pictures from paradise

The fountain in the center of Perugia. Piazza IV Novembre

Our first view of the Basilica of St. Francis as we arrived in Assisi.

These dirty, mangy puppies were probably the cutest things I have ever seen. The one in my lap was trying SO HARD to tell me something with his eyes. I was trying so hard to understand him. When it was time for us to keep walking, it took everything in me not to stick him in my backpack and take him home with me.

We learned how to make homemade pasta. The Orsini family, an Italian family who does organic, sustainable farming on Lake Trasimeno, invited all of the students in our program to their home for a traditional country-style breakfast, pasta making, and wine-tasting. The women in the family are traditional, professional pasta makers, basically. Together, they taught all of us how to make home-made pasta and let us each take a turn helping.

This is the view of Lake Trasimeno from the Orisini Family Home. The lake is BEAUTIFUL, and it was so refreshing to see water after being away from Minnesota for a little over a week. Unfortunately, the lake is toxic...so you can't actually go in it. But it's nice to look at. :)

One of the elderly Orsini women who taught us how to make the pasta.

The end result of our home-made pasta. It was DELICIOUS.

A view of the valley from Assisi. My friends and I hiked through Assisi for a couple hours after visiting the basilica, just enjoy the breath-taking views.

Comments

Mental Health Awareness Month Resources and Reflections

General Mental Health Awareness Resources (linked below): National Institute of Mental Health Mental Health America Brain and Behavior Research Foundation National Alliance on Mental Illness National Eating Disorders Association Brain and Behavior Research Foundation Donor Drive (in honor of Ryan P. Johnson) Myths v. Facts of OCD: International OCD Foundation

mood-o-meter

One of my main goals for my classroom this year is to teach my students how to communicate their emotions and use productive and healthy coping mechanisms. So, I introduce to Miss Forster's first grade class... ....DRUMROLL PLEASE..... The mood-o-meter!! Here's an example of a mood meter that I found online: Basically, here's how it works/how I want to use it. The colors can represent different types of feelings on the spectrum. Blue: low energy/unpleasant=sad, depressed, sulky, tired, etc. Green: low energy/pleasant=happy, content, peaceful, calm, etc. Yellow: high energy/pleasant=excited, surprised, enthusiastic, etc. Red: high energy/unpleasant=angry, frustrated, annoyed, etc. In our classroom this year, we are going to start the year off by learning about this spectrum of emotions-->the mood meter. We'll discuss what the different colors represent, what someone looks like when they're feeling each emotion, what you feel like doing whe

werk ur body

My beautiful and wonderful friend Anna Ayers Looby sent me a link today that really got me thinking. Here's the link: http://sspw.dpi.wi.gov/sspw_physicaled Basically it gave me the flashing reminder that my students NEED PHYSICAL ACTIVITY in their daily lives. Everyone should have a total of 60 minutes of some sort of physical activity every single day. Since my students only get P.E. twice a week, most of them just want to eat their snack instead of run around at recess, and the rest of their 8 hour day is spent sitting....majority of those minutes depend on me. Now, when your school and state have a deathly fear of failing and standards, objectives, mastery, and test scores are at the core of everything you do, it's easy to forget about the importance of educating well-rounded children. If you'd asked me to add physical activity to my classroom during my first year of teaching, I probably would have started crying (ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME I CAN HARDLY GET ALL THE

"What mental health needs is more sunlight, more candor, more unashamed conversation." -Glenn Close

Search This Blog