Dogs, Cars, and Funny Photos

Two cute things of the week: I have a pair of awesome llama earrings from Peru that I wore to school the other day, and when I asked my students what they were, they kept saying reindeer- each and every one! And then I realized that I live in Alaska, where reindeer actually exist...

One of the many labs I saw as I walked around the Valley this week!

Dog companions are also a huge thing here. I was crossing the street the other day, and there was a large yellow lab sitting shotgun in the car at the stop sign, just staring and smiling at me. It was probably the fourth dog-in-a-car scenario I had seen that day, but what made it even better is the man started talking to the dog and was trying to get it to wave to me as I walked on by. It made my day. :)

Hello from my new home! I honestly can’t remember if I’ve written about this or not, but I have been offered the opportunity to housesit for the loveliest couple in Juneau for the next month! Seriously- they are the best, and I am so thankful for this gift that just dropped in my lap. I am now staying in the Valley (instead of in the Highlands near downtown), which is right by Glacier Valley and Thunder Mountain. I have a house to myself for the first time in my life, I have a CAR to drive, and a place to host my awesome friend, Jana, who will be coming up here in a couple weeks (YAY!) and my parents a couple weeks after that (YAY!). I am beyond excited for them all to get here, and they now have rooms to stay in. :) Praise the Lord!

So I am living on my own in a new neighborhood until April, and I am already loving this change of pace. I totally love my place with Rob and Koren, but this feels like a good test-run of full-fledged adulthood! And it helps me get a clearer picture of what life would be like if I lived in Juneau next year (because my two requirements for next year are to live on my own and have a car). Today was a busy day because of the moving in process, but also because I took my Praxis Music Content test- and I passed!!!! That was such a relief. :) I had to take the Core Content Area test as part of my application process, which included math, reading, and writing, but this test was all about music education. So I took a walk down memory lane as I zipped through the test, listening to excerpts, doing music theory notation, and answering music pedagogy questions.

My students are amazing!
Can you spot me??

I’ll keep working backwards; Saturday and Friday were very musical days! On Saturday, Lorrie and I played a piece called Silent Woods by Dvorak at a piano masterclass as a way to prepare ourselves for our performance of it at the Symphony Showcase in two weeks! I will also be playing two pieces with the quartet: a beautiful Mendelssohn quartet and a piece composed by none other than Tyree, my host teacher at Thunder Mountain! He has his Bachelor’s in composition and is a truly great composer. The quartet has greatly enjoyed working on his piece, and he is even giving us a coaching this week. :) I then had a couple hours of cello ensemble rehearsal, a group that consists of other Juneau Symphony members! We are putting on a huge cello choir concert in April that will include any cellist in Juneau of any age who can come, and it’s going to be epic. :) I also got to play an hour of music on Friday night at a Red Cross fundraiser that also featured a dessert auction from our JAMM kids and parents to help them fundraise for Sitka Fine Arts Camp. This music camp will host 15 of our fifth graders this summer and will give them an unforgettable musical experience before they enter into middle school (if you're interested in helping support them, you can donate here)! The fundraiser was a success and was also a blast- we were received so well as a quartet, as was our small ensemble of JAMM students who performed their favorite pieces, “Dragonhunter”, “Simple Gifts”, and “Old Joe Clark”. After that, a fabulous local jazz band, The Ron Maas Big Band, performed, and our students showed off their ballroom dancing skills (because remember, they’re currently doing a unit on ballroom dancing!)! It was so neat to see our fifth graders be strong leaders, as they ran to the dance floor and encouraged the adults to join them. And I think my and my students’ favorite part about the event (besides the delicious food!) was the free photobooth and costumes!! I got so many adorable group shots with my students and with the quartet. :) It rocked!!

I feel very fulfilled after playing so much music this weekend. I am seeing more how much playing means to me, which I didn’t realize until I wasn’t doing it every day. Every time I play my cello, a part of me comes alive again. :) Another part of me that has been awakened is my personal fitness- it’s a miracle!!! I have made the decision to try to make it to the gym at least a couple times a week! Do I have time for it? Not necessarily!! But I can make time. And the great thing about my new location is that I am a close drive from the UAS gym, which my tuition pays for! So I will be exploring that gym tomorrow after school and rehearsal!

