Work and school

So since January 4, I have started working as a Teacher Assistant at Crescendo Charter School. I am so happy to have gotten out from my previous job. Let's just say, it was for me a second-best decision to have stayed there. I am glad I have moved on, and this time, I am in the field where I am passionate about and where I am really directing my career into - EDUCATION.

Crescendo Charter School is under LA Unified School District. It has many locations but I am assigned in the LA campus, along Western/Martin Luther King Blvd. With this job, I get to work under the direction of a credentialed teacher, Miss Panaga, in her 3rd grade class. I assist her in everything, from sharpening students' pencils to teaching the lessons in small groups in her class. I greatly admire her for organizing her big class of 29 third graders - how she can lead them to enter the classroom in the morning without noise, make them write in their journals quietly, make them all listen to her, and many more. She is Filipino, by the way. I was not sure at first but when I entered her classroom and saw the pictures of her family and boyfriend (?)displayed on her table, I was 85% sure she is. We have not talked anything about our personal lives. We do not have time. We have not talked in Filipino yet. I am not even sure if she speaks it because her English fluency is excellent. I finally became certain that she is Filipino due to two instances : 1.One morning, she is talking about imagination in class and her example was that she is imagining she is in the Philippines and she even mentioned that it takes almost 16 hrs to get there: 2.While she was relating a story in class, she has interchanged HE and SHE and she only realized it 3 minutes later. The latter is so common among Filipinos who do not grow up and whose first language is not English. I know I will learn a lot from her and her class. I am so receptive to learning new ideas. I am trying to gather as many ideas as I can for future use.

I work from 8am to 1pm every school day in Miss Panaga's class. Then I get a 2hr break. I usually stay at the conference room with my co-Teacher Assistants Miss Newton and Miss Guerrerro to chat and surf the internet. Then at 2:45, we start getting ready for the After School program. I handle the first graders who stay after school to do their homework while waiting for their parents to pick them up.My day ends at 4:45.

This job is soooo much better than my previous job. I love it. It is sometimes hard to deal with kids but that is the challenge there. You get to listen to them, anticipate what they are thinking, discipline them, talk to them, help them, and most especially, care for them.

This year also marks my first time to be in a Masters program. USC accepted me last year and I did not expect I would finally get myself into this. I am with their Masters in Teaching program + credential. It is a one-year program and at the end of this, I will be a credentialed teacher. I will be able to teach finally at any elementary school in California. I am very much looking forward to that.

As I was reading the syllabus of my first class, I realized that God is indeed the best Director in my life. My first class requires me to do school observations, interview school staff, analyze instructional materials, etc. and with my present job, I need not go out to complete such activities because I can do it in my school. Amazingly perfect. Had I stayed at my previous job, I would be a bad employee because I need to be absent every time to do school observations and interviews. I could not afford not to work. Bills need to be paid so this setup is perfect. Thank you, Lord.

I do not have complaints. Everything has turned out perfectly and I credit everything to God.

My motto for this year "No Complaints" is still on. =)