Life has sure been busy since my last post.  We are completely settled into our new home and have really started to enjoy our routine.  We are spending much less time shopping now that we have everything we need and are eating out much less, which is good because I am not sure how good the trips to burger king were doing me.  Gavin recently acquired a new tricycle which he is enjoying but not quite grasping the concept of pedaling.  It has a handle bar so we steer him and push him around the compound while he keeps his feet on the pedals.  He is developing into a little trouble-making tantrum-throwing sentence-speaking toddler.  He loves to color, he loves to play with play-doh, he is learning to sing, and he loves to do puzzles with Mommy.  He loves to climb, dig, run and wrestle with daddy.  I was quite impressed he only tried to eat the play-doh twice and I am quite sure he concluded that he did not like the taste.  He will get t over excited and begin drawing on the floor, walls, and couch with the crayons if given just a split second with out us.  Another thing he has started to do is snatch pens from my school bag and tear off down the hallway dive on the floor of his room and immediately scribble as much as he can on his floor before we apprehend the pen from him.  He keeps us on our toes.

Michael has been very busy organizing all of our media onto these media devices that categorize our entertainment from music, shows, movies, kids shows etc.  He downloads all the new shows and movies from the United States and we are never have a shortage of things to watch on TV.  Mike also figured out how to get kindle books on our phones and so we won't be without books from the states either as we have yet to find a decent book store with books here in Al Ain, there are of course some of the popular books like twilight and John Grisham novels or harry potter in all the book stores but you just can't find a store where you can stroll through browsing the fiction section as the English sections are minimal (there are book stores that would be fun in Abu Dhabi or Dubai but none here so far).

I am excited to announce the grocery stores here seem to be acclimating to the western presence here as I am finding more and more things I actually want to or know how to cook.  I still miss my lazy lazy frozen stouffers lasagnas, my x, y, z meat helpers (i.e. chicken helper) and rice a roni packets!  And have yet to find powdered mashed potatoes or stove stop stuffing or Cambell soup!  I have not been to the store called Spinneys and hope to find it soon as it is said to have all the western stuff for a unreasonably high marked up price that I just may pay 5 dollars a box for some kraft mac and cheese lol.

A little over a week ago I finally got my residency visa which means I am legal so thus starts the journey of sponsoring Michael and Gavin.  Lots of driving around lots of official translated documents and important stamps and letters for this and official letters for that, then jump over a tree, across the river, over the bridge, sing while hoping on one foot, and do the hokey pokey....no seriously I don't know if I will every get this visa sponsoring stuff done! I hate to be that girl that complains about the country she is in but this country dots their i's and crosses their t's a few too many times!  Then they have to stamp everything.  I get frustrated because everyone needs official copies, you cannot for example scan and email someone a copy of something, you must drive there and they must stamp it and you must sign it, I digress...

One last complaint preceded by the statement that I am very happy with my girls.  I love them to death!  I love teaching here, I love watching them learn and at the end of the day I know I belong in this classroom.  I have some great routines going and some real learning is happening with my girls here. I get along well with all my colleagues and feel blessed to be at such a wonderful school that is working so hard towards the reform. But....I know you were waiting for the but!

The paperwork is far more extensive then it was in the states.  I thought it was actually quite overwhelming in the states as I was a special education teacher and I had to track modifications/accommodations, I had to track academic goals, I had to write IEPs, compile re-evaluation packets, and in the case of a behavior problem I had to conduct functional behavioral analysis', then write a BIP, and then implement and document the BIP and it's effectiveness.  In addition to rolls as a special educator came all the data that the state wanted to show that we were making academic progress and evidence.  But at the end of the day there was a form and a process that was consistent through out the state of New Mexico that was explained to us in detail.  When we used a new  program for data we were trained on it (and we complained a great deal about the waste of time on these trainings).  I complained so much about all this paperwork in the states.  I miss forms, processes, and consistency!

My job here in the UAE is constantly changing, they tell us to do  something one way and we spend hours and then they change their mind...this is very consistent.  We are expected to map all of our students in six areas three times a year and this I can handle, but the way of mapping has been explained to me in multiple ways and I still have no idea how I am supposed to do it.  They have given us a lot of "creative freedom" on how they want this done which means how do we do this?  How should we do this?  So we all come up with different ways and then they decide we should use high lighters on written forms after I spent a few hours creating templates on the computer that I can use to type things in and eventually make it easier.  Then I am handed a nice binder with a pack of high lighters being told they decided we would hand write these forms and color them with high lighters.  Just to exemplify....

In addition I have been told I must map my students in the standards of reading and writing, math, and Science ( pages and pages of standards that are not even realistic for students that are learning in a second language and that have limited proficiency).  I have to gauge if they know all the standards.  The idea here is that each girl with have this binder (so 48 binders total) that will have samples/evidence of their work completing each standard.  We will then check off each standard as they complete them and in theory at the end of the year we will have these binders with check lists that we turn in showing their process as they completed all the standards (I am thinking there are over a hundred standards for all three subjects combined).  I will have to pour myself over these 48 binders three times this year and can you imagine how large each binder will be for each girl?  Not to mention how tragic it will be for me as a teacher to sit there and realize how many of my girls cannot even complete these standards.  For example do you know of a Spanish speaking student in the third grade in the states that speaks limited English that can state the scientific method or tell you the categories of animals under vertebrates and invertebrates in English (maybe in Spanish) ?  I am trying to remain positive and hoping that somehow I will find a system to make this part of my job a learning experience, and beginning to think I should compile some data myself and write a dissertation for my future doctorate or some kind of paper I could publish? Right?  Do we see the Nobel peace prize in my future?  I am only kidding but I really have to find some way of validating this large  of a work load for myself as I fear that these beautiful binders that I will put together will simply be tossed a side with the intentions being good and they will never be put to use.  I digress...thanks for listening to the ramblings.

Yesterday, Mike and I had our three year wedding anniversary and it was quite nice!  I found the Spinneys and bought a six pack of wine, oh yes six whole glorious bottles of wine sit in my cupboard at my beck and call.  I made a lovely meal, I say lovely because all other meals have been a flop and or just "OK" and this meal of butter filled whole cream chicken and mushroom Alfredo and garlic bread was simply divine!  We had seconds and brownies.  It was really lovely...we put Gavin in his room with his new babysitter Diego...do not judge, sometimes we need our time!  It was really nice...to three years with the most wonderful friend and husband!

Today is sort of a fun day at school, I look forward to a day of henna and dancing and food at school and then we have an entire week off of school for Eid, so Happy Eid!