Slightly shorter week this time out as we were treated to a guided tour in and around the entire district courtesy of Marcus Toneatto and David Fairbrother.

This week was quite a bit more involving than the previous one, with the addition of some new opportunities with the elementary kids, and some interesting work in the auto shop, along with continued explorations in the wood and drafting departments.

Continuing on with the two higher risk students in the woodshop saw near completion of their respective projects, and what I feel was a sense of accomplishment and pride in the workmanship. Going back and forth between the two students showed different challenges, with one student having a very high degree of impatience when it came down to the finer finishing, precision joinery section, and the other taking shortcuts on the final phases which resulted in some frustrating repair work which was much more time consuming than the preventative preparation would have been. Neither of these things proved to be a great problem as both students were all smiles as the projects came together. I was a little disappointed the next day however as 1 of the students was suspended for a bullying incident which I understand happened right after our time in the woodshop. It is hard not to feel like I “missed” something there, like I could have modelled some behaviour that could have prevented that, but as Mr. C stated to me later “Don’t fall too in love with these kids, do your best and accept that you can’t be in control of everything, all the time”. It is hard not to get attached, as the student really opened up and spoke about his dad, his prior work experience, and his employment aspirations for the future, and seemed really happy that we were working together – going from this to bullying 1 hour later is the last thing I would have predicted.

I was presented with a new and unique opportunity to teach a couple of elementary drama classes with Elaina, the other TC at the school, and this proved to be a fun and enlightening experience for both of us. The first class was very short notice and we didn’t have a lot of time to prep, but the students were very responsive to the activities and asked if we were coming back for another class – I think that is a good thing! The next class was much more structured as we had 2 days to put together some short scenario acting skits which the students seemed to have a ball with. It is good to feel comfortable in the younger and older classrooms now as I can let my own creativity bounce off of the students unique interpretations of the activities, and feel the results coming off much more naturally then before. I hope I can work with this age group again in the future.