Star Students

Was it my dream that both of my sons were getting Star Students on the same month? It woke me up after I faced the reality at the assembly. It sure made me feel very proud that my hard work has paid off.

I received the first envelope from Ryan's teacher in his backpack. Seeing a white envelope did not across my mind that would brighten my day. When I first read the enveloped, I felt like I was a child jumping of a Christmas Present that I have always wanted. That was one of the destinations that I wanted him to achieve in his challenging class-mainstream class. His teacher chose him for Notable Improvement because he started out refusing to write a sentence a month ago. A month later, he wrote three to four sentences on his own. Not only improving his writing skills, he also was willing to complete the class task without needing to bring any extra assignments at home.

Frankly, I have to tell you. Ryan has come a LONG WAY. He used to have a REAL BAD temper tantrum such as throwing the shoes, helicopter or other sharp toys up in the air when he got frustrated. Several times in the past, he dashed off like he was a runner for the Olympic and won gold medal. But after he had learned to communicate from me and other people who also helped him changed for better. Instead of expressing his frustration, he also interacted and communicated well with his classmates, relatives and strangers from the playground.

Thus, I felt that it was right that he deserved to get a Notable Improvement for overall in academic and behavior as well. I MUST say that I very proud of him, so did all of the people who worked with him at his school site. At the award, Ryan was behaving WONDERFULLY without resisting to go up in a front of proud parents and teachers. He even participated lots of hand-on songs.

Ryan was NOT the only ones who got an award for this month. So when Dylan handed me a white envelope from his teacher in my classroom, it triggered to me that he must have done wrong. But I was so glad I was wrong because I was DELIGHTED to see that his teacher also noticed that he has improved incredibly in his combo class: 2nd/3rd grade class. It also meant that he received an award for "Notably Improvement" too.

His attitude has changed a WHOLE lot better after he came back from a Winter Break. He was more cooperated with us. Dylan has now accepted that he is now in a challenging class. The reason why the teacher noticed that he has improved a lot because he is able to do the Main Idea at 3rd grade level and had passed all of his multiplication table. I must admit that I did not learn to do the multiplication at the end of a third grade class, but Dylan is only second grade.

At the assembly, Dylan was SURPRISED that he was chosen by his teacher. (He did not know what was in the white envelope when he handed it to me) He had his chest stick out as he was showing his Pride. Who doesn't blame him? It made me chuckled and smiled to see that he was proud.

Again, I must say that I am incredibly PROUD of Dylan showing his best behavior and academic within a month. In my heart, he will continue to do from now on because he and I made an agreement that he would have a lunch with me if he shows his positive attitude all week.

The principal told me that it seldom to have a sibling getting Star Students on the SAME MONTH! She patted my shoulder for what I have done wonderfully to my wonderful sons: Dylan and Ryan. She even let my aide watched one of my students for an hour while I was able to witness my sons' proudest moment.

Stephan Speilberg II

Can you image having a child at age seven thinking about making a movie? It did not occur to my thoughts until one of the sign language interpreters told me what had happened during the recess. One of my sons, Dylan went up to his principal about wanting to making a "M.A.S.K" movie.

Then, she asked him what does "M.A.S.K" stands for? His instantaneous replied, " It stands for Maryland Avenue School for Kids." I have not thought about the meaning for each letter. He explained to her that he wanted to film about teaching students about the right and wrong things to do during school hours. That included recess. In the back of my mind, I inquired how often do I see the kids think beyond about the students' behaviors, including his own.

The principal did like his brilliant idea. She then told him that she will take into her consideration from his suggestion. That made me think about that he might be the next Stephan Spielberg II. For this reason of the possibilities, he loves to write, use his excessive imaginations, using his own camera including filming and teach others. Perhaps that explains the combination involved on my side of the family who were involved in stenographer, music composer, English professor that wrote five different languages and psychologist.

Native Indian Project

For the last two weeks, Dylan and I worked together on his project. We went over the information before he actually wrote on his project. Not only writing his report, he also make an Native Indian Project.

On the foam board, the dirt was made out of black coffee with glue underneath. Of course, I could smell the coffee though my husband and I don't drink coffee at all. We got the coffee from my mother in law before Dylan started his project.

Along on the board, Dylan put the dark and light blue, and silver to make a river. On the edge of the river, he put many tiny pebbles and the fish foam in the river. It looked GREAT, and even it looked real!

As for the tepee, David, Dylan's dad, helped to cut the shorter cone and put the sticks with hot glue. David put the brown felt to cover the tepee. Dylan did put the zig zag from my scrapbook borders (Am I generous to hand it to me?), and a Crow Symbols on his tepee. Near the tepee, there was a fire pit out of tiny pebbles and broken sticks with hot glue.

I also helped Dylan finding an image picture of buffalo skins from my printer. He cut the outside of the buffalo skin to put a display on his Native Indian Project. It was not an easy task for Dylan to put the display, so David ended up helping him a little bit by putting the hot glue so the stand would stay.

With the foams, Dylan painted the two rocks with white, light and dark brown. I must admit that he did a fabulous job making this rock looked real. While working on foams, we also put green mosses for the bush and berries. Dylan made a little attempt to put the hot glue on his foam with the mosses. He was braved enough not to get his fingers burned with my supervision. At the end, I had Dylan to think of ways to make berries looked real. He decided to cut in a half from RED Jelly Bean candies. Wasn't he cleaver to think about this?


