Day 4- "It's a small world after all"

Well I guess I should begin this post with the happenings of yesterday afternoon. Janette and I attended Zumba class which is held at a gym covered in graffiti, it was very interesting to take a look of all of the different artwork painted all over the building. Zumba was wonderful! There were people of all different shape, sizes, colors, genders (yes, I did say genders. We had a man near my father's age getting down with his bad self). The teacher was one of the most energetic people I have ever seen. She had such a crazy, upbeat personality that kept you entertained and motivated the entire time. Janette and her friend describe her as a psycho because she makes all of these strange noises during the workouts. I do believe I will be going back soon with her!

I woke up a little later this morning to a nice breeze. Today hasn't been quite as cool as the previous days and it looks like we are heading into a heat wave for the rest of the week. Sigh... After breakfast, Penny came to pick me up and it was off to another day of professional development. Today we discussed the importance of writing and how to important it is to spread it across the curriculum. At first the information was extremely engaging, but by "morning tea", aka break or recess to us Americans, everyone seemed bored out of their minds. I, on the other hand, was kept entertained by one of the lively aids. For those of you who have seen Steel Magnolias, she is Clairee to the T! She isn't so high society and well-to-do so to speak, but she is constantly cracking jokes with everyone, even herself. Many of her friends kid around with her and tell her people are going to start suspecting her happiness for something else. She doesn't seem to mind one bit!

Well getting to the whole "it's a small world after all" bit... This morning before we began the workshops a couple of new faces were there and began asking me about my background and that sort of thing. One of the educational assistants (Side note- which they have WAY more of than we do in our schools) mentioned she spent her holiday traveling throughout the states. She named off several places she had been such as Seattle, Los Angeles, Dallas, and then New Orleans. I asked when she visited New Orleans and it turns out it was during the BCS Championship. She was so excited to meet someone from "the winning team"... "Oh what's that you guys say, something like tide rolling!" I giggled and corrected her immediately and she gave me a big "Roll Tide!" She also commented on how "heinous" LSU's color combination was. I think she and I are definitely going to hit it off.

Today I began doing more work with my mentoring teacher "Melody." Melody is extremely knowledgeable when it comes to what she does and has a very likable personality. After talking with her for a bit, it turns out she hosted a COST student about two years ago from Tuscaloosa. She even came to visit her during her break and low and behold guess where they went out to- Innisfree Irish Pub of course! I knew when she said she went to an Irish pub that it had to be us. Melody mentioned that every guy wanted to buy her a drink just to hear her Aussie accent. Needless to say, I think she had a great time going out. Currently, Melody has a roommate who went to Georgia and moved here after completing her internship. Melody also went to visit her during the Auburn/Georgia game two years ago and made the trip to that other school in Alabama... She couldn't fathom the thought of how wasteful those Boogers were for rolling Toomer's Corner. I assured her that they were the enemy...

After school, Melody dropped me off at Whoolworth's Shopping Center to meet Janette. I had a little time to myself to explore the mall a bit. It is quite strange, people push buggies around as if it was a grocery store, which they have two of in the center. Janette got quite a laugh when I referred to the shopping cart as a "buggy." Here in Australia, they refer to them as "trolley's." She thinks the word buggies is so cute that she said she may start using it! Once we got home, I went on a nice run at the park right beside my home. It is absolutely beautiful and sits right across the river. There also is a nice sand bar where people take their dogs for a swim and play fetch. It made me miss my little Andy man so much!

Tomorrow is our last day of professional development before the students come back. I have never been in a school on the first day back from summer break as a teacher. I am very excited and a bit nervous, 10 weeks of summer break should be interesting!

