You Always Remember Your First........ ACES

An interesting fact about me I was not in FFA Not by choices my school was lame and didn't have an Ag program. 

With that being said This was my first ACES experience and boy was it an experience I honestly believe that may be my chapter should start leaving me at home,every time we go we are in the middle of  the storm of the centenary. After a change of plans do to the inclement weather I ended up riding with my chapter to ACES instead of  driving down and meeting them their, which turned out to be a great advisor learning moment. The school districts two vans had been reserved for us to take ,14 students, for a months. Saturday, however, when Mr.Campbell and Mrs.Reed went to pick up the vans there was only one not a pretty picture and 14 student standing in the pounding of the snow locked out of the buildings. Mr.Campbell called the bus line and a neighboring bus line to try and find our van or an alternative. Needless to say our 7:00 am departure turned into a 9:45 am  departure we asked two parents to stay that had larger vehicles so that the students could get out of the snow til the van showed once it was located 30 minuets away in Apollo. Always double check reservations on transportation, keep a paper trail, and have the person responsible on speed dial with plan B,C,&D. 

Once the van arrived and both were fueled up we loaded the students and headed for Donegal and the trunpicke, Which was a question if we could even get to after previous attempts two days prior in 4X4 the vans are only 2 wheel drive oh boy. We made it thankfully an additional hour later. The ride its self was interesting for me as I was with two of the three freshman we took with us they didn't stop talking the hole time and they had to ask Ms.Ross what she thought about every conversation topic on nothing!! We stopped for the restroom and a quick lunch and COFFEE Cup 1 around 11:55 am! We finally arrived right around 1:10 pm, missed opening ceremonies, and just made the first workshop. The students got their folders and took off  I got mine and the T-shirts for every one along with COFFEE Cup 2 ! During the AET teacher workshop it worked out quite well having a student account log in from 311 to work through the student side without making a fake one or messing a students up. Mr.Campbell and I switch for the workshop so He could see the student side and I could play with the Teacher side of things. I worked on the chapters website, highlight real of student SAEs !  Our workshop wasn't  as long as the students so we had time to check into our rooms before we had to keep track of all of our Minoans and their rooms. 

When every one was checked in we meet for dinner every on was there but the two freshmen Surprise Not they had gotten lost in their room Really? It was realized that we had forgotten the chapter camera amongst all the confusion in the morning. However, I had mine fro my blog with me so it worked out I went up to get it when I went to find our two missing girls. During Dinner they told us about their workshops and how We have to do the "Teach Ag Photo Contest for you (me)" and he last three students in my Leadership class deiced to join the rest and do the TAGS essay contest. They were dismissed and changed quicker then you would think possible to get ready for the dance I was just as guilty I wanted my Jeans. The student teachers found a table and kept tabs on our students, they all thought it was funny that one of mine had a fireman's helmet on til Meagan's came in with a full Spider man costume on. All the students' wanted was for the student teachers to join them on the dance floor they succeed for the Chicken dance and Timber  in hindsight may have been a bad idea for being sour form Thursday but it was great to see that the student really want to just have fun with their teachers and us student teachers.  

After the dance I checked all our girls into their rooms for the evening telling them to have all their stuff packed and ready to go before we all went to the moment of inspiration in the morning. Then I went with Quinn and Meagan to volunteer for courtesy call, which we thought went on till around midnight but they called us back before than. I relay felt like a teacher because I kept checking on my Freshman girls' room and asked Meagan to check my girlfriend to one of the boys room on her floor what felt like 20 times, checked on her room at least 5 myself.   Once back to our room we started to talk about our student teaching experiences but both fell asleep in mid conversation. 
 
In the morning I checked all our girls rooms again making sure they were all up and ready I didn't have to but I just wanted to check on them so the day was smooth running, that and if they listened to my instructions from the night before. They were all ready, well the freshman were missing from their room It scared the crap out of me and I started to panic. They turned up dressed and ready to go in the Girlfriend room.Thank You God! We all headed down to the banquet hall for our moment of inspiration and breakfast. during inspiration, Mr.Campbell was very impressed  that I had everyone there and ready to go ,I was relay happy to see one of the quieter girls who wasn't going to come volunteer for a part in the services. At the end of the closing program we instructed them all to go get their things and head to the vans. The ride home was just as interesting as the ride down, it really makes you appreciate and the weekends your student. We hit bad weather right on the boarder of Summerset and Bedfored and our good time home ended up 30minuets passed the estimated time, positive we didn't have to wait for any parents.

Overall my first impression of ACES was confused and it still is confused as to why chapters travail to Harrisburg for one not even a half a day of workshops squeezed into a short amount of time, the longest part is the dances! I feel that they need to look at the 4-H teen leader reiterate set up so that the students get more out of it and it makes it more worth wild for the chapters.

On to the Next adventure ,SLC, til then!      

All you need is Love......Well More like All you need is Food

Hi all I know I'm late again.....I'm working on it.

This week was full of those blog-able moments, in part some to Dr. Ewing's visit on Wednesday you can only give so many empty threats to students before they call your bluff ! Thursday had to be in my opinion, that is what this is all about,the one to talk about. In my large 8animal science class I am not playing favorites they are just very interesting students, they just as surprised by what they pull most of the time it was the last day of goat nutrition finally we went back to a point that was mentioned a few time throughout the lesson but never really hit hard "Goats are Selective Eaters". To  drive this point home I had them take 3 different kinds of cereal always remember to take the supply list wit you to Walmart or you end up improvising/ grabbing random crap you don't need or is just wrong it ended up being 2 kinds of cereal and potato sticks, long story short it worked.

The Students say food when they walked into class and Ms.Ross became "your my  favorite teacher". This went on up to the point I told them "Now, separate the cereal out again" after they had mixed it all up real good oh all the moaning and yet I found myself laughing at how fast their feelings changed ,when asked how did  you feel about that, hard or easy, it was the hardest thing in the world I know this could have gone wrong ,but I ignored this student frustration, it was really just high school students being high school students. After more discussion the next step was to remix the cereals together, boy were they hesitant to mix up as well as they did the first time, right up to the point I told them to put it into their zip lock baggie they thought they were down hahaha not so easy. For lack of better wording on my part I told them to take their bag and pound the crap out of it All the pounding and caring on made Mr. Campbell a little nervous because he came into the room pretty quick to see what was going on. 

Once the bags had all landed on desks and looked like sweepings of the floor the students were instructed to separate the cereal out again, they didn't whine this just laughed at me till they realized I was dead series. "It's Impossible" "It can't be done", "You're crazy" yes but that's not the point I picked the discussion back up and with the very first question , how did you feel about that, easy or hard? All the light bulbs went off at the same time I need sunglasses they were literally trying to scream the answer over each other  I was smiling so much and couldn't stop once order was restored each of them got to share or add on to the others thought on grinding the feed finer prevents goats from picking out ingredients in their feed compared to larger textured mix yes yes yes. After this great epiphany I figured I would go head and push my luck, so we mad a deal if they could answer all of my questions and each one of them answered just one correctly they wouldn't have a written quiz on Monday I was hoping this didn't back fire and ruin my day, Mr.Campbell's face definitely echoed that thought with a why are you pushing it. Lucky I wasn't disappointed by my students, each one of them answered at least one and they were all correct Ms.Ross was the favorite again  HAPPY HAPPY HAPPY, really made remember Why I love teaching Ag and me glad I stuck it out! It also probably didn't hurt that I left them eat the rest of the cereal and random things we didn't us.  

Til next time!