He and his wife are from California and his wife is 8 months pregnant. So Mrs. Foster has taken a medical leave of absence for the rest of the year. I’ve continued to teach the class I’ve worked with her on, but Mrs. Weiss will take it over when I am done. If you would pray for Mrs. Foster and her family, especially Keith, that would be great. He is on a long road of recovery and they are unsure of how much he will recover. He has a lot of brain swelling and many broken bones, as you can imagine.
Wow, am I almost done? I have something else almost ironic to share. My aunt and uncle don't have internet, yet. In the last week, they have gone from very little technology to having a new laptop and a blackberry cell phone. And so they are getting wireless on the 24th (my birthday!). Well, for the last 4-5 weeks I have spent countless hours at the other student teachers’ host house using the internet for lesson planning and now my aunt and uncle are getting internet literally on the very last day that I'm teaching. Isn't that just fantastic? Better late than never…?
The greatest thing from the week was that I had an interview with Lincoln Lutheran Middle/High School in Lincoln, Nebraska for a 7/8 grade Social Studies position on Wednesday. I think it went well enough. I felt good about it after it was over. We’ll see though! The principal said that they wanted to wrap it up in the next week so hopefully by next weekend I can say whether I was offered the position or not! I was also contacted by Zion Lutheran School in Dallas, TX about a middle school history teaching position. I have a phone interview with them on the 21st!
Something cool that happened from the week was on Wednesday for Geography I had put together a little front/back, read/research/respond activity on OPEC for the kids to work on and when i was making copies of it, one of the science teachers looked at it and liked it enough to ask for a copy because he said that he had a unit that he could really use it. THEN during my interview that night, they asked me if a teacher has used anything that I've created and it was great to say, it literally happened today!
Well, I’m sure I could say a bunch more, but I think I’ll go with that for now. I can’t believe I’m almost done, but as much as I like the school and I love living with my aunt and uncle and being able to spend so much time with them when I haven’t before, I am really ready to be done and move on to the next part of my life. I know that recent country song, “You’re gonna miss this,” plays through my head, but I really excited for what the future holds, and it’s interesting because I don’t really know! But I have faith God will provide something!

In Christ,
Adam

In the Past

This was a difficult week, it really was. If you are reading this, then you’ve read about my trip to the northland last weekend and the greatness of that, well that really threw me off. All this week I was off or behind. Then I think I had 500 papers to grade, including tests. It was really just an overwhelming week. It was one of those weeks for me that left me thinking I need to be done right now and to have my own classroom (I put too much pressure on myself with being evaluated all the time) or that teaching isn’t for me. I am sticking with teaching for sure because I’m not going to let a off-week change everything, and I just know that there is a classroom out there that God needs me in and students I can help.
The highlight of the week was definitely the annual benefit auction gala for Prince of Peace on Saturday. Erinn and I were able to go for free to a $50 ticket event. I had to get dressed up in a black suit and tie, and there were a lot of rich people there. They had 100s of items in a silent auction ranging in price from $7 to “priceless.” A few of the priceless items were a autographed Clint Black guitar in a shadowbox; a Pearl Harbor movie poster signed by Ben Affleck, Josh Hartnett, and Kate Beckensale (I don’t know how they got that); and a framed set of pictures and autographs of Hall of Fame members from the Dallas Cowboys. There were some insanely expensive things.
The food was amazing of course. Steak and chicken breast, some weird potato stuff. Then the live auction had some insanely expensive things, valued at $1,500 to $30,000. We didn’t stay too long, we got depressed because they could have easily paid off both of our student loans…
Anyway, off to another week, the next two weeks are 4 day weeks, which is very exciting. I’m looking forward to Easter (he is risen!). Then the week after that, Friday will be my birthday and it will be a half day. Then the week after THAT will be the last day. So that means there’s 4 weeks left. Fast stuff.

In Christ,
Adam

Flying!

