Viruses, Bugs, Trojans....Oh my!!!

Hey everyone,

So things at school are coming around. It is definitely not what I was expecting. My friend, Jose whose been out here for a year is at a school where he has limited resources, lots of behavior problems (all boy school) and no curriculum to follow. Well maybe he does have a curriculum but there is certainly not the curriculum police coming around making sure he's on task. He's got the freedom to teach the way he truly believes is best and it isn't easy with the behavior issues and the language barrier. He is by himself in the classroom so it's just him against the boys. He has grown to love it. It is completely the opposite of what we are used in Miami schools. I was prepared for this. I brought over 4 bins FULL of school supplies, ready for whatever my kids needed and my school didn't provide. I was prepared for no parent participation and no curriculum or teacher manuals. I was prepared for behavior issues and classroom management to be my biggest problem.

One of my students :)

My school is completely different. I feel like I am in a Miami-Dade school - some what. I have to deal with issues like lesson plan deadlines, time table (schedules) and pacing guides. For those of you that don't teach a pacing guide is a year plan that tells us what to do each week. The pacing guides go to fast for me to be able to teach the students (3 and 4 year olds!!) so I ask them to slow it down and they push everything back a week. I didn't want that, I wanted things to be SPACED out so we have less worksheets to do in one week. So I end up changing the pacing guide and meeting with our AQC (faculty head) and the Regional AQC and tell them what I've come up with and what I think is best for the students. Somehow, magically they agreed with me! I was given permission to adjust the pacing guides!! In a school, where everything had to be EXACTLY the same all across the board. But somehow I got the go ahead. So now I've adjusted the pacing guides and I think things will get better, I can do more fun activities with the students in order to teach the topic - because worksheets and memorization is not the best way! Little by little things will get better but this is definitely the hardest adjustment I've ever had to make. Sometimes I think the classroom with no resources and behavior problems might be easier. I am a teacher and I know how to deal with kids. But most of my issues have been with adults, not very many with kids. I guess most of my classroom management is handled by the homeroom/Arabic teacher. I am starting to love my students, they are super cute and some of them really want to learn. So far I think maybe 20% of the class actually pay 100% attention to me. But hey, what do you expect from 3 year olds. They're supposed to want to play, talk and run around :)

Our bedroom set (at the store)

Now, as for the apartment!! We are finally home!! They delivered our bedroom set on Thursday. We got a bed, two night stands, a dresser and a wardrobe for 1350 dhs (which is $367 USD) Amazing price!! It wasn't the one we REALLY wanted but we are being modest. We shipped Saul's mattress in the container and his mattress is queen (150x200cm) and we are happy we did this but it also limited us on many bedroom sets that we liked. The other ones we liked only came for King size mattresses and they were more expensive - like $1600 USD plus we would have had to buy a new mattress and sheets. The sheets are more expensive here than back home and I didn't really like the quality so I'm happy. We saved money and we get to use my sheets from home!

And we've also bought a couple other things. We got couches - 3 couches!!! A 3 person couch, a 2 person love seat and a recliner chair. The best thing about the couches is that everyone can recline!! There are 5 recliners. The couches were about $1000 USD. We also got a kitchen table for 2 people and a desk for Saul's office. We haven't bought the dining room table yet because we want to wait and see how the couches fit in order to figure out what size/shape table to get.

Kitchen Table

Our Door :)

Things are finally coming together and it's starting to feel like home. Which is a good thing. The bad part is that the more it feels like home, the more I feel that something is missing. I get up in the morning and open the bedroom door and I want my dogs to greet me. I miss them so much!! I don't really know how to imagine the rest of my time here with out them. It doesn't feel right. I feel so strongly about it that I can't even talk or write about without feeling really emotional and crying. I keep trying to think of how to bring them here and how it would be. I feel that I will pay whatever I need to pay so that they can be here with me. But then I can't imagine leaving them with strangers for the summer and every time we go out of town. So I need to be strong and know that they are happier and healthier in Miami with people that they know and love them. And they will be waiting for me when I get back. Dogs don't forget, right??

So yesterday and today is our weekend and we haven't had such a great one. I used a flash drive at school on a computer that doesn't have internet. I was warned to be careful because all computers have viruses and spyware. So I thought I was safe by using the one that doesn't have internet. Boy, was I wrong. I brought home a very bad virus. We spent yesterday trying to fix it, with Joey's help. NO LUCK!! My computer has been cleaned but Saul's laptop has not. The virus has taken over everything. We can't control the task manager, or open the hard drive. It has taken away all administrator authority on the computer. So we backed up his files - which may just be corrupt in the end. But hopefully with Joey's help and his Apple we can save the files. Now Saul's trying to restore the computer to factory settings and the virus won't even allow him to do that. I'm not sure what else he tried - he's not very happy right now :(
Hopefully it can be fixed soon! I feel very guilty about my stupid flash drive - I guess I won't be touching those computers at school ever again!


Ok, guys that's all for now. I will update again soon.

Love you all :)