Closet nerdery

I’m pissed that my early childhood education fostered in me the belief that I don’t like science. PISSED! I feel like I got gipped out of years of wonder and exploration.

Science was taught to me in the driest, most boring way possible by teachers who I’m pretty sure never enjoyed the subject, either. I was told that in order to like science, you must be good at math, which I most certainly am not, and so I was given up on. And science must be the hardest subject to study, which I’m pretty sure I’m far from. Oh, and there was the whole Erin is good at the arts, so she must be bad at the sciences bull that was dumped all over me in high school.

That’s crap, right? I mean, “science” is such a blanket term, covering a vast family of knowledge and the pursuit of knowledge, really. Maybe I’m not totally in love with chemistry, but who says that should limit my interest in other fields or studies? Who says I have to work in a lab, or cannot simply be the lay-scientist, or even just a mild science-geek who enjoys thinking about the universe? It’s crap that negative public school experiences shadowed my entire education instead of encouraging me to explore wider.

In college, when I was enrolled in my required science classes, I truly excelled in them, much to my surprise. When I got somehow tangled up in the medical field after graduating with an English degree, I discovered that I was more into medicine than I’d suspected. I get giddy when listening to NPR’s Science Friday or watching NOVA. Now that I’m several years removed from formal studies, I am able to recognize and admit that some of the news, literature, and hobbies I enjoy the most really are scientific in nature!

So, I guess what I’m saying here is that I’m done with this idea that I’m not good at science, and I’m happy to be making up for lost time. I think I’ve been a closet nerd all along.

Solar Science project

You may have heard about Sunday’s annular solar eclipse. I actually somehow missed the news of its coming, and when our neighborhood started seeing a lot of unusual traffic, my husband mentioned that it was probably because people were headed to the beaches to watch the solar eclipse. I’d never witnessed an event like this before, and insisted that we figure out a way to safely see it.

How lucky we are to live right on the West Coast, where viewing was decent! Instead of fighting with tourists and crowds at the beach, Chris and I quickly whipped up a pinhole projector with some white card stock and a pin and headed into the street in front of our apartment to see what it was all about.

Chris trying out our impromptu pinhole projector.

Super cool! I wish I’d known way in advance so that I could have joined up with an astronomy club for a more professional viewing, but I can say with confidence that I won’t soon forget how phenomenal it is to experience something like that! The light began to grow strange and dim even though it was daytime, and the tiny sun on our paper started to be eclipsed by the moon.

Tiny eclipse.

The crescent grew smaller and smaller, and we almost got the full annular “ring of fire” effect later on. Man, how amazing it would have been to look through a professional telescope to see this! But, it was still fun to see how the eclipse effected even the light through the little spaces between leaves of the trees in front of our place, casting little crescents and circles on the stucco of our building, thus resulting in a very nerdy conversation about light and space.

Crescent shadows on the wall.

Shadows of the eclipse.

Maybe I’ll be more prepared to view the Transit of Venus on June 5th!

Haunted Hospital?

In news from my area this week, it was announced that during seismic work at Santa Clara Valley Medical Center in nearby San Jose unearthed pine boxes containing bodies!

Apparently, back in 1875, there was a pauper’s cemetery where the hospital now is, where the very poor and family-less were buried. You can read the whole article here. Seems that the cemetery was marked on a 1935 map of the area, but was never found, and so it was built over! There are an estimated 1,445 bodies under the earth at this site. Now the county has petitioned to remove at least 100 bodies to make room for construction and are going to hire a special archaeologist to try and help identify remains, or file to dispose of them in accordance with the law.

Now, I know I can’t be the only one who’s thinking that there have got to be some pretty pissed off spirits haunting this hospital!

I’m not dead…

…but maybe my blog is. Seems like I just can’t make myself write here much anymore, even when I feel the urge to. What’s my deal?

There are lots and lots of blessings in my life right now. I continue to love and learn from my job at the elementary school in a way that is absolutely refreshing and rewarding. I’m looking forward to our summer camp program and continuing next year.

Chris just got promoted to a Design Lead at his work, which is a huge accomplishment that makes me so proud of him! This promotion means good things for him and for us. What an amazing thing it has been to see my high school boyfriend work so hard to become this incredible man. 

My sister is expecting a second child in July- another little girl! Our family is super stoked, and this baby is truly a miracle. Aren’t they all, really? I love my niece so much, and I can’t wait to see how love multiplies in our family when #2 arrives.

My parents have announced that they are BOTH retiring later this year! I cannot express how much I feel that they deserve this, and it’ll be amazing for the two hardest-working people I’ve ever known to enter this time in their life.

Today, Chris and I bought a car. Not long ago I would have never been able to fathom being able to do this, and now we were able to save and plan for a used model of a car we love. Buying your first car is a big deal, right? We think so; it felt monumental. And now I can get the old Honda Civic that Chris has been driving and get rid of the serious hazard I’ve been driving!

I don’t mean to brag, but I’m feeling pretty great about life right now, and I feel like we’re finally coming into what we’ve been working so hard for. Cheers!

 

Watering the Lawn: Helping Positive Childhood Behavior Grow

Earlier this year, it was arranged for speaker to come to a staff meeting for my school program and talk to us about challenging child behaviors. We had three sessions with Bob, and a lot of what he said was extremely enlightening, inspiring, and helpful.

One point he made was delivered through an funny anecdote from his own life. When he was a young professional, he was thrilled the first time he was able to move into an apartment with a small back yard off the tiny patio. Thrilled with the prospects of such an arrangement, he excitedly tilled the soil and planted grass. Before long, grass sprouted and his little yard was green and pleasant. 