I don’t know what it is about flying. I have done it several times, but every time comes with the same amount of anxiety. I just am thankful that I am not paralyzed by the anxiety so that I can still experience the incredible feelings. I’ve always wondered which I enjoy more, taking off or landing. I would definitely have to say taking off. Sitting at the end of the runway and feeling the power of the engines as they roar to life and there is just that sense of what is to come and when that release happens and the plane begins to barrel down the runway and gains speeds that only can be experienced in a plane or a fast car doing something extremely illegal. Then that moment just as the wheels have leave the ground is indescribable. The plane takes to the air and has that momentary dip as the forces of the air passing over and under the wings to provide the lift take over. As I flew on Thursday, the Dallas/Ft. Worth area had a decently heavy blanket of fog, thankfully not enough to delay the flight. The incredible whiteness was eerie as we climbed through the fog. Then once we got above the fog, the sight above the clouds never ceases to amaze me and wonder in awe at the amazing hands of God. As we continued our ascent above the fog, the top of those thick clouds looked more like what I’ve seen in the pictures of the barren lands of Antarctica, freckled with rising plateaus of clouds above that even. To make the sight even more extraordinary a new song by the Newsboys began to play on my ipod. I recently purchased this song, and I had no idea it would so profoundly affect me that day. The song is called, “in the hands of God,” and that is exactly how I felt. Not only was I talking myself into feeling that for comfort as I prayed for a successful flight, but the words fit perfectly. Repeated in the song is the phrase, “You’re amazing!” That is exactly the perfect thought as the plane continued to rise above Creation into the heavens. The sight was truly amazing, and I feel that way every time I fly, it never ceases to completely impress me. He is truly a powerful and amazing God who we worship.
And to make the whole experience even better, I went ahead and spilled my apple juice. Don’t worry, none got on my computer. It was very difficult to open. The second container opened much easier.


In Christ,
Adam

Pictures!!

I have some pictures here!



The Grassy Knoll.

The used-to-be Texas School Book Depository. The 6th floor window that Oswald shot from is the corner window under the ledge (not the top window). There is now a museum and gift store in the building, but it was $13.50 to get in, and we weren't willing to pay that, so we didn't go.

Me standing on the X a guy puts on the road. This is the "fatal head shot" X. There is another up the road where he was shot in the back of the neck.

A view up the road and of the Depository. The conspiracy theorist that rope us into listening to his talk on the Grassy Knoll believed that the other red brick building across the street had a gunman as well.

Me pretending to be the Grassy knoll gunman. I know, it's actually somewhat of a morbid picture to pretend to be an alleged assassin. My apologies. As you can see, the fence needs mending though.

Where we had one of the best burgers in the country.

The Prince of Peace Student Teachers, enjoying a nice day and a cool place. This is the Water gardens. The water is falling down those walls, and there's a large pool thing behind us.

This was definitely the coolest. We walked down there. It was really loud with all the rushing water. Also scary because people have drowned there and it would be easy to slip and fall in.

Spring Break....