Overall, I felt really good about doing well on his project. Not only making it look beautiful, I made sure he got all of the facts ready in case his classmates or his teacher ask him questions during the presentation.

Peace Building Assembly

Last Friday, Dylan's 2nd and 3rd grade classes did the Peace Building Performance in a front of the entire school and the parents who were invited to watch the performance. The entire class learn four songs in SIGNS! It was awesome to see all of the older hearing and deaf students signing together.

I had a little opportunity to video the show because I didn't realize the last song was short and sweet. It is called: This is My Song. While I was taking pictures and videoing my son, Dylan, a teacher who sat next to me telling me that she could hear Dylan's voice. I asked if he was loud. "YES!," said by his former 1st grader teacher.

By the time we got home from school, I asked Dylan a simple question what made him singing LOUD. His response was, "I wanted my voice to be heard!" It reminded me like Martin Luther King Jr. who also wanted his voice be heard, too.

Our New Toy

A night before Inauguration Day, we set up a tape recording because we thought we might not have any access to watch the live news of Barrack Omaha. We wanted to play it safe.

However when we came home from work, we discovered our 27" T.V. had died on us. We were not able to watch from the beginning of the live show from tape recording. We only had a little chance to see it from the re-run news.

Buying a brand new T.V. constrained us to spend our money for this one. It took us a while to decide which size we wanted to buy: 46" or 52". I did want to buy a smaller size because of the cost, but David was the opposite- 52." After we finalized to get us a 52", I must admit that I was glad we got this size. This T.V. is able to adjust different fonts, sizes (especially for us reading the captions from distance), colors, and the size of the screens such as standard, wide screen or full screen.

A Sweet Surprise B-Day Party

When I first opened my classroom's door, I was staggered to find a birthday balloon, small flowers, and cupcakes on a mini table before the school started. Then, I automatically knew it was my aide because she has an access to get in the classroom. She was able to sneak in and set up an early birthday message. As soon I got out of my classroom, I was about to meet my students at Peace building Circle. I forgot something. Know what happened to me? Believe it or not, I locked my classroom out on my birthday! It left me no choice for ending up being embarrassed when I had to asking my secretary to hand me a spare key. She laughed, but did not realize it was my birthday.

As soon some of the Deaf and Hard of Hearing discovered it was my birthday, a friend of mine asked me why didn't I open my mouth. I simply replied that I am not the kind of a person who bragged about my "upcoming" birthday. We teased each other that we both were officially "29 years old!" Wouldn't it be nice to rewind my age?

Just before the kids' recess, the four Deaf and Hard of Hearing classes from Pre-School to fifth graders came to celebrate my birthday. They all were grateful to get away from working and eating the vanilla cupcakes, popcorn, and a cup of Orange Juice. Drinking Orange Juice may sound strange to you, but knowing it was a perfect morning snack especially at this season. All of the deaf students and staff sang in a song in both signing and orally. I admitted it was a nice feeling seeing them signing a song for my special day. Not only eating a snack, I got two extra gifts: screw punch from Martha Stewart for my scrapbook and candles and handmade soap for my bath.

When all of the kids headed for their recess, I also headed for my break. Without realizing, both of my sons Dylan and Ryan also heard that there was a surprise birthday party. They were upset that they didn't get a chance to sing a song for me. Ryan told one of the interpreters, "I'm MAD, I'm MAD at my mom!" Boy, I felt so bad! I did make it up for later of the evening.

When we got home, there was a package waiting for me that I had an eye from my sister in law, Deby's basement. She had 20 multi-colored drawers for the scrapbook. I thought it was an ideal place to store all of my scrapbook items in one place. Thus, my sweet husband ended up buying me for my birthday gift. He also brought me a bonquet of red carnations for my birthday. I am pleased by getting what I wanted for my birthday, instead of getting 4 boxes of 50 Tupperware each. (Clue: It happened to me once on a Christmas night.)

The boys were thrilled that I chose to go out to Souplation for my birthday dinner. They loved it. While we were there, the cashier did not charge me because it was my birthday. It sure saved my husband a ten dollar buck for my meal. Not only getting a free meal, the manager decided to give me a bag of homemade chocolate chips cookies. (I'm not always fonds of eating cookies, but knowing that it made my boys happy.) They even had a chance to sing me a Birthday Song.

Overall, I would say that it was one of my nicest birthday gifts I have had. Getting a sweet surprise b-day party was a nice way to start off the day despite of locking myself out of a classroom.

Life with Romero

Both of my sons, Dylan and Ryan, received a Happy Meal from McDonald's for a lunch treat from me. Inside of Happy Meal, there was a toy dog from "Hotel for Dogs" movie. They were thrilled to get a toy, though they have not seen this movie.

At first, both stick to their dogs on their first night. But not Ryan. He was very attached to his new friend, Romero. He actually takes Romero with him EVERYWHERE he goes. Trust me, he does! The pictures of his new friend, Romero tell it all !

Romero was encouraged to try his new meal.

He was nurtured to learn to brush his teeth.

Ryan was teaching Romero to read, "The Racing Cars " book.

On a third night, Ryan was happy to sleep with Romero.