edgewater

edgewater
Originally uploaded by roxbnl8

gift from brother gerald. maggie's is different but also nice. antique, tarnished silver, real turquoise. speechless.

window

window
Originally uploaded by roxbnl8

a few new pictures. maggie and i visited monument valley this past weekend. it was wonderful.

brochospasm

well it's been a while. things have been happening. i chaperoned a trip of 20 kids from pinon hs to IU for spring break. it was excellent. there are about 10 or so who really want to go there next year.

we went to canyon de chelly a couple more times, too. once on a dorm trip (completely unorganized and terrible overall) and once with tim camping. that was a great evening.

i learned how to make frybread last week. i'm going to have a big frybread party when i get back so all of my friends can try it. it's pretty much the best thing i've ever eaten.

i've got bronchitis and a cold- no school today. school's gone better than it has lately anyways. i'm struggling but trying to pull through. i'm just anxious to get back home... only four more weeks. it's amazing how fast it went but how slow it seemed to go when it was passing.

we still have the grand canyon and monument valley to go. also probably some sheep slaughtering.

hagoonee'

adventures

stories are coming, tomorrow. i haven't forgotten my blog... i've just been terribly busy.

ya'ah'teeh

welcome
Originally uploaded by roxbnl8

hello from beautiful pinon.

new pictures. not much to update. things are same ol' same ol'. we met up with everyone at dine' college in tsaile last weekend. we camped at red rock and froze but had fun. gallop flea market saturday and the best frybread of my life. got sunburnt and drove to pinon to a wind storm and early morning snow.

two more weeks of romeo and juliet. no sight of trash cat.

new pictures. click.

INTERNET

ya'ah'teeh!

i have the internet today! it's a mud/snow day... we had three last week, too.

maggie and i are going to four corners and possibly monument valley this weekend, depending on the weather. we're still trying to get with phyllis to herd sheeps. we got to see gerald a couple times this week, too, which was great.

last night we went to a country western dance at the dorm and spun little girls around. it was charming. there was a live band and a gaggle of awkward high schoolers.

trash cat may be dead. thanks to maggie. ask me later.

still living on frozen burritos and iced tea.

last week i took the banjo to the dorms and became popular.

class is going well- romeo and juliet is going great.

maggie and i are going to be painting a doctor seuss mural at the elementary school.

later gators.

internets

news: maggie has some sort of bug or cockroach in her ear. i had to look for it with a flashlight.

news: we don't have internet at home anymore and this site is blocked at school. don't know how often i can post anymore!

news: everything is going well. students are finishing up their midterms and we're starting romeo and juliet next week. yes.

news: 37 days until spring break.

i feel that the education system in this country is too far gone.

quentin

oh thank you, flagstaff michael's. i'm making mittens with long cuffs, my pattern. that's seed stitch at the top. you can enlarge that picture if you want, but it's blurry.

Night People

The dirt hung heavy in the air and invaded my nose and lungs and years of buildup made it hard to breathe and see and think. My hands grew rough and brown each time I knelt to touch the earth and my fingernails peeled back when grains of sand buried themselves deep underneath, prying and separating the flesh from the nail. The heat from the stove burned my back and the stove kept eating firewood so I had to move my chair and on the first try it burned my hand. The ladies laughed, baring gums with a smattering of teeth, and spat into empty pop cans, saliva stringy slipping between lips and collecting. I had been awake for a thousand hours and my eyelids grew heavy and my eyes glazed over and I listened to the singing and felt weary but kept rising and kneeling and digging and counting. When we finally left, frost covered the mud and puddles were iced over and the stars shone with the moon, and our pockets were heavy and our minds were far from our homes.

red rock

red rock
Originally uploaded by roxbnl8

new pictures from new mexico.

red rock nat'l park.
window rock (navajo nation, az).

edgewater

well since i've posted i've been adopted by the edgewater clan. that's gerald's family.

things have been going well, as usual. classes are turning out ok-- my kids are working on writing sen john mccain (r-az) and we're getting ready to move onto a nonfiction piece about the importance of grandfathers in mexican-american culture. after that, it's midterm project week, then romeo and juliet starts. still not quite sure how i'm going to go about teaching that, but i'm sure it'll be swell.

i've started keeping an awesome collection of everything i'm doing... lesson plans, handouts, student work, etc. i'm waiting on permission slips to get returned so i can add pics of the kids, too.

let's see... maggie and i are going to be herding sheep saturday morning with phyllis. she's going to drive us out to her place and that will be that. i'm very excited. we'll also play more shoe games this weekend since dine' tradition says that we have to get them all played before feb. 1. i can't believe a week from tomorrow is february... the weeks go so fast when i'm teaching.

