March 2, 2008

Tell Me Something Good

At 7:41 a.m., Big I stumbled into our bedroom breathing heavily and looking terrible. She then announced that she was going to throw up. As Mr. BBM quickly led her into our bathroom, I silently thanked God that she is now older and did not crawl into our bed to do her barfing business. That has happened one too many times.

Right now, she is fast asleep on the sofa, with her cheek propped up against the back of the cushion. I know she is really sick because usually I need to remind her that she is sick and needs to stop running around the living room. She has no appetite. She is as white as the few remnants of snow remaining in our front yard, and her forehead is warm. When are we going to catch a break?

Lil C just finished a round of antibiotics for an ear infection. I’m still coughing from whatever Big I brought home from school a few weeks ago. Even our Realtor has been infected from spending too much time with us. I’m thinking it might be wise to put Big I in a sectioned off room like E.T., and also that we might want to install a decontamination shower at our front door.

Yesterday we had two showings. One was a second showing and the Realtor once again, had all kinds of questions for us. Our neighbor told us that the couple was here FOREVER and that they were checking everything out. We thought we might have an offer in hand yesterday, but there’s been no news yet. We also sent our list of options to our Realtor so he can help us negotiate a good price on our new house.

Today everything is up in the air. Will we all be barfing by nightfall? Will we be well enough to leave the house on Tuesday for the Broker Open House our Realtor has planned? Will these people make an offer on our house? Will it be a good offer or one that makes us hang our heads in despair? Will the builder give us the options we want for the price we’re willing to pay? I absolutely hate not knowing.

Please, someone, just tell me something good.

Posted by Black Belt Mama on March 2, 2008 in Mental Strain for Mama | 5 Comments

March 1, 2008

Admired Martial Artists Month is HERE!

It’s finally here! Each Monday, during the month of March, another exciting martial artist will grace the BBM blog with their presence. For more information about the contributors, go here. Enjoy! I know I will! Please scroll down for new entries.

To make this month even more exciting, The BBM Review in conjunction with Turtle Press, will be giving away six martial arts prizes this month. For more details, visit The BBM Review! The last chance to enter the contest is on Friday, April 4th by noon Eastern time. Leave a comment and get entered to win! The drawing will take place Friday evening and the winners will be announced on The BBM Review.

Posted by Black Belt Mama on March 1, 2008 in Admired Martial Artists Month | Leave a Comment

March 1, 2008

Crazy Flexion

I had another post-op appointment with my surgeon yesterday. He came in to the room, shook my hand, took a look at the notes from the PT and started shaking his head. "147 degrees of flexion?" he said incredulously. "That’s not normal," he joked, except he wasn’t joking. He asked me what my good leg gets and when I told him 155, he just laughed. "You’re doing great," he said.

He checked out my knee, answered some questions and then we got down to the karate talk. "When can I go back?" I asked him.

It’s still June. In two months I’ll go back to him. He’ll check out my leg strength and whether or not my leg muscles match. Then, I’ll get a functional brace and keep building strength. He told me I’m still not allowed to do any kicking or pivoting whatsoever. He said for the next month, I still have a weak leg that needs protection and I will always need to do strength training for my legs.

For some reason, I felt like he didn’t trust me when I told him I won’t step back onto the dojo floor until he says I’m ready. I assured him that there is no way in hell I’m going through this again and that I would listen. The good news is this: he said I’m doing exceptionally well and that I can start standing and punching my heavy bag. Just NO pivoting or stressing that knee. He doesn’t want me back in class until at least June because he said that even though he trusts me, he doesn’t want me (or him) to have to be wary of others in the dojo. He said if it starts hurting in the front AT ALL, I’m to immediately stop what I’m doing.

I finished up my appointment and went out to the PT room. I heard my surgeon and PT laughing about something. When I went over to the table, my PT asked me if I had heard what he said about me. Apparently my surgeon is so impressed with my mad flexion skills that he was joking with my PT that I could stand on one leg in the quad stretch position and paint my toenails. My feet have been nothing but neglected for months now so maybe I should give that a shot.