You know what ELSE I did this week? I COOKED!
A big shout-out to Sophia for pushing me to eat like an adult. :P

Speaking of personal health, I had another physical therapy appointment the other day after taking a break for three weeks, and I received great news- I am much stronger than when I first came in! My PT had me do the same exercises she initially gave me to test my strength, and I passed many of the tests I couldn’t do before. I still have work to do- she gave me new stretches and exercises to target certain parts of my upper body to continue strengthening my shoulder- but it feels so good to see how much better I am doing! I am barely ever in pain when I play, and my posture has gotten a lot better. So thankful!! I also really look forward to my appointments because my PT is the BEST. Mostly because she’s really easy to talk to, and she laughs at ALL my jokes! Even when I’m teasing myself for not being able to do some of her more intense exercises. :P

Check out how far Unalakleet is from Juneau!

And the final big thing I wanted to share is that I learned this week that I will be going to Unalakleet, Alaska (YOU-nuh-luh-kleet) for a Spring Break Rural Practicum in just over three weeks!!!! This teaching immersion experience is all set up through the university, but Sophia, Heidi, and I are being sent to this specific school because an awesome leader of the arts in Juneau used her connections to make sure we were sent to a school with a music program. :) This trip is meant to encourage pre-service teachers to experience teaching in rural Alaska to give them the chance to develop an interest in living there upon graduation. I am super, super excited to visit Unalakleet and work at the school there for a week!! I found out they have a cello there, but the school principal told me he has not heard a cello played in Unalakleet in the ten years he’s been there...whoa! I don’t know many details about the trip or this village, but I do know that it is right on the Bering Sea, all the way on the west coast of Alaska, AND it is the first checkpoint for the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, the infamous dog race that goes all the way from Anchorage to Nome, Alaska! Check out the map to see the distance between Juneau and Unalakleet, and also click here if you’re interested in reading more about it!

It has been a really good couple of weeks. It’s definitely busy, and I feel incredibly behind on my schoolwork. And my jazz unit plan finally starts a week from tomorrow- eek! But I am working hard at putting it on our JAMM website and am pretty proud of my work. :) I’m loving life in Alaska more and more. :)

I just casually saw a rainbow over Egan Drive/Glacier Highway the other day, which is our only highway in Juneau. :)

SmartMusic blog post!

Hello, beloved friends and family! It has been another great week in Juneau, and I have had a wonderful, social weekend. I wanted to dedicate this blog post to the post I wrote for SmartMusic that was published on their blog earlier this week. Instead of reading about my feelings this week, you get to read about some awesome teaching tools I have learned! Enjoy. :)

http://www.smartmusic.com/blog/how-to-keep-your-students-engaged/

My latest hike to Salmon Creek. :)

For He Knows...

“Man plans, God laughs”. -Yiddish proverb

This is my view of Douglas Island and the Strait as I walk up my street. :)
It has also been warmer here than it has been in south Georgia, where my sister, Rachel lives!!

Happy Presidents Day to all! I thought it would be okay to write my post a day late because I knew I would have today off to get to work and crank out the various papers, lesson plans, and posts for the week. I am also very thankful for this extra day off because I have developed another cold (I think this is my fifth time being sick since August?!) and really needed today to rest. So I will be doing work in bed in my pj’s all day, and I am greatly looking forward to it! I was able to sleep in until 10 this morning, and I woke up to hear my solar dancing elephant energetically flapping his ears. :) It’s a good day!

A few great things happened last week. First of all, Sophia and I have decided to partner up on a research project for our Educational Research class this semester, which I am greatly looking forward to. We will be answering this question: “How does tri-weekly, intensive, instrumental instruction at a Title 1 school affect the development of self-efficacy, belonging, and a growth mindset in 5th graders?”. Sophia and I are passionate about exploring this question, as its results may help us to be stronger advocates for El Sistema and music education. We will conduct research and collect our findings in various ways, including administering a survey to our JAMM students as well as students who have never been involved in JAMM, making observations of a focus group during JAMM classes, and collecting information from student reflections Sophia, Lindsay, and I are leading our students through in the Songwriting and Improvisation classes we are teaching.