hagooshii

and then!

and then!
Originally uploaded by roxbnl8

gas? it's $3.15 at the pinon conoco. we have a quarter tank. let's keep going. next gas station? an hour away. we were certainly running on the fumiest of fumes. the secret. the secret.

lesson #1: don't be cheap.

teacher store? closed. our reason for driving four hours to flagstaff? teacher store.

lesson #2: call ahead.

driving on the highway? not very dangerous, on a normal day... unlike today.

lesson #3: be careful. the dinosaurs are out.

flagstaff? totally awesome. full of delightful hippies and lovely independent businesses, my favorite of which is the used book store by michael's.

lesson #4: consider further adventures and possible relocations to flagstaff.

check out the new photogs. you can call me samantha many moons.

ba' goshi

ba' goshi
Originally uploaded by roxbnl8

maggie and i had quite an adventurous weekend. plus we still have flag tomorrow.

yesterday we went to a wind way ceremony for gerald's auntie elsie. it was from 8-1:30 and involved lots of chanting, rituals, body painting, and delicious fry bread afterwards. then we came home and took a nap because we knew we had to go back... we went back to gerald's around 7:30 and played shoe games until 12 or so. i have to say... we're getting good. the second game was great for me... i kept fooling the other team and when it was our turn i would go over and find the ball. maggie was getting good too. we didn't bet as much but still made about $7 or $8.

today we woke up and went to bashas' to get breakfast. we came back here and realized we had mistakenly bought fabric softener instead of detergent, so we went back to bashas' after doing a bit of work at the school. then we went to see the extreme makeover home edition green hogan. on our way there we saw calvin herding his cows. he directed us where to go to get a closer look at the hogan, and we almost didn't make it because of the mud. luckily the fit fishtailed its way to victory.

now we're at home hanging out. i might do some lesson plans. we shall see.

hagoonee'

vite vite

ok! so yesterday and today were awesome, lesson-wise. the kids are starting to come around.

dr. stachowski came to pinon today. it was cool to talk with her and everything.

maggie and i just got back from bashas'. we got pizza and candy. it's the end of the week ;)

we are going to shoe games again tomorrow, and there's a ceremony for gerald's mom on saturday morning, which we are also invited to. yes.

everything is great in little pinon. maggie and i didn't even get lost today.

tomorrow... in-service. no kids.

good news: i finally got my classroom key. huzzah!

real quick like

i got a migraine today and puked at school. it was after a lesson failed because of technology and after i had to discipline the kids because they were really trying to push me and see what my limits were. i'm sure it was stress-induced. it was terrible and freak. (nb: i guess if you want to look on the bright side of life, i haven't had one since that one time i was knitting with jackie, kate, l'abri, and al at the spoon. that was a couple months ago... i just don't know if i should be worried about these things. how often do they have to be for someone to be worried? eh.)

maggie and i moved into our house. it's very good. pictures soon... we finally can have warm showers.

i'm a busy bee. i'll be setting up a slam poetry club at the high school and helping maggie set up a tutoring/reading club at the community school.

"report card party" tomorrow at the high school. this means meeting parents.

first IEP meeting ever today. i've got a kid with LD and heart problems who has mild seizures (but hasn't had one in a year).

got the results of the AIMS/NWEA test scores. i have kids reading at every grade level. i mean every grade level. below 2nd, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, all the way up to 10+. i'm going to start a differentiated instruction program with assignments and worksheets with varying levels of difficulty. i'm also planning to start a "student spotlight" wall to display good work. i have a lot to do in the next few days...

did you see the new photos?

new pictures

dorm room!
Originally uploaded by roxbnl8

look at them.

"i'm secretly a wimp."

well. the past few days have been very interesting. i guess i’ll break it up based on in class/out of class.

class: i’ve decided to take over mrs. tom’s freshman english 1 classes starting this wednesday. we’re going to start with a unit on expository writing, have midterm, then do a unit on romeo and juliet, then do the final. i’ve got a lot of planning to do today since i was to just pound out these unit plans way in advance. the midterm and final will be in-class projects, and each unit will have two papers. the tough thing is going to be getting everything done in class… the periods are an hour and half long but mrs. tom suggested not assigning homework on any day but friday because the kids just don’t/can’t get it done. so we’ll be doing a lot of in-class activities and reading, i guess. i’m still debating if i should make wednesday’s minilesson a personal reading day; the day is broken up into bell work, vocab work, a minilesson of about half an hour, and a regular lesson of about half an hour or forty minutes. after these units are over, i’ll be having spring break and then doing one more unit. then it’ll be over, strangely enough.

