Returned from 2nd day at CES 70, the Max Schoenfeld School (Excel every day... the Schoenfeld way!) a school apparently named for a dapper gentleman who used to stroll about the previously Jewish neighborhood wearing a top hat. My CMA group ('Corps Member Advisory'-- Teach for America loves acronyms, as well as corny team-building stuff) will likely be called the Schoenfeld Sharks after my roomate's drawing of a shark in a top-hat. I wanted the Jets, but was overruled, and roundly booed for the West Side Story joke. The past couple days we've had a lot of curriculum sessions where we cram about 30 of us into a 3rd grade classroom (complete w/ 3rd grade desks and tiny little chairs, the structural integrity of which was quite dubious) to learn about how to teach. Today we got "how to teach literacy" in about 1.5 hours... I think there's gonna be a lot of winging it. I found out my summer teaching assignment today- 5th grade enrichment class w/ Mr. Pichardo. He seemed like a great guy, and definitely tried to put as at ease as my collaborative (me, Jo from Arkansas, and Andy from Idaho-- Jo, Jeff & Andy sounds like a low budget radio morning show, maybe in the Harrisburg media market...) met with him today for the first time. Unfortunately we're picking up in the middle of the unit he started yesterday on a book called "Frindle", which I'm not really familiar with, so I think we're going to try to finish that up quickly and get on to our own plan. Right now we're going to try to do a biography unit. We only have 5 weeks, so we'll probably read some short bios and excerpts to and with the kids, discuss parts of biographies, etc., with the goal of the students researching and writing a bio of someone important in their family or neighborhood. Hopefully we can pull it off, it's a lot to do in 4 weeks, but TFA is pretty big on "big, ambitious goals that other people might say are unreasonable" (the catchphrases around here are rampant). Last night we had our opening ceremonies... I was pretty cynical going in (mostly from being hot and cranky, and, as my roomate J notes, "needing a nap" But despite some initially cheesy moments, it was really f*%*ing moving. (working on watching the language... misbehaving kids will now be "those flippin' kids") Anyway, got a another meeting tonight at 10 with my collaborative, and I'm still trying to cease sweating from the run I took 3 hours ago (followed by a 15 minute cold shower, then dinner in the ACed room... this weather sucks a lot) then perhaps bed. Our bus doesn't leave tomorrow until 7:15 so I get an extra half hour of sleep. Loving it.