I have to be honest, I wish I could be on break forever. I of course greatly enjoyed the freedom of spring break, but alas, it is nearly over. I have been as responsible as I could be by doing several lesson plans. I definitely didn’t get as far as intended, but not having internet at home has been somewhat of an issue. I did go into to the school twice, but the second time I couldn’t get the copiers to work with me so I didn’t get a whole lot accomplished.
I definitely am a little worried to begin on Monday. A part of me doesn’t feel ready, which is crazy because I have already been “teaching” for 7 weeks. I think it is because I don’t feel like I am familiar enough with the “ins and outs” of Prince of Peace and everything that the students have been allowed or not allowed to do previously. But as a once-a-teacher friend told me, for awhile I can plead ignorance, which is something that I probably can only do while student teaching. Both of my cooperating teachers are so good that it is also daunting to take over, they are very well-liked. Also, one has a teaching style that is wonderful, just rather different than my own, but I am looking forward to the growth that will provide! And finally, I am already counting down the days because I really just want to be done! ☺ (6 weeks!)
Last weekend I took a weekend trip to Little Rock, Arkansas to visit my beloved friend Elaine. She had visited my home before and since I was only 5 hours away we thought it only fair that I make the trip over there, and man am I ever glad I did. We got to do some much needed hanging out as well as Elaine’s mother made some scrumptious food! The drive there was crazy because of some terrible roads (there was actually a stretch that I drove on the shoulder because it was better than the road) and I drove in rain for the bulk of the trip. I stopped in Hope on my way there for gas (birthplace of President Clinton woo hoo *not*) and the gas station attendant had better facial hair than I do, and she was youngish too. Elaine also took me to the Clinton Library which was actually quite cool, for a democrat. It’s a neat place, I recommend it. Like I said, the trip was just completely worth it!
Monday, Erinn and I had a little outing of ourselves. There is a “lake” (more like a pond) just down the road from our houses so we decided to hang out there and read and enjoy the beautiful weather. They recently put in a walking path by it so there was a lot of dirt and that black tarp stuff to prevent erosion, along with tons of trash (gotta love city life!) Then as Erinn and I worked our way around the pond-thinger to find ducks close to shore for us to feed bread (Erinn’s idea!) we ended up stopping to look at a turtle or something and I suddenly felt a stinging sensation on my feet and looked down to see a large quantity of fire ants crawling all over my feet. Lets just say I began to dance for joy, and Erinn joined me as we scrambled to rid ourselves of the unpleasant feeling. I got some pretty awesome bump thingers (I thought about looking them up on webMD). Shortly after that we then saw a rather…not small snake slither into the water. I wondered, since it was brown, if it was a water moccasin, but I didn’t feel like acknowledging that we had been so near to an extremely dangerous snake, and I didn’t like acknowledging that I had been so near to any kind of snake to be honest. After we crossed a spillway that looked like a sidewalk and almost falling several times, we finally made it to a place that allowed us to feed some birds. I had already fed mine to some small ducks and a large quantity of sea gulls before (I actually ate most of it…it was good bread), but Erinn being the frugal person she is, expertly budgeted hers to share with some beautiful mallards. We spent the rest of our time there watching children laugh with glee while feeding whole loaves of bread to those by then rather domesticated birds, reading, and getting some much needed color.
Tuesday, my aunt took me to see her hair styling shop, which is only the size of a small bedroom, but it fits her perfectly really. Then Erinn and I spent part of the afternoon “sun-bathing,” or as I call it: laying outside without a shirt reading (seems more manly..yes? maybe a bit). We did our best to imagine the waves of an ocean slapping the shore, but all we got was the occasional train, a random continual squeaking noise, and various other sounds typical of an urban environment. I did get sunburned though, which was the intention actually. My uncle talked us into putting on sunscreen, which all my aunt had was SPF 50 for kids. I dutifully put some on, thinking I could just as well have put my T-shirt back on… But I enjoy now being tan in March rather than it taking until mid-June. Then that night my uncle took me to my cousins house so that we could escape the 7 ladies my aunt had over for a night of Bunco and socializing.
Wednesday was boring, really only did ironing and teacherly things.
Thursday was a most excellent day because my uncle brought the girls and I all around the metroplex area. We first went to downtown Dallas to show us around and then we stopped at Dealey Plaza and we got to poke around where one of our presidents was shot, JFK. It was great to be in such a historical place and to be constantly bothered by gentlemen lacking teeth trying to sell us a $5 newspaper thing that chronicled the assassination. I eventually was able to buy one off of another man for $4, I love saving a buck. I will post several pictures from our day, so see above! We then made our way over to Fort Worth and hung out at an awesome park of water-ness, I can’t remember what it was called. There were fountain things. My uncle also took us to an old fashioned burger place called Kincaid’s and it literally is one of the best hamburgers in the country (like number 5 I believe a magazine article framed on the wall declared). It really was amazing though. It was a great day.
Friday, Erinn and I went to Louisville (the next town over) to the Borders there because they are having a 25% off educators week, so thankfully they gave us the discount and I spent a lot of money! I actually got some amazing deals. One of the books I got is regularly priced at $50 and I got it for $7.50. I actually spent around $50 and got 7 books. I was very excited. We then went to the mall near by, and then to Mardels, which is a Christian bookstore and education supply store. I bought a timer and an EZ grader, which I was told I can’t live without if I intend to teach. It was a fun day, filled with spending money and getting hit by Erinn every time she saw a Volkswagen beetle, which I hadn’t experienced since my younger years. For supper I was invited to the girls’ house by their host mom and she cooked a wonderful meal of roast, twice baked potatoes and then a night of board games and Wii, a good time for sure.
Now I am chilling out (it is Saturday) and intending on trying as hard as I can to not freak out about Monday!
Thank you for reading, sorry it was so long, it was an active week! Blessings to you on your coming week, and if you have a minute, say a prayer for confidence and the attention of the students for me!

In Christ,
Adam

Installment 2!

