February 16

It seems like such a long time since I’ve last written a blog! Well, half-term break is over and we’re back to school. We began the short week with some writing, in which we continued with creative and imaginative writing. I told the students about an incident that happened to me at the airport over the break and they then used the setting of an airport to begin their writing piece. They have come such a long way with their writing and each piece seems to be getting better and better. Because in the next week or two we will be moving on to look at poetry I did a grammar lesson on similes and metaphors and how and why writers and poets use them in their writing. The students seemed to grasp it all and were even able to come up with many of their own similes and metaphors. Before break I had done an REM lesson on respect and was very surprised by the results. Yesterday Mrs. Higson and I actually went to the other P7 class and taught this same lesson together. It was very interesting because even though the classes are the same age group, the answers were completely different and the maturity levels of the class were definitely shown. In maths we moved on to using centimeters and meters in calculations. We began on Wednesday with basic conversions from centimeters to meters and then meters to centimeters. Yesterday we moved on a bit to begin measuring the perimeter of objects and today some of the students continued to look at perimeter while some that have picked up on it quickly have gone on to area. Wednesday and Thursday we have also been finishing up and practicing for our Shakespeare productions and I have actually already videotaped two groups already and they both were great. Today we started off the day with more Shakespeare and then went into some more writing. We finished off the day and the week by doing some observational drawings and then having a work time where some groups were able to finish their Chaucer characters and others were able to practice their Shakespeare plays.
Now, I wish the week could have been that easy. Kim and I had a great time in London and Paris. It was everything I thought and more. One of my favorite things that I saw was the Changing of the Guards at Buckingham Palace in London. I had heard so much about it and was so happy that we were able to see it. We took the Big Bus Tour and was able to see all the great sites throughout London. We stayed in Kensington where there seems to always be something going on. From London we went to Paris and had a fabulous time as well. The first day was spent at the Eiffel Tower and other sites in Paris. I was even able to go to the top of the Eiffel Tower. It was amazing. The second day we went to EuroDisney and that was a lot of fun too. It was a great time and everything was flawless until coming back to Scotland. In London, right before getting on the plane, we had to go through immigration. While Kim was able to get through immigration, they wouldn’t let me through. They wanted me to show them my return ticket to go back home to the states. I had none of this with me as it was back in Scotland because I didn’t think I needed it to get back in Scotland once I was allowed in. The immigration officer that I was dealing with was very rude and basically told me that it was my problem and I needed to show him that information and until I did that I wouldn’t be let through. He began yelling at me and Kim, who was two desks away from me, was able to hear everything he was saying to me. He told me to find a Delta Airlines desk and have them print me off an itinerary of my flight. He also said that it worried him that I was in Scotland since the beginning of January. I had no idea what to do since Delta doesn’t fly out of Heathrow so there would be no desk to go to. I ended up asking someone at British Airways and she was very helpful with everything. If it wasn’t for her I really don’t know what I would have done. The only phone number I had with me was my host families and when I tried calling I couldn’t get through. The lady helping me then went to find Kim to see if she had any numbers and she was able to give me her host families number which I got through. I also tried calling home to try and get the information faxed to me, however, my dad had it and he was out of town at the time. Kim’s host family was able to get in contact with my family and they were finally able to fax the information over. When I finally went back to immigration to show them all my information, the guy that had let Kim through now was helping me. He didn’t even look at the information! After missing my flight and going through all the hassle he wouldn’t even look at it and he knew everything that I had gone through because he asked if I was with Kim. After finally getting through I was met by Kim who had cancelled her spot on our previous flight and we were able to fly back to Edinburgh together and I was never happier to be back in Scotland than I was then. That was probably one of the worst experiences I’ve had in traveling and I hope I never have to go through something like that again. It will definitely be something I will remember forever and hopefully in the future actually be able to laugh about it. Hopefully we have better luck this weekend. Kim and I are meeting up with Kim’s family in Edinburgh for the weekend. On Saturday we will be taking a bus tour to Loch Ness and spending the day there. I’m very excited for this and know it will be a good weekend.