Sara Sickels

Day 1: DONE!
Burpengary, Australia
So after having to re-check luggage, losing a day of my life, 2 hours of sleep, 9 hours of layovers and about 20 hours of sitting in airplanes we FINALLY MADE IT! First day spent in Aussie (pronounced OZZIE by the way) was spent hangin out with my host family, whom I already adore. The two boys, Luke and Ben, are so fun. They introduced me to a bit of Rugby and Aussie Rules (which is AFL, or Australian Football) which were really fun to watch. Hopefully I can catch a game of AFL while I'm here. I was also introduced to their older daughter and her husband over dinner, so we had a bit of good conversation. It's kind of hard to keep up with all the lingo. It was an early night for me as I was falling asleep at the dinner table.
Today we went to the QUT campus at Coboolture for our first day of orientation. We had a tour of the campus and got student ID cards to use while we are here. After coming back into town I finally got around to unpacking my bags and bought a cell phone to use while I'm here as well. I haven't done anything TOOOO adventurous yet, but there's still plenty of time :)
It's quite cold here tonight! Probably equivalent to mid-October. Jeans, a long sleeve t, and a hoodie aren't enough. I wish I brought more socks...
written by  Sara Sickels on August 16, 2010 from Burpengary, Australia
from the travel blog: Australia!!

whew. what a week
Brisbane, Australia
I've survived my first full week in Australia!! And boy, what a week it has been! Apart from the lectures and orientations at the Caboolture campus, we've had a few very exciting excursions.
Wednesday we visited the Wamuran school near the QUT campus and it was great to see a day in the life of an Australian school. The schools themselves are waaay different than those in America. First, every classroom is almost in it's own separate building, if not sharing with one other. The "hallways" are completely outside with only a roof to cover in case of weather. Students also eat lunch outside and they get about 2-3 "tea" times during the day. There's almost more eating and playing going on than time spent in the classroom! I had a wonderful teacher to observe for the day and I quite enjoyed it. Their school is represented by a pineapple, so we all got one as a welcoming gift :)
Thursday we went to the AUSTRALIAN ZOO!!!! :) Even though we might see koalas and kangaroos in the wild, I was so excited to see them up close. The zoo was absolutely wonderful. We saw the show at the Crocoseum and the birds fly directly over your head. Awesome. As a group, we spent the majority of our time in Kangaroo Heaven :) The animals are free to roam wherever and I probably befriended about 20 or so :) Such cool animals. I also held a koala and got my picture with it which was something I really wanted to do when I'm here. The koala was soft as expected, but stunk quite a bit. I think I smelled like koala the rest of the day.
Friday we just met with our supervising teachers and mine is soooo great. Saturday we had a 'barbie' on Bribie Island which is a bit farther north than we had gone before. Let me just say this... THE ISLAND IS GORGEOUS. We had the picnic on the non-surf side with the other homestay families and it was great visiting and playing (or in my case watching) cricket! A few of us also went down the beach for a stroll and out into the water on a sandbar, which was a bit deeper than anticipated so I had wet jeans the rest of the day. My homestay brought me over to the surf side (where you can actually see the span of the Pacific) and that beach tops ANY I've been to. And of course, my camera battery was dead the second I took it out so I don't have pictures of the beach. I also sat down with my family, had a coffee, and just took in the beautiful view :) Saturday night was my FIRST time seeing Brisbane while not being jet lagged! It's become my new favorite place :) Kelly, Emily and I ate dinner at the Plough Inn, went on the Brisbane Wheel and just drank in the awesomeness of Brisbane night life! It reminds me a lot of New York City. But classier? If that makes sense. All the shops close super early but we did hit up a few tourist shops :)
All in all, a very successful week :)
written by  Sara Sickels on August 21, 2010 from Brisbane, Australia
from the travel blog: Australia!!

Is it week 3 already??
Morayfield, Australia
I know I haven’t updated since last week (and even THAT was a weeks worth of recapping) but when lesson plans are on my mind every night after school, the blogging kind of gets put on the back burner. Then napping comes second :) So I’ll try to remember as much as I can from the past week.