I’m feeling very encouraged and I think I’m officially entering the boredom stage that my surgeon warned me about. I do feel though, that I’ve really rounded a corner lately. Yesterday, I got another degree of flexion back. I’m at 148 now. In two months, I’m hoping I can demonstrate my pedicure skills for the surgeon and get that brace ordered. I’m getting there; I’m really getting there.

Posted by Black Belt Mama on March 1, 2008 in ACL Hell | 3 Comments

February 29, 2008

We’ve Got it ALL Wrong

When I was a high school English teacher, my students spent an entire week of our Julius Caesar unit decorating the classroom to look like ancient Rome. While many students in the other sections of 10th grade were busy working on study guides, my students were studying architecture and erecting carpet rolls into pillars, drawing replicas of the statues and art seen at that time that were hung up around my classroom and preparing to become ancient Romans. On one of these days, a principal was walking the halls and noticed that the entrance to my room now had pillars as seen in all the Caesar movies. He walked in and was shocked to find that he had been transported back to ancient Rome.

My students didn’t sit at their desks for that unit and take turns reading lines. Instead they requested parts and stood in the front of the classroom and acted the play out. It was a play after all, meant to be acted out, not read like a newspaper. I can pretty much guarantee you that my students had a much better understanding of Julius Caesar and what actually happened than the students who sat in other classrooms filling out 18 pages of study guide while they tried to read the play independently.

During my second year of teaching, the English teachers and administration decided that students should have 10-15 minutes of SSR (Silent Sustained Reading) in our classrooms. I was all for it. I knew that many of my students didn’t pick up a book outside of the classroom and I was happy that we were told to give them that time to read. Each quarter they created a cool project based on something they read. Some of my students crafted tattered looking journals of what it might be like to live on a deserted island. Others made fashion portfolios of what the styles might have been during the time period they were reading about. It was a great way to get others interested in the books and the students really seemed to enjoy sharing what they had read and learned.

Half way through the year, the administration changed their mind, and told us that we should instead use 10-15 minutes a day drilling out students with multiple choice questions as seen on the state tests. A veteran teacher and I spoke up. We told the administration that all the research out there says that teaching to the test teaches nothing but how to take that test. No real learning takes place. The research also states that students who are exposed to active learning, who aren’t forced to take standardized type test after standardized tests, actually do better on standardized tests overall. It didn’t matter. Despite a Master’s degree and many hours of classes that said otherwise, we were overruled. That was my last year of teaching.

Since I left the world of education, it’s only gotten worse. I have several friends who are still teaching in classrooms and the emphasis on testing, testing, testing, is stronger now than it ever was. Today I read an interesting article in The Wall Street Journal about students in Finland. The Finns are kicking our butts. I read the article with great interest and there are several things that stand out as much different from the classrooms of today.

First, the Finns don’t start going to school until they are over the age of seven (To all those who have silently shaken their head at me for not putting my kids in preschool or Big I in full day Kindergarten, read that line again). They rarely have more than a half hour of homework per night. They don’t have clubs, honor societies, sports or tracked classes, and there is little or no standardized testing. Despite the fact that their teachers have the freedom to come up with their own materials and choose the books and materials for their classrooms, the students score higher than every other country in the world in science. In math, they’re number two, coming in a point behind Taiwan. In reading, they score only slightly less than South Korea, also coming in second. In Finland, teachers are trusted to do what’s right for their students and they’re obviously doing it.

When people from other countries go to observe their classrooms, they find simple chalkboards, not technologically laden classrooms, an environment where the more advanced students are helping the slower students, highly educated teachers, and kids who take responsibility for their own learning and actions.

