Blog Archives

@ MSSD for the Academic Bowl

7/28/2020

I love teaching. The engagement in the classroom with students as they build knowledge, explore relationships, learn to express themselves and really hear others is wonderful. And you never know when you’re going to have a great day when everything seems to click. I may have two, at most, three days like that a year. There are good days and then there are days that are transcendent. Top 3 days of the year.

I can’t predict when I’ll have a day like that, but the closest I regularly come to that feeling is graduation and the Academic Bowl. Graduation because you’ve seen where they were and know what they have accomplished. The AB is similar -- feelings of pride for them and a sense of belonging for me. To have people look forward to seeing you is a great feeling. And the fact that a coach will flash my lights at 2am to discuss a challenge to a second round question from a match 10 hours prior means they are holding it just as tightly as I am.

Judges were incorrect, but that’s neither here nor there.

This year we went to the Model Secondary School for the Deaf in Washington, DC. I think I’ve been to seven schools and have experienced beautiful campuses, wonderful hospitality, and friendly, warm people.

Here’s my favorite picture from MSSD.

Bricks are painted light blue with red, white, and blue wings on that blue. Hashtag MSSDEagles in the lower left.

Statue by Daniel Chester French on Gallaudet campus of Alice Cogswell and Thomas Gallaudet

Welcome sign from Gallaudet University welcoming us to the Regional Academic Bowl

Picture of me and a coach from the Louisiana School for the Deaf

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I love Punta Cana!

7/26/2020

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I love Punta Cana became our refrain for most of the trip, and thereafter! Mike’s wife had a birthday and decided to celebrate with some of her besties in the Dominican Republic. Having made the decision to travel more in Chicago last year, I was on board for my first trip to DR (sorry Jackie, my bad, we should have gone).

Spent four days or so in Punta Cana reading on the beach and next to the pool, playing games, and listening to music. If I knew it would be the last traveling I’d do for a while I would have stayed longer! And while it was the very first time I took time off work for a vacation, it will not be the last.

One of the many lessons I’ve learned from ‘rona is to travel while you can. Do not put off that trip, book the flight, see the sights. Essential workers have to prioritize their own well being, along with everyone else.

Not the years in your life, but the life in your years and all that. No one reminisces about the routine time they stayed at work or decided not to leave early.

Overlooking pool and night sky, Moon partially hidden behind clouds.

Walkway along the pool winding through resort, with grass and trees on either side.

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Christmas Time in Rochester

7/26/2020

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I don’t get back to Rochester terribly often these days. Off hand, I think I’ve been back five times, three of which were wedding related. No one was getting married this time, but my father turned 81 a few months ago and it had been too long since I’d seen him. My sister and her husband came up from Houston and both of my brothers were in town.

We went to see The Lion King...

Banner displaying an advertisement for the musical The Lion King.

...sat around and talked, played cards, connected a Roku streaming stick, and watched hours and hours of James Bond movies on PlutoTV. Wish I could have stayed longer.

But! When I was leaving I noticed some very cool features in the Rochester airport I tweeted (twote?) about. Accessibility features help everyone and should be incorporated from the beginning. This is a new addition to the Rochester airport, but I would love to see these features more widely adopted everywhere. I was in a train station in France and the ground had ridges. It could help the blind, people with low vision, or anyone that would benefit from a tactile response. Universal Design for All!

Floor of a train station with two sets of three raised lines running parallel along the ground. Lines indicate a path to follow. Blind person represented walking with a cane.

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Baltimore -> Bahamas

7/12/2020

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Still in need of a travel partner if you are interested!

NCTE occurs immediately before our Thanksgiving break so I decided to hop on a cruise from Baltimore to the Bahamas for the week. That’s about as much planning went into it. I knew I was going to be in Baltimore so why not?
I’d been to the Bahamas before, but this was the longest cruise I’d taken at a full week. The blues were incredible, water and sky, and I napped on deck when I wasn’t reading on my Kindle.

Linked up with a friend from work in Nassau, won some trivia, and sat on the balcony staring at water. I used my notes to draft some thoughts as this doc student life is legit and I watched movies on deck.

Was sad to leave the Caribbean behind and return to Baltimore. Went from shorts weather to brick quickfast! Embarkation and disembarkation on cruise ships I think should be done differently. Kicked out of your rooms early just to clog up the halls and stairways before you can leave. I think you should be able to wait in your room. Yes, the next cruise would leave later, but you aren’t doing anything that first day anyway. I’d rather leave at 6 and have more time in my room on the last day then leave at 4, but have to lean against the wall for 90 minutes or sit on my suitcase.