However, Bob soon noticed that although he loved his teeny little yard, it was beginning to look pretty shoddy. Baffled, he got on his hands and knees and yanked out the weeds. This helped somewhat, but the yard still looked less than pleasant. The following week, he saw that there were even more weeds, so he yanked those out, too. Week after week, he realized that the yard looked worse and worse, and despite keeping it consistently free from nasty weeds, the grass began to die rapidly.

Bob was so frustrated! So much time and energy had he expended, but it still wasn’t behaving properly! In desperation, he phoned a green-thumbed friend who he considered an expert at these things and begged for guidance.

“What have you done to help your yard grow, Bob?” she asked him.

“I planted all of this grass and I keep pulling the weeds but it is still dying!” he explained.

“Sure,” she replied, “and what are you doing for the grass?”

“I told you, I’ve pulled every single weed!” he exclaimed, exasperated. 

“Well, okay, Bob, but you have to help the grass grow.”

He hesitated. 

“Bob, you have to water your lawn for it to grow!”

Well, Bob had never thought of that!

Lawns, like children, need to be watered to grow. Yes, weeds– or challenging behaviors– need to be managed right away. But, if you want to see more of the beautiful parts growing, you need to encourage them to. Bob suggested “raining praise” on the behaviors that you’d like to see from your children/students. Complimenting, encouraging, and general cheering for the positive things you observe does more to entice growth than simply managing the weeds. 

I work with a very challenging “tween” age group, and they can really demonstrated some really unruly and ugly behaviors that really irritate me and generally cause the whole class to wither. In the beginning, I was trying my very best to keep the “weeds” down by dealing with these behaviors as they arose in my class, but my students’ attitudes didn’t seem to be improving, and I was about to pull my hair out. After hearing Bob’s story and the discussion that followed it, I tried “raining praise” on my students consistently throughout the day to see what happened.

What a difference, and right away! The first day, I did everything from complimenting a kid on how well he walked into the library, to cheering on a student who played well with a friend, and even telling a kid that the way he was reading his book made it so easy for the other student at his table to finish their homework. Silly things, some of them, but I noticed more smiles from my students and myself! Since then, I really feel like the attitude and behavior from my students has greatly improved. The lawn of my class is much greener these days.

Parents and teacher friends, I just wanted to share Bob’s fun story that reminded me of a very important part of working with children, and I hope it makes you smile!

What Should I Read Next?

It took me years and years of reading to discover what I really like to read.

I mean, in college I was force fed all kinds of important literature until I believed I loved it. And I guess I did. Or, do. But mostly, it is because I appreciate it, but don’t necessarily get my rocks off with it. When I graduated, I actually stopped reading for months (!) because I felt unmotivated to pick up one of many, many great works of literature that I had on my list or my bookshelf. I was tired of it. When I started up again, I went for popular recommendations by friends. 

Over the past few years, I read again simply because I love to read and have the time to do it at my leisure, and I’ve started to discover what kind of books really tickle my fancy. I thought back to when I got the most pure thrill out of reading, and so I began reading more young adult fiction. Turns out, I still love it! Also, I realize now that I like things with a little sci-fi twist. I never knew! I shamelessly read popular works of fiction and all of the book-to-movie hits and I mostly love it all.

Of course, there are so many books out there that I still read books in all kinds of genres–yes, even some of the “greats”– but it’s really cool to know what I like best so I can seek out more like what I’ve enjoyed. Pinterest is a great place to learn about new books. I even discovered this website called What Should I Read Next? where you enter the title of a book you enjoyed and it generates a list of other titles similar to it. How cool!

Spring “Break”

It is officially Spring Break for the schools in this area, and I was stupid enough to sign up to work the modified Spring Break “camp” for my school district! It’s okay; the hours are supplemental and will be added to my next paycheck, and I still got today and Friday off, equalling two long weekends. Plus, I understand that the Spring Break program is a lot like the Summer “camp” program (which I also want to work,) which means fewer kids, no academic work, tons of field trips, and theoretically a lot more fun! I’m looking forward to going to the park, the beach, and the community swim center with the kids this week before heading to see family for Easter next weekend.

Today, Chris had to take the car in to get a couple of things looked at, so he’s working from home. When he got out of bed, there was light in the sky, which is unusual. Not long after that, I stirred a bit in bed and was about to turn over to settle back in for another hour of sleep when I barely cracked my eyes open and he was standing at the foot of the bed looking all expectant and perky, waiting to gleefully greet me and tell me that he had just made fresh coffee for me because he’d guessed that I’d be up soon. Damn morning people! So, I dragged my ass out of bed on my day off and drank some coffee with him in the living room, which I have to admit is such a rare treat for us to do together that I did enjoy it thoroughly.

Afterward I got dressed and followed him to drop off the car. I stopped and found an appropriate pair of sandals on sale at Kohl’s (the school has guidelines for safe sandals and I wanted some to wear to the beach with the kids and around town this summer,) and we headed home. Because I was up and going earlier than usual, I got several loads of laundry washed and put away, cleaned the kitchen, and even went through a ton of old clothes that are too big now to donate, and rediscovered several things that used to be to small that fit great now. Not much of a break, I guess, but I guess it’s been a productive day so far and that makes me feel pretty good.

The best part of today, though, is that it is beautifully sunny outside and I have the rest of the afternoon to enjoy the day while reading my new book. Maybe I’ll even take a nap. Happy Spring, friends.