not class: maggie and i went to gerald’s on friday night to play shoe games. in a nutshell: we played and gambled with navajos for eight hours. i’m writing a short story about it, which i’ll eventually post here. it was quite a night. yesterday we went to flagstaff to get teachery things and eat something delicious. we stopped at the hubble trading post on the way there—the oldest trading post in the nation! it was sweet. we’re definitely going back. once we got to flag we had mexican food at this little place that had the best salsa ever (daniel, in disbelief: “better than casa brava?!” sam: “yes, way better.”). it was wonderful to have a nice hot non-cafeteria food meal. after that, we ended up visiting a scrabook store, the dollar store, office max, and target. i got some binders for my units, magnets for board races, some sturdier teaching shoes (leather, ugh. i had to, though. desperation.), some stuff to make cards to mail out to people, candy for my classes, and some stuff for the girls at the dorm to play with (maggie and i both chipped in a got nailpolish, hairties, and some valentines). we drove back and stopped at a hopi trading post to get gas and pick up some arizona postcards. we got back to pinon around 11 and drove up to the gate at the school. it was locked shut. we parked at the post office and grabbed our stuff… maggie was sure that we’d have to climb the fence. i’ve never done such a thing. she shimmied up and through an opening and i passed the stuff through. i was getting pretty nervous that i’d have to live in the car for the weekend. i finally went over to the part where cars drive through and wiggled underneath the gap between the road and the fence. it was quite funny, because i’m a total wimp. but it makes for a good story. now i’m off to start planning and working on my shoe games story.

the plan for the week: teach like crazy people, then plan better and go back to flagstaff on saturday with enough time to stop and see all the sights along the way… the petrified forest, meteor crater, etc. we might be doing the grand canyon on sunday, seeing as it’s only about an hour north of flag. so who knows. we also want to hang out with some of the other IU people that are here teaching full-time. we’ll see… should be a hectic but fun week. we’re also going to try and organize a reading or homework club for the dorm kids. OH and i also have to do my first CC report for IU.

hagoonee’

ps, address:
Pinon Community Schools
ATTN: Samantha Martin, IU Student Teacher
PO Box 159 Pinon, AZ 86510

MOM: IT'S PO BOX 159, not 156. sorry!

i think it was the skinwalkers.

navajoland was fun today. it was fun yesterday, too, but… we got to teach today. i'll be taking over mrs. tom’s freshman english I class in a couple of weeks. two periods, each an hour and a half long. there are only four periods in the whole day. one of them is planning, and the other is mrs. tom’s native american lit class, which she’ll be teaching (and which I’m extremely stoked about).

mrs. tom is awesome. she’s very organized and up-to-date on teaching techniques and methods. thumbs up for sure.

the kids are very quiet. they all wanna be rap stars or something, too. se got to see their AIMS scores from last semester… all classes gained a few percentage points but sophomores dropped about 5% (in terms of number of students at grade-level in various subjects). percentage of freshman students at grade-level in reading? fifteen. the school has a plan called “55 x 8” to help motivate students. they're is shooting for 55% of students at grade-level in all subjects by may of ’08. that means we have a ton of work to do.

anyways. the big thing i’ll be doing is romeo and juliet. shouldn’t be too bad. there are so many resources for it. i just have to wade through the suggestions and find the stuff that will help me design an effective strategy for reaching my kids.

after school, maggie and i came back and served dinner. then we played with some of the girls, mostly string games. cat’s cradle style. the kids, boys and girls, know so many different string things. they all wear wraps of string around their wrists so they have something to do. i’ve got mine around my wrist. the kids were trying to teach us some tricks but they’re crazy fast and complicated. it’s fun, though, because the stuff has different names. jacob’s ladder is four diamonds. they have one called navajo rug, one called two coyotes, one called open gate. i tried learning two coyotes but it’s way hard. i did manage to learn two diamonds, though!

OK. i’m going to go get some rest, friends. hopefully i’ll have some pics this weekend because maggie and i are going to flag(staff). hopefully i won't get invaded by skinwalkers. maggie is sure she heard one in our room last night, in the bathroom, breathing. luckily i have my necklace. as for maggie... i guess i'll have to find her a medicin man.