Ah well. These aren’t real problems.

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NCTE, the IV?

7/11/2020

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Baltimore! I believe this was the fourth NCTE I've attended. Atlanta, Kansas City, Austin, and now Baltimore. My view is pretty much as long as I'm teaching English I'll make attending NCTE a priority. I know everyone doesn't have that ability, but it's been by far the most beneficial conference related to ELA I've attended.

The information is great, but the people are gold. To meet people you've only interacted with on Twitter -to put a personality to a tweet- and have a chance to learn from and with them and then go out to eat, it's one of the highlights I look forward to every year. As I'm writing this the NCTE conference for 2020 in Denver has already been canceled due to Covid.

I'm supposed to be in Australia right now after having finished presenting at an international conference and NCTE being canceled stings a little more.

It's difficult describing what a conference experience is like if you haven't experienced similar. Imagine knowing a code and having this insider knowledge. Most days, in most spaces, there are only a few of you that know the code / all the inwords. But, then you go to a place with thousands of people and everyone knows the code and you start with this shared knowledge and understanding that you don't often get. That's what it's like!

I was a cheerleader in undergrad and trying to explain to my friends that weren't cheerleaders what we did at practice was confusing on the best of days unless we all stood up and I physically showed them. But during Nationals when everyone for 1.5 miles was a cheerleader or dancer, groups could form on the beach and throw basket tosses mixing and matching because everyone knew the routine.

NCTE is being surrounded by thousands of people just like you and still being seen. To some extent. They aren't perfect, but they are good.

Long lines of people waiting to enter auditorium. More are coming down stairs and escalators.

So good that I made a friend that came from (I want to say...) Palau to attend. Do you know how far that is from Baltimore?! If you flew from Baltimore to Hawai'i I believe you'd be about halfway. Listened to George Takei welcome us then went out for steak.

I don’t remember exactly what it was…. bone in ribeye maybe? With crab meat on top. And a bunch of other stuff. It was the recommendation of our wonderful server. And I probably ate more steak in that setting than I’d eaten up until then in life.

Bone in ribeye, with butter, crab meat, and asparagus on top

Remnants of a steak. Bone, knife and fork, and three spears of asparagus are all that is left.

I won’t try to recount every impactful moment, but in reviewing pictures it was somewhat surreal to see my professor’s name cited in a session I attended. My friend Marvell lives in Baltimore and it's always great to spend time with him. Don't get to hang out nearly as much as I'd like, but it feels good to catch up and decompress a bit.

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The city by the Bay...

7/8/2020

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That's San Francisco, right? I'm going with yes. The 2019 baseball trip brought Mike and I to San Francisco!

It was my first time in California and the farthest west I've been since a trip to Reno when I was a cheerleader during undergrad. We watched some baseball, walked around a great city, played trivia, met up with my friend from high school, and watched more baseball in Oakland. That's a tale of two cities - Oakland and SF.

Trip highlight was probably walking the Golden Gate Bridge and making our way down to the water. It was peaceful, beautiful, and encompassing. I enjoy traveling and have a long list of countries I want to visit, but we have absolutely stunning sights all across this country and I'm glad the baseball trips give me a reason to explore some of them.

Knocking off these two (Oakland needs a new stadium badly) I have 6 more: NY Yankee, Tampa, Seattle, San Diego, and both LAs. I think Seattle should come with a trip up to Alaska cause why not and it's my goal to have Dodger Stadium be the last one since they had the audacity to leave NY.

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St. Simons

7/8/2020

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I'm trying to chronicle my travels, but you know... life.

Typing during the second week of July 2020 about the first week of June 2019. I went to the IDEAS Conference in St. Simons, Georgia and presented the last day about Thinking Maps. Previous to that, I attended workshops on fingerspelling and Foundations of Literacy.

Long days, but I saw my first Tesla closeup in the wild, had Brunswick stew for the first time, and met a friend that came up from Jax for sushi. I believe I went to the same sushi place seven years ago.

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My Travels

@ MSSD for the Academic Bowl

I love Punta Cana!

Christmas Time in Rochester

Baltimore -> Bahamas

NCTE, the IV?

The city by the Bay...

St. Simons

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