Settling into Fall

It'll be this way until December.

Me, right before speaking on KINY Radio!

This past week seemed to give me a glimpse of what the rest of the year will be like. I feel like the quartet has gotten into a good groove as a group already, which is really exciting! We have found a good rehearsal schedule and have even begun playing for some gigs around town, which will continue this week. We even got a chance to speak on the radio to talk about our quartet and the wildlife cruise we will be performing for this next weekend! It's been so great to have so many musical and educational opportunities here. We started off the week teaching with Lorrie at Glacier Valley and stayed after school every day to work with a small group of JAMM kids to prepare for a donor event we performed for on Friday. We let the kids pick the songs they knew and wanted to perform, and then the quartet helped conduct the one-hour daily rehearsal of the music. We came up with a song order and talked with the students about rehearsal and performance etiquette and what it means to be a leader. By Friday, they were super solid, and we teachers sang our praises over their hard work and ownership of the music. The quartet joined the kids in the performance of their songs and also played a Beethoven quartet movement halfway through the thirty-minute playing slot. It was so fun to help the kids work toward a goal and see them succeed so well! In addition to having us help out after school, Lorrie has been super great with letting us do as much or as little in the classroom as we want to right now. So this past week, each of us was given the opportunity to lead a portion of the class (usually it involved us teaching them a game or song). To be able to already start putting myself out there as a teacher helps me learn much faster because so much of it is through hands-on experience. There were some classes that I felt like I really just wanted to observe, though, because I had no experience and wanted to see what Lorrie did. So for example, the first graders began their first violin classes last week, and as a cello performance major, I have no experience with playing or teaching violin. So I hung back on the side of the classroom and took note of everything Lorrie did as she established routines and helped the kids become familiar with holding a real violin. It was a great learning experience, and I was able to join the following violin classes and help the students if they needed anything.

The quartet performed at a donor event with the JAMM kids!

I have been learning more about what drives elementary schoolers and how to have effective behavior management skills, which is something I really wanted to learn more about! I have also continued to see that I love kindergarteners! They are just adorable. We introduced them to the music classroom last week by reading one of Glacier Valley's signature storybooks, "Pete the Cat: Rocking in My School Shoes" to them, which has a repeating musical refrain. The kinders came into class later in the day with adorable little paper cat hats on their heads, so they can be Pete, the cat. So cute!!! And the most adorable thing about kinders? The oblivious things they do and say!!!! After that last kindergarten class for the day, we had a fifth grade class, and we were all sitting in a circle to play a name game. As we began doing this, a little kindergarten boy knocked on the door, looking into the room with his mouth sitting open. Lorrie opened the door, asking where he was supposed to be (he was supposed to be eating lunch in the cafeteria next door to the room), and he just kept asking with a voice full of awe and confusion, "What are you doing???" over and over, his mouth continuously agape and his eyes just looking straight into the music room. He eventually left to return to his food, but we teachers all laughed about that adorable encounter later.

We also observed/helped out at another elementary school, Riverbend, where I will be spending my time my second semester of student teaching. It was neat to see a different teaching style and different school environment. It was also cool to see the similarities, especially between the content of the two schools! I'm learning that the music teachers in Juneau don't have an idea of what the other teachers are doing in their schools, so our quartet can sort of be the eyes and ears to bring any suggestions and make connections within the music teacher community. It's awesome to help in that way!

Besides that, the quartet is preparing for a performance tomorrow night that is in honor of the Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, which is such an amazing opportunity! We are very excited about that. We are also having paper violin nights this week, so we will go to Glacier Valley and Riverbend to help students create their own paper violins (which we got to do last week!)! And the wildlife whale-watching cruise I have been looking forward to for months is finally this Saturday!

Me and Tobin, on Mt. Roberts!

There were a few beautiful, sunny days last week that went away just in time for my good friend, Tobin to come visit me over the weekend. However, he was born and raised in Seattle and actually enjoys rainy weather, so it was no problem for him! We had a great time exploring Juneau together: we took the tram up Mt. Roberts and hiked some (I finally saw a marmot!!), we drove to the end of the road on one end of Juneau, we browsed the shops, watched movies, went to a brewery, shopped around Fred Meyer (which is both my and his favorite store!), and went to my church. He also followed me around school and the donor event on Friday, so he got to see what I have been so excited about here! It was a happy weekend that reminded me of some of the things I've left behind to be here, which made it bittersweet.

The sun might make an appearance for a little bit this week, but I've been warned that Fall is usually consistently rainy. I've been told to expect every day to be rainy from now until Winter, unless it is too warm for snow! I start one of my online classes this week, which I sort of forgot about until yesterday...So, back to business!

Holding onto the sunlight. :)