Day 3- First Day of Internship

Well today has been quite the experiences of "firsts." This morning was the first morning I woke up chilly and even had to pull the sheet over me to keep warm! The morning breeze was very nice and the pleasant weather lasted throughout the day. It stayed around the mid 80's all day and was absolutely perfect! However, I do catch myself waking up rather early, and I am not sure quite why! I got up around 5 AM and was wide awake and never got tired throughout the day. Maybe I'm establishing a new routine! Before school, I had breakfast with Ryan (my host family's son who has been diagnosed as autistic) and Steve (my host dad). My host mom, Janette, is a principal at a school nearby and had to get to work very early. I learned a good bit about Ryan today, who has been quite shy around me. So far, I know he loves hats and works at a company that does work for Quantas Airlines. He untangles the headsets we use on flights and sometimes cleans them. What is wonderful about the education system here is that they begin job specific skills for children with disabilities as young as 12. At age 16 they begin going out and having work related experiences just like we do in the states.

After breakfast, it was time to head off to school. Steve drove me into school, which is only about a 10 minute drive, and attempted to teach me the bus routes. They keep telling me how easy it is to learn. I think I am just going to actually do it rather than having someone tell me what routes to take so I'll actually learn it! Once I got to school, I was greeted by my mentoring teacher we will call "Penny." Penny is an interesting person and was such a big help throughout the day. She is in charge of the entire "team", or staff as we call it, of special educators. Here they like to call it "ed support." I knew it was meant to be when I saw a group of elephants tattooed around her arm, I really wanted to look at her and give her a "roll tide." Since today was just a professional development day I was able to learn a lot about how their education system works. For starters, their grades are completely different from ours, they go by years in school. So an example would be 7th grade would be known as "Year 8" here which are children ages 12-13. It definitely is going to take some getting used to. They are not exactly sure where I am going to be placed in the school, but hopefully I will know something by the middle of the week!

During the meetings I also got to hear about their revamping of the curriculum. Currently, the commonwealth is making major changes to what the Australian Curriculum should be, which is very similar to the changes our education system is going through back in the US. What the main focus is, or what I got out of it, is there should be uniformity across all areas of curriculum. A good bit of the meetings were things I was not able to understand, but thanks to the friendly staff they were able to clear things up for me.

Speaking of the staff, everyone is absolutely amazing and EXTREMELY laid back. I was a bit overdressed, most people wore jeans and flip flops since it was a relaxed sort of day. The "team" I am with are very tight knit and say the best cure to avoid stress is laughter. One of the interpreters who is on the team looked at me and said "If you see us laughing hysterically, you know that is when we are working through something personally that way we don't end up behind bars!" I really liked that idea. And they all love to drink! That is all they ever talk about. One of the first things Penny asked was if I liked to drink! They even have these meetings once a month called "sun downs" where all the teachers get together and drink at school with each other, sort of like a big party. While that is very uncommon for us at home, schools across Australia all do this and it is not seen as unprofessional. I think their approach to their jobs and the camaraderie they have with one another makes for a wonderful working environment!

I also was able to learn some new Australian lingo at school today. One of the math teachers was referring to tutoring centers in the area and said they were "light on the ground." It took me a second to realize, but once he began talking about the shortage I realized he meant there were very few in the area. Also they refer to cinnamon rolls as "sticky bread" which makes perfect sense. They also think it is quite bizarre how the US still does not use the metric system, fortunately I have an app on my Iphone to do all of the conversions for me!

After school, Penny dropped me off at home and since then I have been blogging away. I haven't had a chance to take any pictures of my school but I am sure sometime this week I will be able to. Janette invited me to a Zumba course tonight which I am looking forward to. This will be my FIRST time ever trying out this type of exercise. I just hope that everyone in the class doesn't laugh to hard at my pitiful dance skills. For those of you who don't know what Zumba is, GOOGLE IT! You'll giggle when you picture me trying to do it!

Day 2- Images

Harriet's Harbor

Memorial Gardens

Check out the "Joey" in the Mum's pouch!

Day 2- Images

Chelsea's wonderful backyard.

Mansions near the beach!

Afternoon Snack!

Solar paneling on roofs is very common, this is a picture of Chelsea's home in Sorento.

Chelsea and I with the roo's! More pics to come after some shut eye!

Day 2-"No Worries"

Well after realizing I still have a difficult time sleeping in this heat, it was an early morning for me. About 5 AM. I actually am pleasantly surprised at how awake I was, the upside to this is I don't have to worry about oversleeping for school.