Speaking of which, those two classes are going so well! It was definitely a bold move for us to introduce these classes that are so different than what the kids have ever done with JAMM. But these 4th and 5th graders are really blossoming into wonderful, creative artists. Sophia and I are teaching them how to write their own lyrics and create their own online portfolios they can have with them forever. Lindsay and I are showing them how to listen to different sounds in their everyday lives and play them on their instruments. We even took our students outside the other day to have them listen to sounds they want to express on their instruments. Both of these classes are so vital for accessing the incredible amount of creativity children have, and I have learned so much from them because they are so daring and imaginative!! It’s amazing to see a glimpse into their colorful brains. These classes are also helping our students develop their own sense of identity- especially when they write about their lives and have their own online platform to express parts of who they are. This is so important, especially for our students who are entering middle school next year!

In addition to the research project, Sophia and I worked with Lorrie this weekend to write a grant, which was my first experience doing that! JAMM has many needs, including more instruments for our kids who are going into middle school next year, and more administrative support. I was excited to be part of the grant writing process because I know it is a significant skill for a music teacher, especially one who is interested in opening their own El Sistema non-profit program some day (which is my ultimate dream!). I also feel personally invested because I have been thinking and praying a lot about my plans for next year (because I finish summer classes in under 6 months!), and I feel a strong desire to stay in Juneau and keep working with JAMM next year. :) I am very much still in the thinking and pondering process and am trying to see how it would all piece together, but this dream really became real when I went home for Winter Break and could not stop thinking or talking about Alaska and my work with Lorrie, my students, the quartet, UAS, and the Symphony. There are so many things I have yet to learn as a teacher and administrator, and I want to really invest in this community. I also just cannot pass up an opportunity to learn from Lorrie more because she is as incredible as I thought she would be! And being able to hike whenever I am free is just life-giving to me!

Sophia and I had a blast playing together!!!

There is also such a rich music scene here, which I experienced once again this past week! Sophia and I were part of an opera production of L’Orfeo, which is a baroque opera by Monteverdi that is based on the Greek myth of Orpheus going into the Underworld. Sophia and I had a blast being standpartners and learning to play in this completely different style of playing. Baroque-style playing is much lighter and simpler- I didn’t use vibrato the entire show, which was so nice and pure! We also greatly enjoyed meeting new people from around Alaska and the country who are experts at singing or playing Baroque music. We hung out with some awesome theorbo players, a baroque cellist, some baroque violinists, some hilarious brass players (but aren’t they always hilarious?! Am I right, Dad??), and some amazing singers. The singer who played Orpheus was just incredible. I could listen to him sing all day! And he basically did because he sang solos for about 75% of the show! So rehearsals kept us busy, as they were every night last week until 10pm, and then the shows were Friday-Sunday. But we got to borrow baroque bows and play beautiful music I had studied once upon a time in music history class. It was so neat! And a group of those musicians came to Glacier Valley on Friday to share about the opera and their instruments with our fourth and fifth graders; the students loved learning about these new instruments, and they even showed off their beautiful singing as they sang "Simple Gifts/Going Home" with our instrumentalists!

Valentine’s Day was also a big treat for me- but not the actual day! FRIDAY was where it was AT. You know why?? Because that’s when all the students celebrated Valentine’s Day! I walked into Glacier Valley on Friday to see little ones all dressed up with their cute little heart dresses and headbands and red shirts. And then as students walked into the music room to drop off their instruments in the morning, they came bearing gifts of chocolate, cards, and cute little valentines! I got a big box of chocolates shaped like hearts from one of my bass students; that made my day! I was so surprised and touched, I thanked him and gave him a big side hug. He grinned, his cheeks turning red out of shyness and joy. The gifts kept coming for all of us, and while the chocolate was a nice snack (and may have been my breakfast this morning…), it was all just a symbol of love and appreciation from our wonderful students. These kids are musicians and citizens with beautiful hearts, and that becomes apparent to me more every day.

So, it has been a great week! I have taken time to think about the future and the present, and I am still in awe that I am here. Sometimes, it still feels really scary; I feel so far away from my past reality. It often does feel like I am in a different country, which many of my friends in the Lower 48 say! And yet, as I reflect on the past, I realize what a big, amazing risk I took to come here and how God totally led me to it. It gives me such comfort to know this is His plan for me- because I was definitely led to it with some big fears and hesitance! And yet He knew this is exactly where I am meant to be. I may have a very different life and different friends here, but it has been more fulfilling and exciting than I could imagine. And I never would have expected to grow so close to the other girls in the program and Lorrie. And yet, those are my closest, most dear friends! I am so thankful as I think about how this entire journey began February 24, 2015- about a year ago, when I received an email with a crazy idea to move to Alaska and be part of a new program that would equip me to be a great citizen, artist, teacher, and scholar. I read through my very first blog post this morning, which I wrote 7 months ago in the Seattle airport on my way to Alaska for the first time. You may recall that before I decided to come to Juneau, I was faced with a decision of staying in Chicago to work with InterVarsity on DePaul’s campus or move across the country to a life unknown. This is what I wrote:

