Snow Days

I haven't wrote in a while on this thing, despite the abundance I have time I have recently acquired. This past week the weather was around 2-8 degrees as the high and school was canceled. Not snow days, but cold days. Who would have thought? But, the children walk to school, some five minutes others 35 minutes. The weather being as cold as it was, was not making the trip any easier for them and made the school harder to heat. I got to school this past Monday only to learn that classes had been cancelled for the day. I went home and hung out with my host mom and neighbor. The neighbor mentioned that school was cancelled for the entire week for her children, who are in elementary school. I wondered if my school would be in the same situation. Good thing I called my counterpart who told me that there would be no school for the rest of the week. Woohoo! Another long break for me. We had just returned from Christmas vacation and had only gotten through one week of classes before we stop again for another week. So I slept in, read a lot, watched television and all in all, was very lazy. I went to the piata in Ungheni on Thursday morning and when I returned my host mom said that the neighbor's children went to school and that there was school. Hmmm, no one told me. So I did not go, even though I had classes yet to happen later in the day. No one called to let me no, so good riddance to them. I asked my host mom how people in the village knew that the school would open for Thursday and Friday. She said, one person calls another and it spreads like that. Everyone just calls around gossiping and that is how they find things out. Interesting. I did manage to make it to school on Friday to finish out the week. Even then, there weren't that many students in the classes, it still was a little cold. But this week it is back to normal, except each class stays in their homeroom for every lesson instead of moving around. The teacher's move around to them. This somehow helps to combat the cold weather. Go figure.
Today my 8th graders are learning about the U.S.A. We learned the great lakes, different important cities (Atlanta is even included in the book's vocabulary...sorry, they left out Columbus), and big rivers. They really enjoyed it and liked hunting for the places on my map that is under the chalkboard. For the optional class today after school I started to teach the United States Song. The song that lists all the states in more or less alphabetical order. I wrote the words down, had them pronounce all the states, and sang it for them. We have gotten through 1/4 of it and I am going to finish teaching it to them on Thursday. I will be sure to take pictures and even video. So kudos to Matt who had to memorize the song in elementary school and I had to listen to him practicing it for an entire evening. That is how I learned it and am now able to teach my students. They are loving it and enjoy memorizing things like this. They will be excited to know the song and want to impress their family and friends that they know all the states in the United States.
So that is all I am up to right now. I am still crocheting my blanket, I am almost done with the 2nd ball of yarn. Only five more of them to go and I will be done. My host mom is impressed with all my crafty abilities. I am also beginning to read some great books by a great British author, P.G. Wodehouse. He is very funny in, of course, a British sort of way and using the most interesting words to describe and explain things. His stories are so incredibly hilarious and absurd. It is just what I need to add to my daily regiment. I am reading "Laughing Gas" right now and am looking at "Very Good, Jeeves!" sitting beside me waiting to be opened. I highly recommend them! That is all, I am signing out now!