The first day of school was a very exciting one. I had met my class the previous Friday, so I kind of already had a feel for how the class was going to be. The day starts with an “oral language” program where the students get up in front of the class to present a word of the day or the weather report. I think it’s a wonderful idea for getting students to be more confident with their speaking skills. It’s so funny hearing their enthusiastic (or not so much) morning greetings to the class. My first activity with the students was to help them work on research for an information report on a country of their choosing. I basically supervised their research and made sure they were getting the information they needed. I slowly started learning names, as well as who are the chatty ones and who are the trouble makers. After about an hour of research, I was able to introduce myself to the class. As a gift from MN, I had brought a picture book called “M is for Minnesota” for the class as well as a loon which makes the loon call when you squeeze it (the students had fun with that one). To start, I asked the students what the loon was since none of them had a clue. I got answers such as flamingo, penguin, duck, and swan. Hilarious. I paged through the book and read some of the more interesting (at least in my opinion) points. Amanda, my cooperating teacher, put together a folder so the students can take the book and loon home for a night to read it more in depth. So my kids should know ALLLL about MN by the time I leave :) I didn’t teach today, but we sat down to discuss what I would be teaching the rest of the week. On Mondays and Fridays, my teacher has an hour of Non-Contact Time, ON TOP OF the hour lunch break and half hour morning tea. I observed the rest of the day and started prepping for my first lesson on Tuesday :)
written by  Sara Sickels on August 23, 2010 from Morayfield, Australia
from the travel blog: Australia!!

“Good Morning, Ms. Sickels!” (boy does it feel good to be a teacher!)
Morayfield, Australia
This is a weeks worth of school day recapping. What a busy week!
TUESDAY
Today I taught my first lesson! I taught a Maths (yes it’s spelled mathS with an S) lesson on choosing the right sign for different algebra problems. I thought it went very smoothly! I was really worried about my accent (or what I consider my lack-of-Australian accent) but the students seemed to be able to understand me just fine. My weak spot, which I am well aware of already, is going over the time allowed. Yes, I said it. I go OVER the time allowed. I guess I plan too much? So much for worrying about under-planning. Amanda went home early today with a headache and said she was going to stay home the next day. I could choose to go experience another Year Four classroom or stay in the room and “watch the children turn into little ferals.” I think I chose wrong.
WEDNESDAY
Any other clinical day has been a piece of cake compared to this one. There are 2 boys in the class who absolutely do not follow the rules. They are pretty tame when Amanda is in the room, and they sometimes actually put an effort into learning (who would have thought with these two?!), but today they were another story. One boy refused to put his glasses on during the lessons, even though there is a note taped to his desk that says “ARE YOU WEARING THESE!!” with a picture of his glasses. Nope. Won’t wear them. Even after 4 warnings (which was 3 too many on my error). Then you have another boy who likes to throw rulers, erasers (which are called rubbers here… not to confuse you with another meaning), and cuss whenever he feels like it. The same two boys decided to pick on another boy during morning tea and made him cry. The first boy mentioned got a detention in the room and he decided to kick chairs around. Whew. What a day. Thank goodness there will be normalcy tomorrow. My lesson itself went well much to my surprise though. I taught a lesson on the different “ur” sounds in spelling. They were perfect angels for me. Who would have thought?
THURSDAY
Today. Was. Fabulous. After Amanda had a nice chat with the misbehaving boys, the day was a breeze. I worked more with the research group (like every morning actually) but I had more of a relationship with the kids since they actually know a bit about me through my lessons. I try to use humor and light-heartedness, as I think it gets students to realize that learning can be fun and doesn’t have to be so rigid all the time. After that, I was stressing the rest of the morning as my full-hour lesson would be after morning tea. I figured I would do a 30 minute lesson and give the kids about another 30 minutes to do some fun activities. I taught my lesson on probability with spinners and had them split up into 5 groups for the games afterward. The lesson was AWESOME and they really got the concept. The games on the other hand were tough when planning, as I came up with them on my own (applause here). There was one in particular that seemed like it would work, but I never tried it. Using “pie” pieces that were sliced into different fractions, I had the students come up with a spinner that had one big chance, one medium chance, and one impossible chance of landing on it (if it were an actual spinner). I didn’t know if the pieces would end up fitting together but told them to try their best. BUT holy cow. They did it. It was such a highlight in my day that they actually thought outside the box and made it work. I wish I had my camera. The hour positively FLEW by. I think I’m going to like this teaching thing :)
FRIDAY
Today was a bit of a relaxer. I didn’t teach anything but did give the spelling test. All I can say is that my MN accent is way more prominent than I had thought. Amanda had to re-say about 3-4 words because the kids couldn’t understand me. That made me giggle a bit. We also got to plan my teaching for the next week. A couple more hour lessons!