"how do you speak in indiana?"

today was our arrival in pinon. we finally made it. we left the shade-conolodge and stopped at a tiny gas station to fill up before heading to the reservation. it was raining and i had to pump standing under maggie's umbrella. i had to pre-pay, and the little old navajo woman had to tell me the trick to get the gas to come out of my pump. it was charming, in a scary sort of way.
we headed out of gallop and drove towards window rock, the first big city on the reservation (and, as maggie reminded me, the capitol). the navajo national history museum, which we had planned on stopping in, was closed, so we kept driving through window rock. we started getting up higher into the mountains and crossed paths with a rather fierce blizzard. i was driving, which was fine, but the car doesn't have four wheel drive, which i was nervous about. i ended up getting behind a truck and going 30 mph or so for about 10 miles, up and down hills, completely unable to see anything except the truck and the silhouettes of dark green pine trees. out of nowhere, the storm stopped, and the skies cleared. we continued!

since we had to drive through chinle which is fairly close to canyon de chelly (pronounced shay), we decided to stop and see the sights. canyon de chelly is awesome. so beautiful. i took a lot of great pics, which are on my flikr account. we hiked a bit and went to a couple different lookouts. it was super windy and chilly, but definitely wonderful. i also got to break in my hiking boots. they're working just swimmingly.

after that, we headed to pinon. the drive there, about an hour away from chinle, was incredible. once we got into town, we were happy to find cows, horses, sheep, and wild dogs roaming free, sometimes getting in the way of the car. i really hope to get some experience working with animals.

once we got to pinon itself, we realized a couple things. one: it's smaller and more run-down than we anticipated. two: the schools and the bashas' are the nicest places. we drove up to the community school and talked to phyllis, who said we would be living in a house instead of the dorms because the student population is decreasing, so they closed all of the dorms but once, which has only one bathroom per floor, hence the housing unit assigned to us. BUT there isn't any furniture in there yet, so we're staying in a totally empty dorm for (hopefully) tonight. mrs. denali was the dorm lady who helped us out, and she was very friendly.

after settling into the dorm, i took a shower and a nap. maggie and i went to the cafeteria at 5 and helped serve dinner to the students. we got a chance to eat, too. janet was the cafeteria lady that we helped, and we sat with a lady named nora, who talked to us about the school and the kids. i kind of got a more traditional vibe from her, since she kept looking behind me and not necessarily directly in my eyes. i just followed her lead. most of the other ladies look right in my eye, so i'm not feeling as anxious about that whole thing as i was prior to getting here. the kids were adorable and just like "regular" kids, whatever that means.

after dinner, we helped clean up, cleaned tables, and mopped the floors, which was a workout, for sure. now we're relaxing in our dorm, waiting for tomorrow....

TOMORROW. now it's today. we get up. we get dressed. we get psyched. we look out the window. it's a blizzard. we drive to the schools. it's a snow day.

we go back to the community school (aka the dorm, henceforth known as pcs). we go serve breakfast, clean the cafeteria, mop the floors (twice). we go to the kids' dorm to see what's up. we hang with some boys for a bit, watching spongebob. i bring in pickupsticks and dominoes and tangrams, thanks to mom. they are a smash hit. we play a few more board games. we go serve lunch, clean the cafeteria, mop the floors (twice). we collapse in our rooms. i get depressed. then we serve dinner, clean the cafeteria, mop the floors (twice).

we go to bashas' and get bashas' cards. we're official residents of pinon now. we get some stuff to eat since we have the evening to chill out, watch tv, compute, and rest. we head back to drop off stuff and see what the kids are doing. maggie goes to the dorm and i go to the gym. big kids play basketball, little kids play eat-popcorn-and-drink-slushies-from-the-consessions-stand. i chat with nora, and she tells me about her family. we head back and the kids eat chocolate cake and drink cocoa. now we're back in the dorm, using the computers in mrs. benaly's office.

heard a girl say "that's cheap" today. she said it when she found out we don't get paid.

i can't describe how amazingly cool these kids are. i'm always in awe of most kids, but man. these kids are so helpful and kind towards one another, so mature, and so intelligent. they are way more mature than their "regular" american counterparts, i'd say. they're so funny. they're always trying to test maggie and me, too, by telling us blatant lies. we catch them. we've actually got some of them believing that we're living in chinle (1 hr away) in a hotel. we just didn't want them finding out where our dorm is (since there's no lock!). i've been having a great time just getting to know them... mostly the younger ones. i'm still scared of the high schoolers.

today was definitely an up and down day. i felt depressed in the afternoon, but hanging with the kids was so awesome. i miss my friends and family, and daniel, and bloomington, but i'm feeling good about getting settled in here and starting to meet people. i met this awesome man named gerald today. he's a cafeteria worker. he was really interested in us and was into sharing stories about his life. he also told us to beware if a navajo man says "hey, shhhhh!" because it's a love-call. he invited us to a mystery event (dance?) at his house on friday. pumped. also hinted at further events that may occur down the road. double pumped.

