24 July 2006

forgot to print my lesson plans to sch this morning. came all the way home. went back to sch on bike because my laptop took too long to start up (from hibernation). but guess what? all our lesson plans were "thrown out of the window".. not literally lah. =p but yeah, we revised everything because based on the test we gave last friday, almost ALL the students could not do the stuff we've been doing. so we decided we need to revisit everything from the start again. sigh. so 1 hour before class, we re-planned the day's (& week's) schedule. was thinking on the spot and on our feet as we got thru' the day. really thank God for all the "instant" ideas. esp the part where i had to teach and i absolutely have no idea what i was going to say. i just 'popped' an equation on the board and did it with the whole class! but i'm really thankful to God that the whole class was silent (they're usually very noisy and disruptive) and paying attn for the very FIRST time! *smiles*

anyways, rebecca (my mentor) got robbed. ok, attempted robbery in daylight. 1015am near the entrance of a grocery store (apparently it's quite a busy place) on a bright sat morning.. the sat that just passed (while i was taking my MTEL =p). with her 2 children!? - a baby (just turned 1 year old a couple of days ago..) and a 4-year-old girl who's called sarah. =p *eyes brightens* man, the guy must be very desperate coz he "attacked" a lady with children?!? also, the purse was but a draw-string pouch with 8 bucks inside! i mean, c'mon.. mother of 2 and you date to attack her in broad daylight? well, the guy reached from behind and tried to snatch the pouch. only that the strings (rope-like) were over rebecca's shoulders and her baby was in that arm! he yanked so hard she opened that arm and the baby fell off. good thing she managed to scramble to catch him and "break his fall" on herself. he fell about 5cm from the ground so he wasnt hurt. but he was crying real bad as you can imagine. she injured her arm quite abit. ropeburn. plus the guy had to pull on the pouch and drag her across the sidewalk and road! more burns on her side and legs. ouch! sarah meanwhile was dumbstruck. she was crying and pulling rebecca's legs as the guy dragged her (she said later that she was afriad the guy was going to take her mother. how cute kids can be?). i guess u cant expect a 4-yr-old to run into the grocery store (abt 2m away according to rebecca's description) and ask for help right? rebecca was saying she didnt know if she shld've gotten her to run in for help. the only thought racing thru her mind what that he might kill her and if she shouted for her to run, he might go for her instead. motherly instinct i guess. anyways, he didnt get her pouch in the end. ran for it, took to his car and zoomed off. witnesses said they got the partial license plate of the car but they didnt match (some student in class or maybe it was the next-door-teacher, suggested it might even be a stolen car..) so the police couldnt do anything. interestingly, the boys in class asked if that robber was black (he was. in my class, the boys are mostly black kids mind you! hmm, maybe all black..) well, it got me quite scared coz i'll be "working" in that neighborhood come sept. 3 of 4 of the middle schools that Harvard is attaching us to is that town. pls pray very hard for me!! i'm considering sharing a car with keng and get him to pick me up after schools on most days. i'm writing this not to scare anyone k? i believe that i really need protection from God and prayers from His saints. =) *i won't carry draw string bags k? =p*

anyways, bad things aside. the kids in class liked my pants - there's a zipper on each side just below my knee. they're fake, cant use them to put anything in but i guess it's unique. =p like me. haha. i "taught" abit of chinese at the end of class. 2 of my students stayed back to finish their class assignments and asked what language i could speak other than english. i said chinese and heh, the boy asked me to say sth. i wrote ni2 hao3 on the whiteboard and they were so intriged by it! haha. another next-door-teacher came over to return the metre rulers she borrowed and she asked me how to say math in chinese. well, i almost couldnt recall how to write su4 xue2. haha. =p

enjoyed the special ed speaker who was invited to class today. i think i might wanna take modules on special ed and see if it'll help me in gearing me towards becoming a special ed teacher (currently i'm gg to be a general ed math teacher) - so Harvard doesnt certify special ed but i'll try to work around it.. =) maybe take outside classes or well, cross-uni modules if i can. see where the Lord leads and open doors. k, i shouldnt be blogging. have papers to mark and grade. Tata.. =)