I know I’m really only updating what goes on in the school, but I have absolutely enjoyed my time spent at the Kerber household. The boys are a hoot. Ken and Karen are so amazing and entertaining. Dinner is always a fun time and it’s a guarantee that I will laugh.
written by  Sara Sickels on August 27, 2010 from Morayfield, Australia

Awesome wave, dude!!
Mooloolaba, Australia
Originally, I had planned to spend the night in Brisbane with a sister of one of the girls that rides Karen’s horses. We were going to hit the town in our best party dresses (at least my best one that I had brought), maybe club-hop a bit, and go on a river cruise the next morning. Needless to say, the plans fell through but other (maybe better) ones came along. Saturday morning, Kari, Michael (Kari’s host dad), Megan, and I drove up the Sunshine Coast to try surfing. You heard me right. I actually tried surfing!! On the way we stopped at a bit of a look out to take a few pictures. WOW. The view was incredible. In all honesty, THAT is the reason I came here. Teaching in a foreign country is an awesome experience, but Australia has always been my number one go-to spot for international travel. I am so a beach girl.
After a bit of oogling the awesome beach coasts, we found our final destination at Mooloolaba Beach. Megan and I started with the 2 surf boards we had available, and Kari used the boogieboard. After getting adjusted to the water, which was a challenge in itself, the real problem is staying on the board. None of this “lets try to stand up and ride the wave like the pro-surfers we are” crap. I nose dived, slipped off backwards and had the board fly out from beneath me sideways. More times than I could count. When I actually maintained balance on the thing, the paddling was easier than I thought. I knew the front crawl move would be useful for something. When the waves were actually OF decent size, we paddled to try to get on top of the wave and attempt standing up or kneeling. Didn’t even come close. It was a blast trying though :)
We spent the remainder of the afternoon walking around the shops at Mooloolaba. Saw some things I was interested in buying, but wasn’t so interested in the cost. 600 bucks for shoes? No thank you. We also had lunch at the Coffee Club which was pretty close to the coast. I had a beer with lunch and it cost about 7 bucks. So is life I guess when you’re in a tourist trap. Besides my lunch, my only purchase for the day was a 5 dollar hat that only a tourist will wear :) After napping on the car ride home, the night was fairly uneventful. Had dinner with my family and went to bed early! Definitely a party animal :)
written by  Sara Sickels on August 28, 2010 from Mooloolaba, Australia

Welcome to the Sunshine Coast :)
Maleny, Australia
After sleeping in until 8, which was glorious, my host family took me up the coast for a little bit of sight seeing and shopping. Because shopping isn’t really preferred by the boys, we dropped them off at Aussie World for the day. Think of a county fair carnival. That’s about the quality of the rides. But they were so excited to sit on the bumper cars all day that it didn’t matter much to them. After saying goodbye, Karen and I headed up the coast to the Mapleton/Maleny area, which is basically central to the Sunshine Coast. I tried to stay as involved in the conversation in the car as much as I could, but I was so distracted by the beautiful hills and view of the entire coast. Once we reached the lookout, we were literally within reaching distance of the clouds. The entire coast was laid out before us. At that point I couldn’t decide what view was better, the land or the ocean from yesterday. When we were finished being in awe of the view, we drove about 20 km further to the shopping area. We grabbed a Coke for the walk, and started on our shopping journey.
I was planning on buying tons of unique stuff since my wallet was full of my recently withdrawn cash  Let’s just say… my lunch and gelato was the only purchase of the day. The shopping center has a lot of shops that would come in handy IF I had my own house. I mean “Christmas in July” and candle shops aren’t the kind of places I really had pictured shopping at. Regardless, we had fun walking around and window shopping. When I pictured shopping in Australia, I had imagined coming home with loads of new unique clothes that can only be found there. Sadly enough, EVERY item I had even considered buying was “made in china.” How lame. I found a few things that said “designed in Australia, made in Indonesia” which was a little better but I still didn’t feel like spending my money on stuff like that. Karen and I DEFINITELY made our trip to the Fudge shop worth it though. I have never in my life seen so many different varieties of fudge. “Kahlua”… “Chili Chocolate”… “Wasabi”… the list goes on and on!! I sampled about 5, including the chili chocolate. The chili doesn’t hit ya until the end! Karen ended up buying a few varieties while I was satisfied with just the samples  We ate lunch at (an overpriced) little shop and grabbed gelato for dessert! Since we had hit all the shops, we headed back to gather the boys up and, after given Ken’s armband, I was able to check out Aussie World a bit. Luke and Ben sat on those darned bumper cars for the entire time I was in there! I had hoped to beat them at mini-golf but no such luck.
written by  Sara Sickels on August 29, 2010 from Maleny, Australia

ZOINKS!