What a week! I have a feeling I’ll be saying that a lot in the coming weeks, but this really was quite a week. This has been my week to get used to the school and students, and for the students to get used to me. My coopering teachers have been great to give me some opportunities to allow the students to introduce myself to them. What makes me excited and most looking forward to beginning is that some of the students have told me that they are excited for me to take over, even students that I didn’t think would be have said they are excited.
Monday was a typical first day I would say. The first impression of the students was great. I can tell they are mostly very good students and I enjoy how polite and nice many are. I am most impressed with them. Several even took the initiative to introduce themselves to me!
Tuesday was crazy, to say the least. It was my first field trip as a teacher, and what an opportunity it was. Prince of Peace took the whole high school and staff to the King Tut exhibit at the Dallas Museum of Art. As a social sciences teacher I was extremely excited to go, but after riding in a bus (even though it was a very nice bus—not a school bus) for a long time (we took the long way downtown) with 25 juniors and seniors and then a lengthy wait outside the museum, we finally got in and I spent most of my time so much in teacher mode that I didn’t get to appreciate the exhibit as much as I would have liked, or as much as it deserved. However, what I did see was amazing. It was awesome to see items like an Egyptian gold-covered coffin and chairs with its weaved seat still fully in place. I could take a ton of time and list everything I saw that was amazing. It was a random day filled with a lot of observations and things to learn. Also, they allowed us to check out the other exhibits in the museum and it was awesome. The modern art area included some works that involved lights. The best made an entire room yellow with a monochromatic light and a glass tunnel entry and when you went in it mess with your eyes so that everything you saw was in shades of black and grey. It was awesome. There was also a small industrial fan suspended from the very high ceiling and it was on and kept spinning. It was also awesome. Before we left the school, we had a lot of hang out time with the kids, which was nice to experience. Then when we returned there was some more hang out time and then an all-school pep rally.
My cooperating teacher working with me on World Geography allowed me to do a mapping activity for part of the period with them, and I think it went pretty well. It was wild doing it 3 times, but I’ll have to get used to that! It is interesting to see how different the 3 periods are in personality. My cooperating teacher for World History also let me more fully introduce myself to those 2 periods of sophomores. They had some great questions as well. One of the students, who is actually a senior commented rather than questioned by saying that she thinks I am a very happy and calm person. I thought that was great because I haven’t really always been that, for those of you who know me. ☺
So now I am just preparing for taking over the classes. I am taking over World History Friday and then I’ll have 2 classes totaling 5 periods for now. I will be starting with the unification of Germany and Italy and then Russia in Geography.
I don't know if I will post over break, depends if I do anything exciting. I am spending this first weekend in Little Rock visiting a college friend. I am very excited to hang out with her at her home, just not looking forward to the 10 hours on the road. It will be worth it! I will probably post a devotion that I am doing Friday with the World History class. I am excited to have that faith connection with them and I hope that it will open some doors for them.

In Christ,
Adam

Student Teaching 2!

I am in Texas! What a trip. This last weekend has certainly been an interesting one. After talking to my dad at 6:00 am Friday morning while basically having a panic attack, we left at about 8:00 am from Seward and drove all the way to Carrollton, TX, arriving at about 6:45 pm. We stop several times to switch drivers, go to the bathroom, and for a long lunch with a friend’s “relative.” The drive went pretty well and the weather was beautiful. It is in the 80s today and we are to have another day or two of that (which is above average) and then a front will come in and the highs will be upper 40’s. I will say I forgot my shorts and I could really use them!
Today we went to the Church/School for an Open house and I was able to meet both of my cooperating teachers and get textbooks. What a wonderful, though slightly overwhelming experience. My teachers seem to be amazing people and the staff is very fun, so I think I will fit in while I am here. I will have 2 periods of Sophomore World History and then 3 periods throughout the rest of the day of Freshmen World Geography, and then 1 12th grade government class. The sizes will range from 10 to 25 students. I’m sure after my first week, I will have plenty to talk about. (Is that ending a sentence with a preposition? Because they don’t appreciate that in these parts…☺.)
I am enjoying spending time with my aunt and uncle, they are being wonderful and helping me “feel at home” as much as they can. I have settled into my room nicely. Today I called that room “my room” and my aunt joked with me about it. Today Aunt Becky made an amazing Sunday dinner and we invited the 2 other student teachers over. We had ribs and Becky’s special mashed potatoes (mom! Get the recipe!), corn, rolls, and ice cream for desert.
The internet situation still needs to be figured out yet. Uncle Wayne said that he would check with the neighbors about getting me a password, but he hasn’t done that yet so for now I think I will head over to the girls’ host home to get on the internet. I haven’t been on the internet since Friday morning and I am going through withdrawals and I feel all sorts of disconnected. Isn’t that sad? I am dealing though.
I know that my life is going to get progressively crazier but I hope to keep up on this as much as I can so that people can keep up on what’s going on since sadly I won’t be able to stay in direct contact with everyone that I want to. So if you are reading this and want an update and I haven’t gotten to it, drop me an email at adam.hengeveld@gmail.com.