I can’t tell you how many times I had parents calling me to make excuses for their kids on why they couldn’t complete their homework or show up after school for extra help. Only about 30% of my students completed their homework each night. The other 70% didn’t want to take responsibility for their learning. These were the same students who came groveling to me the week before report cards came out asking if they could still turn in those 10 assignments that never got finished. I had parents and coaches who came lobbying for these special privileges as well. For the record, I never caved in. The Finns don’t seem to have these problems.

When they come here for student exchanges though, they are often asked to repeat the year upon returning. In the article, one student who spent a year in the states said that all her tests were multiple choice, a project consisted of spending an hour gluing a poster and most kids didn’t complete their homework. So why do teachers do these types of things when they obviously aren’t working for the students here?

Education administration is so ridiculously top-heavy. While there are plenty of good administrative people, there are plenty of people who sit at the top collecting top dollar salaries and dictating to teachers what’s best for their students when they haven’t stepped foot in a classroom in a decade. Administration and government need to get out of the classrooms and let the teachers do their jobs. Given the time and materials and freedom to do so, I think most teachers would choose to forgo the multiple choice tests that administration dictates are necessary and create more active learning environments where true learning takes place. There’s a reason why even my Special Education students had a better comprehension of Shakespeare than some of the other kids from classrooms where they just sat and read Caesar. I didn’t do anything in that unit that translated to state tests, but the learning was apparent.

While educators from around the world are studying how the Finns are getting it done, I think they should be looking in both the classroom and beyond. It’s not just how teachers are teaching in the classroom. It’s also the home life that matters. The truth is that there are a great many parents who are not involved enough in their children’s lives here. We have students who don’t take responsibility for their actions or education. We have a society full of people who don’t see the importance of learning for the sake of learning. This is something that has to change, and the first place it has to happen in order for us to compete with the rest of the world is in the home.

***Speaking of "education," Monday begins Admired Martial Artists Month here at BBM. I’m SO excited for Monday. The articles are rolling in from our esteemed list of contributors and I think you’re going to REALLY enjoy reading what they have to say! Grab the button and help spread the word! Thanks to Becky for all the great buttons!!!

Posted by Black Belt Mama on February 29, 2008 in Things that get my gi all in a bunch | 5 Comments

February 28, 2008

Sleep Deprived

I’m going to bed entirely too late because I’m busy perusing the options sheet for our potential new house. I’m waking up entirely too early because once I’m awake I can’t go back to sleep. There are bathroom rugs to be washed and dishes to be put away and toys to be picked up and laundry to be folded. I’ve never been this organized in my entire life and it’s exhausting work.

I’m like a mini Martha Stewart. The other day, I caught myself considering folding the ends of the toilet paper the way they do in fancy hotels before our showing. Soon I’ll be putting chocolates on our own pillows and offering myself turn-down service. I think I’m losing it, but once you get on the Martha train, it’s hard to get off.

We have two showings scheduled so far for this weekend. One is a brand new first showing; the other a second showing. They’re both at the exact same time. I’m thinking that is really good for raking in some offers. Here’s hoping that a little whiff of competition brings the offers in ink. The only thing that stinks about them is that they are in the morning. We are a lazy crew around here. We’re rarely out of pajamas before noon on Saturday or Sunday and Mr. BBM and I like to linger over the leftover bacon and coffee for a couple hours and chat.

This weekend, we’ll be in high-powered cleaning and getting out of here mode and I’m not all that happy about it. The best possible scenario would be for a good offer to come in this weekend. Then we’ll know if we have to sacrifice the stone up to the sill or the 9 ft. basement ceilings on the new house, or if we can just go for them and not worry.

Our neighbors have offered to let us come over to their house during our showings. They said we’ll open a bottle of wine and spy on the newcomers through their office windows. I’m wondering if they’d mind if we switched the beverage to some serious coffee and whether or not pajamas and slippers would offend them. I can always offer them turn-down service and origami tissues and toilet paper. Then maybe they’ll let me take a very much needed nap.