Tangalooma, Australia
Ok. I promise that after this last weekend’s update I will blog at least once every other day!! As much as it is a look into my daily life in OZ for those who are reading, it’s also a great way for me to remember little details so when I’m back in MN I can read my posts and reflect on the awesome experience I had.
Week 2 in the schools has, yet again, been so incredibly awesome. I’ve gotten to teach so many more lessons and I’m starting to feel really comfortable up in front of the classroom. Next week should be interesting, as I’m supposed to be teaching half days to FULL days during the last half of our time here. Wish me luck!
As great as Fridays are, I really couldn’t wait until 3 PM because it starts our weekend in Tangalooma!! After a few scheduling confusions and deciding to forgo Fraser altogether, we were offered to stay on Moreton Island FOR FREE! Jodie, one of the lovely school staff, offered up her beach-front condo for the 8 of us for the entire weekend!! So of course we couldn’t decline the generous offer. So after gathering all of my weekend necessities out of the classroom, I hauled my bags to the parking lot. Much to everyone’s surprise, Jodie got us a LIMO to take us to the jetty!! How wonderful! The last time I was in a limo I went through the drive-thru at Taco Johns. But that’s another story for a different time :) Once picking the high-school girls up, we were off to the boat which would take us to the island!!
Once arriving on the island, after quite a windy and wet ride, we were able to catch a glimpse of the dolphin feeding right off the dock. The resort has around 8 or 9 wild dolphins that come into shore every night to be fed! It was so neat to see them in the wild! Our group found our way to “Heaven” and boy were we in for a real treat. Our condo for the weekend was absolutely spectacular!! 2 bedrooms, 1 master suite including Jacuzzi, huge entertainment/living area, and the best part, a BEAUTIFUL seaside view of the ocean right from our patio. Jodie sure spoiled us!! We ate a quick bite at the Beach Café (who says cheeseburgers and chips are a bad meal?), and then had a little fun in the water :) It was such a gorgeous night. We all headed back to the condo, but Megan, Sarah, Corinne and I didn’t feel like staying in for the night. So the four of us headed back down to the bar, and jammed out to some awesome karaoke :) Megan and I were introduced to Chambord, which is a blackberry liqueur. Mixed with cranberry juice and fresh lime… it’s quite delicious!! It became our official Tangalooma drink! I had so much fun with those girls and it was definitely a great cap to a wonderful day already. Plus, cute Aussie boys at a bar? What could be better? :)
P.S. Scooby Doo was filmed on Tangalooma!! Hence the 'Zoinks' :)
written by  Sara Sickels on September 3, 2010 from Tangalooma, Australia

How did I get sand in THERE?!
Tangalooma, Australia
Saturday started by waking up an hour before my alarm was supposed to go off, but we all got ready quick to make sure we would be able to sign up for sand tobogganing!! Sand tobogganing = sledding. In sand. How cool is this?! The tour started in a fairly large 4WD vehicle and it drove us through some of the coolest forest areas I’ve ever seen. Once we slowed down a bit, we were able to see the MASSIVE sand dunes laid out before us! It was like looking at a desert! It’s so bizarre to think that something like that is even possible when just on the other side is beautiful ocean front. The crew quickly gave us the run-down on how to hold on to your boards, as well as techniques for not getting sand up your nose. I want to say the worst part about the trip was the finding-sand-in-your-ears-two-days-later thing but the climb up the monster hill was intense. Walking in sand is hard enough but walking in sand at an incline is worse. I was definitely out of breath by the time I got to the top but the view was amazing. Once I was up to bat, I was instructed to go head first on this piece of wood I was given. Yeah, right. Plus you have to hold the front end up the whole time otherwise you’ll get a face full of sand. So it was kinda hard to get the hang of it but once I was let go, oh man. What a rush! Once tumbling to the bottom, I found myself crunching sand in my mouth. Mistake 1: never open your mouth when going down the hill. The second time around I wanna say was even worse. Mistake 2: make sure you have something protecting your eyes because sunglasses sometimes don’t cut it. Yep. Sand IN my eyes and even behind my contacts. Very painful. But once I was able to rinse my contacts out, it was all good. There was a photographer taking pictures so we got some pretty goofy ones of our group :) We all stink at synchronized jumping.
