Mario Bros.

My two oldest sons, ages 6 and 5, were playing Mario Bros. this week; however, we don't own a Nintendo. They weren't playing the game, but they were pretending the game. They each chose a character from it (they have played it before when our classic Nintendo still worked as well as on the Wii at friends' houses) and were running around the house as those characters. At first I felt bad for them; other kids their age have video games and are pretty good. My kids don't even know how the controllers work on most gaming systems. Then I realized how much fun they were having. They were running, laughing, working together, and not once did they mention that they wished they had the real game. They were content; they were having fun with what they do have.

How often do I as their parent think they are deprived of something that is unnecessary? How often do I place importance on material things? How often to I feel guilty about things that I shouldn't feel guilty about? How often do I NOT model this contentment that my children were showing because I don't have something?

I see their classmates, while waiting in the cafeteria for school to begin, playing hand-held video game devices. My children have a toy action figure or animal to keep them occupied. Every now and then I see them look at their friends' stuff with some longing. Typically, several of their friends put down their games and join them in an epic battle between a toy dinosaur, Yoda, and a Transformer.

And I am proud. Proud that as they go "without", they seem to be much richer.

Old Blog Posts

Because the original purpose for my blog was going to be focused on my job, the URL reflected that. After posting once, I did not post again until a year later. I then decided to write about my kids as well. So "dcaseventhgradeenglish" didn't really make sense. Here are my first two posts from the previous blog.

Research Papers
Did you hate doing research papers as much as I did in school? As a self-proclaimed dork, I enjoyed most of my school work: the accomplishment of getting all 25 questions completed in a Saxon Math textbook, the writing of essays in response to a short story, the logic behind a geometry proof, and the excitement of breaking down a sentence to diagram it. I would never admit it then, but I loved the learning process which included such activities. But...I always hated doing research papers. Now, as a seventh grade English teacher, I teach how to do a research paper in MLA format and I hate it even more. Maybe I get too much of a thrill standing in front of the class engaged in a conversation. Maybe I get tired of students whining about not finding any information. Maybe I hate it because I hated it as a student! I wish it were not required. I need some suggestions on what to do when I as the teacher despise the content that I am required to teach. I know I can fake it some, but students are wise enough to pick up on it. I don't necessarily want advice on how to teach a research paper, but a discussion on what to do if I hate the content I am teaching, no matter what it is.

Posted a year later:

Research papers...again.
So, I began this blog last year, and I have only posted one entry. Surprising? Not at all. It's ironic that I decided to look up my account to see if it still existed almost one year later. And, again, I am beginning the research paper unit with my seventh grade students. The differences in my feelings on the matter have not changed much, but my purpose for this blog is very different. I was looking at my account so that I can start sharing my thoughts about my kids. After reading my first post from last year, though, I don't want to compartmentalize. So, I will still mention thoughts that are related to my profession, but not solely. I hope to record thoughts that occur to me as I watch my kids. I hope to have a record for me to remember how they talked, played, asked questions, etc. so that I won't forget. This isn't something I am doing in hopes that I get readers. I don't really care if anyone ever reads it. (Apparently this was not what my plans were when I wrote my original post.) We will see if it's another year before I post again.