“I was offered the InterVarsity job a few days after my interview and had a couple weeks to decide which path to take the next year. I had to make this decision the weekend of my Senior recital...Talk about everything happening at the same time! But after a lot of prayer and thinking, I just knew that I had to take this amazing opportunity in Alaska. And the moment I decided and committed to it, I felt like I turned toward that beautiful state, started walking, and never looked back. I know that I made the right choice and have never once questioned it. It’s just perfect, and I know that this was always in God’s plan, even when I couldn’t see it. And it really feels like it is so me!”

It brings me back to that excited nervousness I felt that day and the months leading up to my move here. I feel so encouraged, so protected, and so loved, thinking that I was chosen to go on this path of such adventure. It was terrifying (and still is, especially when I think about entering the “adult world” next year!), and yet it has been so thrilling. I know that God gave me this adventurous heart, and I hope that I will always be open to His crazy plans!

YAY ALASKA!!!

The view from Perseverance Trail. :)

Getting in the Groove

I still can’t believe I live in Alaska!!

It was another great week of teaching!

My Spanish unit is going very smoothly, and my students will take their end of the unit test this Friday. Tyree and I have been assessing them along the way, and we are both impressed with how much they know. I am continually amazed by their ability to read and speak in Spanish, which both of us teachers greatly attribute to the curriculum we use. It is designed by Carol Gaab, and it incorporates a lot of storytelling in the lessons. Having the students associate the vocabulary they learn directly with stories and act the stories out has greatly increased their ability to remember the words and what they mean. It’s very exciting! I’m eager to see how they do on Friday.

Orchestra at both TMHS and GV have been going great. At the high school level, I am inviting my students to take more leadership in their learning by asking them to have discussions about the music, especially in regards to the phrasing. I even had a student come up and conduct with me during a warm-up exercise, which she and the students really loved! Sophia and I, and Lindsay and I are team-teaching respective units on songwriting and improvisation with our oldest JAMM kids this session, and classes began last week and went so great!! We are all (including the students) extremely excited to delve into this new topic with them that really accesses their personal creativity. I am also working with my chamber kids to polish up Dragonhunter (one of their favorite pieces!) for a fundraising dinner we are doing with Red Cross in a couple weeks. The quartet also has some gigs coming up, so we are preparing for that!

Our kindergarteners played their "A/E Open String Concerto"
for the Lysander Piano Trio! Afterwards, one kinder excitedly exclaimed,
"THIS IS FUN!".

Speaking of making beautiful music, we had a professional trio called The Lysander Piano Trio come visit Juneau this week to spend time with the students in our schools! They visited Thunder Mountain, Floyd Dryden Middle School, and Glacier Valley! I followed them at TMHS and GV, and it was amazing to hear such an incredible group of musicians play. It brought me back to my time at DePaul! It was great to talk with them, and they were just blown away by our students. Our kinders performed for them, and then a lot of students asked some great questions. I’m so proud of our kids!

It has been a busy weekend with a lot of work and some great socializing time. I got to see an incredible play done in Juneau’s theater, Perseverance Theatre, last night called “Our Voices Will Be Heard”. It gave a great glimpse into some fascinating parts of Tlingit culture (it paired a Tlingit myth about the wolf with another true story) while addressing a very heavy topic. I am very impressed with the arts/music scene in Juneau and am so happy I got to support the local artists with their fantastic work! ALSO: Heidi, a friend, and I were TOTALLY sitting next to Governor Bill Walker, which we realized just as the play began. I am sort of glad we learned too late because otherwise I probably would have asked for a selfie and embarrassed myself...BUT HOW COOL!

It is snowing in Juneau today, and it is a gorgeous sight. It will be beautiful to watch as I do my work today! And last but not least, I leave you with the DePaul newsletter from this week….

I feel honored to be part of their “Alumni Spotlight” section, and I’m sure “Ruth Hogel” does too… :P