Once the tour dropped us back off at reception, we were beach bound! It was quite windy but we were able to lay out for a bit before getting pelted with sand. I was even able to call home using Emily’s phone while we were beaching :) Because of the sand, we all relocated and Emily and I found ourselves at a secluded pool area. I read a bit of Harry Potter and fell asleep in the sun. What a great afternoon! When walking back to our home for the weekend, I spotted Sarah, Corinne and Megan at another pool so I caught up with them. JUST as I jumped in they said they were leaving. Thanks guys. So I threw my cover-up back on and took a nice little stroll along the beach by myself :) After showering once I got back, we got ready for dinner out! I didn’t like my outfit I had planned to wear (I wear it too much) and I remembered seeing a cute tube dress/cover up in the gift shop so I quickly ran down there and made a very fast 50 dollar purchase. I’m horrible at impulse buying, but hey! It’s a cute dress :) After getting beautified, we headed down to the bar to get a drink and watch the gorgeous sunset. We had also planned on going to a steak house for dinner but us 4 girls again decided to just get cheeseburgers and drinks since the nicer restaurant had prices to match. It was another great evening :) We came back to the condo and started watching Free Willy, in which I fell asleep to. Might as well rest up for tomorrow!:)
written by  Sara Sickels on September 4, 2010 from Tangalooma, Australia

Frankie :)
Tangalooma, Australia
Sunday started by a little sleeping in and a quick coffee down at the shop with some of the group. 6 of us had signed up for parasailing the previous day but it was canceled due to the crazy wind. Today’s weather was also crap, so we got our money back since we had it rescheduled for today. Megan and I were crossing our fingers and toes that the snorkeling wasn’t canceled too! We were going to do it yesterday after the sand adventures but we wouldn’t have gotten back in time. After we signed up (yessss), we were told to come back just before it starts to make sure it doesn’t get canceled. So the two of us arrived at 11, got our snorkel gear, and waited. Once getting my suit on the RIGHT way, we were told that us 2 were the only ones to show up. They said we could kayak out there and take our time, since they caused us “so much trouble”. So free kayak rental? And snorkeling as long as we want? UM OK!! After debating whether to take a single or double kayak (always go with the double), we were off to the shipwrecks!! The shipwrecks were placed there for attraction, but they are genuine shipwrecks. Plus they attract fish. So how could we refuse that?
Captain George and Co-Captain Sickels rowed against the waves and took in all of our beautiful surroundings. We abandoned ship after awhile and pulled our kayak the rest of the way. Megan spotted a few starfish along our journey and we held them which was really cool. These guys were huge. A couple was strolling along and offered to take our pictures with the starfish. We later found out that they were from Canada and on holiday at Moreton for the rest of the week. We had a nice conversation with them along the way. They gave us great tips for when we go to Cairns! We parted ways with them at the shipwrecks and Megan and I dove right in! After getting used to floating and breathing, plus the nervousness that comes with cloudy water, we hit the shipwrecks. Holy incredible. Because there wasn’t much sun, it made it hard to see the bottom. But once I was able to focus my eyes (and calm down a bit), all I could see was FISH. FISH UPON FISH UPON FISH. Swimming right past my face. I think I screamed into my mouthpiece with sheer amazing joy. Megan was the leader with her bright green flippers, and we snorkeled our way in and out of the ships. I don’t even know how to describe it except AWESOME. The Titanic scene where they pan over the shipwreck is what I saw. Right in front of me. Except there were tons of fishies. Megan and I stopped to rest on a sand bar right in the middle of the wrecks to de-fog our goggles and we were able to stand up. It was so amazing watching these fish swim right past your legs, right past your hands. After about another 20 minutes of discovery, we headed back to the kayak with wonderful memories. Kayaking back to the hut was easier and we ended up walking back to the wrecks to take pictures too. So we got our workout in for the day!
After a refreshing shower, packing up our things and cleaning the condo, we were home bound! It made it easier that we left on a not so sunny day but it was a fabulous weekend without a doubt :)
P.S. Megan and I named all birds, fish and starfish “Frankie” :)
written by  Sara Sickels on September 5, 2010 from Tangalooma, Australia

No More Ms. Nice Teacher...
Morayfield, Australia
Today started with the realization of EXACTLY why you’re supposed to laundry in the morning so it can hang dry all day. I threw a few loads in yesterday after I got back from school (which wasn’t until about 5) so my clothes had FROST on them this morning. So much for the outfit I had planned. Luke stayed home again today from school, and Ben is continuously coughing. I better stay healthy out here. Losing my voice last week was bad enough.