got a really nice email from alys today. also one from my AI tim and another participant who's staying in kayenta, paul. got a couple of reports to submit to IU tomorrow... on snow day #2. we'll see how long we don't have school.

warning: gusty winds may exist

trail
Originally uploaded by roxbnl8

today was certainly the most entertaining day of our adventure. we spent the day driving through and exploring new mexico, the land of enchantment. we've stopped in gallop, nm, about 2 hrs or less away from pinon, az. we're at a very shady econolodge... when we got to our room there was a kid sleeping in one of the beds, and he belonged to the family of navajos working the front desk.

our day started out in texas, land of cow concentration camps. we saw a bunch of cows getting ready to be slaughtered, and it was terrible. there was some pretty nice scenery, there, though, once we got closer to the tx/nm border. after crossing into nm, things got even better.

we ate lunch in albuquerque, nm, at little anita's. we stopped again just outside of albuquerque at rinconanda canyon, home of the petroglyphs national monument. a bunch of rocks with ancient carvings. there was a mile-long trail, which we hiked. the weather was beautiful- probably about 55 degrees, sunny, and breezy. we could see the rockies from the canyon, and it was totally quiet and there was hardly anyone there. excellent adventure. we got back on the highway and stopped again at a small indian art store, then another, which was owned by a terribly nice laguna lady whose relative has a relative who's studying optometry at iu.

then we drove to gallop and explored a bunch of american indian trading posts. the population is gradually becoming more american indian. it's rainy, and we're probably going to order pizza later and just hang out tonight. tomorrow... we'll be at pinon! i'm terribly nervous but also extremely excited. ahoy.

check out the flikr pics by clicking the pic above.

"we're in texas, and it smells like shit!"

well we're in a less swanky hotel in amarillo, texas! it's a travelodge. some of the outlets don't work. texas smells like manure, but the skies are clear. we drove for 12 hours today, stopping for breakfast in the dismal but dismal cuba, missouri jack-in-the-box. i had grilled cheese and applesauce. the guys didn't wait up for us... we ended up driving to oklahoma trying to catch up and then passing them when they were stopped (unbeknownst to us) at a GUN MUSEUM. we caught up with them, though, at a cherokee trading post in oklahoma. we had dinner there, too, and the boys almost got me to eat a bit of buffalo steak... i might have to eat meat on the rez and the idea is that my stomach will get used to it, but... i didn't eat it (even though the waitress showed me an info pamphlet about it and it was 100% organic, etc). i just don't want to eat meat now only to find out that i don't have to eat it on the rez.

interesting sights today: tulsa and oklahoma city, big ol' crosses along the highway, wild turkeys, two dogs on the side of the road (alive- hopefully still alive), sheep, horses, cows, falcons, hundreds of billboards for maramac caves in MO, a beautiful sunset, gary and berta (the guys), my expanding postcard collection, cherokee stuff.

right now i'm going to brush my teeth, read/write a bit, and get some sleep. we're going to try and make it to albequerque or gallup tomorrow. i can't wait to see the mountains in new mexico.

CONGRATS, DANIEL! yesssss.

st louis

st louis
Originally uploaded by roxbnl8

well i'm at a swank hotel with wireless internet, so i'm going to write something. where might i be? st. louis, missouri. holiday inn. st. louis isn't very far from indianapolis, really. maggie and i drove about four hours to get here... we arrived with plenty of daylight and decided to stay because we have more days to get to the rez that we actually need.

after realizing that we were completely out of gas, we decided to go to the arch and worry about finding a gas station later. there was a "western expansion" museum underneath the archway, describing thomas jefferson's plans for developing the country. it was incredibly fitting because the archway is "the gateway to the west," but also quite surreal because of the whole white america killing american indians and sending them to reservations and now we're going to student teach there deal. after the museum, we went up to the arch. we rode in tiny white pods which clanked and tilted back and forth the entire way up. the top of the arch overlooked the mighty mississip and st. louis. we looked out of tiny windows about three feet long and one foot wide. after that, we found a gas station (thanks to a nice attendant at the arch info desk) and grabbed lunch in union station. i had a nice falafel. now we're back at the hotel-motel-holiday-inn.

i got a call from gary and his placement partner berta, and we're going to meet up with them tomorrow in oklahoma.

bookkeeping: i set up a flikr account. click the pic.