After a quick bite to eat for breakfast, my COST Supervisor came and picked me up then it was off to pick up Chelsea (another COST student) to make a day trip to the beach. I still am having a hard time adjusting to getting in on the other side of the car, someone always has to remind me to walk around! Another interesting thing I noticed along our drive were the road signs. Rather than saying "yield" their signs say "give away." Just another quirky Australian fact for you all! Chelsea lives about 30 minutes away closer to the coast, which is a very swanky area. She and I later in the day had the opportunity to walk around and check out all of the multi-million dollar homes. After picking up Chelsea, John dropped us off at Hillary's Harbor which he referred to as quite touristy. We absolutely loved it! It still is "Holiday", or summer vacation as we like to call it, so it was pretty crowded. Sunday's are a big going out day for the people our age, there were tons of pubs covered with young kids celebrating their last couple of days before returning to "Uni" aka their university. Both of our host families warned us to wear plenty of sunscreen because with the cool breeze from the Indian Ocean, one can easily get burned without feeling it. The cool breeze that comes in on the afternoon is known as the "Fremantle Doctor." During the morning, it is rather still and the water is very calm, but early in the afternoon a strong breeze comes through and stirs everything up and usually begins in the Fremantle area of Perth and works it way up to stir everything up and bring everyone back to reality. We both constantly reapplied sunscreen but still ended up pretty sunburned, Chelsea even had to have an ice bath when she got in!

When we got too warm we began our tour of the upscale neighborhood on our walk back home. It got rather warm on the way home, but it wasn't too terrible. Many of the homes have solar paneling installed onto the roofs to conserve energy. One thing that is very important to Aussie's is keeping their environment clean and in good condition. We went for a "dip" in the pool at Chelsea's house which is very beautiful. John later came and picked us up and gave us a quick tour of a memorial garden where I got to see my first kangaroo! They are very friendly and would even walk up to the car expecting to be fed. The kangaroo reserve is also is a cemetery, which the Aussie's pronounce "sem-I-tree", and people become quite frustrated with the roo's because they tend to nibble on the flowers set up in memorial for love ones lostt. We also were able to see ravens and other Australian parrots!

Once I got back in, I had a nice relaxing dinner with my host family. Tomorrow is my first day of school at Belmont City College. I am so anxious to begin and a bit nervous. The teachers here have to do four professional development before the "pupils" return on Thursday. My cost supervisor offered me wonderful advice that is very common here, he said "you'll hear many Aussies say 'no worries' and that's the type of attitude you should have on this adventure in your life." I really took that to heart and thought hey, it might be nice to get away from the hustle and bustle of our American lifestyle and just sit back and smell the roses, I am going to try my best to adopt their laid back view on life!

Day 1- Arrival to Perth

Hello everyone! Welcome to my blog all the way from Perth, Australia. I currently am working towards my Masters degree in Special Education grades K-6 and have had the opportunity to complete my internship here in Australia. I am very anxious to see how education works in a different society. Everything seems quite different, I am trying my best to pick up on Australian lingo, but so far have had to ask for a lot of explaining....

I titled this blog "Cheers, y'all" because this blog will have my own personal, southern touch on my travels throughout western Australia. It is quite warm here at the moment, around 90 degrees farenheit. I must brush up on my metric system, I am not used to seeing everything this way! I just got settled in a couple of hours ago and am trying my best to stay awake to get used to the time difference. So far I have not had a chance to explore too much, due to my exhaustion. It has been quite wonderful though so far. The family I am living with are very, very friendly and have given me plenty of space to make my own. They have done everything possible to make me as comfortable as I can be this far from home. Even so much as to buying me a very nice fan to keep cool. The temperature definitely will take some getting used to! Tomorrow another student and I plan to go to a local beach. My house mom has warned me numerous times to wear clothing and plenty of sunscreen due to the UV warning, which is quite common this type of year. I felt as though I was talking with my own mother when she told me to be careful in the sun, which was nice. Hopefully by tomorrow my mind and body will be on the same page so I do not feel like a walking zombie....