Interesting mornings lead to interesting days. Today was no exception. After the oral language part of the morning, I started right in with reading groups. The green group I had today was wonderful. They got a bit chatty when I started handing out their new activities but I was able to rope them back in. Because of the tight schedule, and teaching weakness of going over time allowed, I had wanted to wrap up the group after going around the circle one time. Surprisingly, the kids wanted to continue reading aloud. I had planned to send them back to their desks to continue working since I had about half of the remaining students come up to me with a question during small group. After they were actually sent back, I walked around the class to make sure everyone else was on the right track with their work. Never had I heard “Ms. Sickels!!” more times in a half hour. It seemed like every student had a question/problem/something amazing to show me. That was kind of cool actually :) Makes me feel more like a teacher! Once we were able to round up our farel little children (farel means wild) they started on their rough copy of their celebration report. Being that some chose Halloween, it was kind of neat seeing their interpretation of it. “Kids ask for lollies and scare people.” That being one sentence from a report! I had a laugh at some of them. During the work hour, a boy from another class came in to finish a few projects since his class was going to Special. One of the naughty boys was “coughing” but saying “loser” under his breath. I told him to knock it off since it’s not appropriate whatsoever and extremely rude. Not only did he not listen to me, but he said it RIGHT in front of that boy’s face. So I gave him a pink ticket which was my first one ever! Getting a pink ticket = detention. He walked out of the room with a smirk on his face but that was quickly wiped off after I gave him the run down. I was mean, which surprised me. But I finally got to use my mean teacher voice for a good reason!
After morning tea, the students got to work on a few math tests. One of them had a section devoted to chance/probability and another one for bar graphs, which were two of the lessons I taught the previous week! It was a true test for me to see if my teaching is up to par. I was supposed to teach a small health lesson during the last half hour of the middle session but the testing is more important, so it’s postponed for another few days! I corrected all 26 of one test and slowly started the other ones. Phew. Correcting is a pain. After a nice break at lunch with our strawberries (including wonderful conversation and enlightening details about Australia), the Year Fours headed out to the oval for our Cricket competition! The same two boys I had mentioned in a previous blog were acting up yet again and started pushing each other before the games had started. I was already on a ‘mean teacher’ roll so I quickly separated them and had them sit out the rest of the game. I had a chat with each of the boys to get their side of the story and how it escalated to the almost fight. They, not surprisingly enough, told different stories so Amanda said she would handle it in the morning. I ended up sitting with one of the boys for the remaining time and it turned out to be quite enjoyable. I had asked him questions about nothing, just to lighten the mood a bit. We ended up talking about a lot of really random things which kind of made me smile to be having this conversation with a 9-yr-old. I learned that his dad is a doctor (or at least used to be), he’s quite the dare-devil and has broken a lot of bones including his collar bone and leg, and he APPARENTLY knows Cary Hart. I think he was pulling my leg on that one. He was telling me all about how he rides his FMX bike and one time he went with a “really good” FMX biker to some track. He said something like “and his name is… Cary… Cary something…. Oh yeah: Cary Hart” At this point I had to do a double take because Hart is fairly well known in the States for his crazy bike riding. And this boy was telling me this story with a complete straight face. I don’t know what to believe! I told him I would need to see a picture of him WITH Hart to take him seriously. And he replied that the one he “does have” is in a frame at home and his dad wouldn’t let him take it. Ha. But the day quickly came to an end and I really did enjoy the time spent one-on-one with this boy. That’s one thing I LOOOVVVVEEE about teaching: you can be absolutely hated and the worst teacher ever one second, but by the end of the day you are their best friend. Once the bell rang he even turned around to say “Goodbye Ms. Sickels!” when he was already a couple strides away. Pure awesome.
Tonight at the Kerber house was fairly normal. After getting my dry clothes off the line, I did a little research in my Australia travel book for when we do our week in Cairns/Sydney. I think I found something up my alley: BUNGEE JUMPING. About 20 minutes north of Cairns, there is a bungee jumping spot where they have 16 DIFFERENT WAYS OF JUMPING!! Forget jumping in New Zealand; this is perfect. Now my mission is to convince the 3 others to go with. Otherwise I can go alone and just make the full day out of it… which you can do since they offer a package of unlimited jumps :) Otherwise, we did pizza for dinner and I finally got a plain pepperoni for myself. The pizza here is weird. They use barbeque sauce for some pizzas and the toppings are just bizarre. Now off to correct more math tests!
written by  Sara Sickels on September 7, 2010 from Morayfield, Australia