Why I Love Words

I started to like words in high school, but I don't think I started to love words until I became a teacher. Even as a student, I saw the value of improving my vocabulary, and I generally accepted vocab lists and quizzes with more grace than my peers (at least, I hope I did...) because I figured it was good for me.

But, I don't think I discovered the magic of words and word choice until I started teaching, and started to take vocabulary seriously. Ask any of my students, and you will find out that my vocabulary lists are a bit of a terror: my students are required to memorize the definitions of the words (as well as spell them correctly). Why do I do this? Because I, too, was a high school student, and I was quite skilled at looking at my vocab list the morning of my quiz--for the first time--and then acing the quiz. Our vocab words weren't that hard, but at the same time, I didn't really remember the words well: I didn't learn the word as I should have.

It was as I began to compile these lists for my classes that I began to sincerely love words. I think as a student, I managed to get away with knowing the sense of the meaning of a word because I was well-read for my age, and had mastered the "figuring out from the context" trick. But, as a teacher, I couldn't get away with that: I actually needed to know what words meant. So, my vocab list compilation was not simply an exercise for my students, but for myself. Many of the words that were on the lists were words I didn't know well, but writing the lists and sentences forced me to use them. I started to pepper my speech with the words that I learned that week, and even found and bookmarked dozens of websites with awesome word lists. I started going to etymology websites to read about the history of a word. This is all a little embarrassing to admit, because it is evidence of the obvious: I am a total nerd.

Last year, I remember getting furious after overhearing a conversation outside my locker (my room is right by the high school lockers at DA; I was not eavesdropping, I promise. This was a loud and obnoxious conversation that was for anyone to hear). It was a group of freshmen, and they were talking about their vocabulary list for their English class (not mine, however):

"Dude, I don't get it."
"Huh-whaa?"
"This so lame, man. Like, when are we ever going to use these words in real life? It's, like, so dumb."
"Uhhh, ya. You're so right, man. Why do we have learn these words, anyway? It's so dumb, Dude." Loud guffaws of agreement from the other freshmen.

AAARRRGGGGG!! Said the teacher from inside her classroom.

I was furious because I was--and am--so frustrated that we as a society seem willing to settle for less knowledge these days rather than seek out more. Why not learn more words--why not increase our vocabulary? Why not learn that math problem that we may never learn in real life? Is there no value or beauty in learning something for the sake of learning?

The English language has the largest number of words of any language in the world (because it's a combination of so many languages) and there are incredible words for remarkable specific things. It's so cool (a simple word, I know) to be able to have words like: "fidimplicitary" and "akimbo" and "bruxer" and "avuncular" and "ripsnorter" and "balderdash" and "lachrymose."

Why are we willing to walk around in the world satisfied with the level of learning we have? If we lose our thirst for knowledge, our thirst for understanding: are we still human? If we're just willing to get by with what we have, willing to learn only what we need to survive, will we become something other than human some day? Some kind of strange devolved creature?

I don't know--and I hope that we never find out. I hope that we go to Mars, even if it costs a lot of money. I hope that people continue to invent crazy new forms of poetry, even if they don't appear to make much sense. I hope that people keep writing novels from strange and bizarre perspectives. I hope that people keep using mathematics and physics to build incredible architectural structures. I hope that we find the cure to cancer, and AIDS. I hope that we as human beings--as individuals and as a society--never lose that thirst for knowledge, understanding, and beauty that discovered vaccinations, that inspired "Hamlet," that composed "Ode to Joy" and that gave us the airplane, the Mona Lisa, and the Pythagorean Theorem.

And that is why I love words.

On Actually Becoming Miss Bowers

Sometimes, entire days go by in which I only hear my first name once--to the extent that I actually am surprised when I hear some say "Danielle." It's shocking to hear my first name.

How does it happen? How did it happen? How did I slowly morph into Miss Bowers? It's not that Miss Bowers has such a different identity or personality than Danielle, but she is different. I don't know when exactly it took place. It would be cool to be able to pinpoint it, like in one of those inspirational teaching movies where the teachers have this awesome moment where they help a child understand what a verb is, or how to add 2 and 2, or when they stand up to the mean kid in the class who's been making their lives miserable, and it's that moment that the music sweeps up, and the audience knows: they are now a teacher.

I don't know that real transformations are that specific. Sure, there are events in our lives that we can certainly point to as the start of a transformation. For example, as a born-again Christians I can say when I became a Christian: the day, the hour, the place, etc (even though I don't remember it well--I was 3 or 4). But, on becoming Miss Bowers, I do not have an inspirational movie moment. I think it was in the day to day business of being a teacher--until suddenly I looked up from my stack of grading and realized I was no longer pretending to be a teacher, but actually was a teacher. Strange--a bit scary--and yet cool at the same time.

I'm still Danielle, but most days, I'm more Miss Bowers than Danielle. Miss Bowers has no problem walking into a crowd of teenagers and joining their conversation, whereas Danielle would never do that. For example, last year when I took a french course in Switzerland, I landed in a class full of students who were the age of my students. I didn't get to know a single one. It's terrible, I know. It wasn't the language barrier, because many of them spoke English. But, I was Danielle, not a teacher in that environment, and I couldn't bring myself to attempt to infiltrate one of those groups. Danielle doesn't even do that well with her own peers, much less a group of teenagers.

Miss Bowers is funnier than Danielle, I think. Or, rather, Miss Bowers can get away with incredibly corny jokes that Danielle would never be able to pull off. (Of course, then you have to wonder if Miss Bowers really does pull them off, or if the students are just laughing at her. I prefer not to know).

Miss Bowers can get away with using big words in conversation, whereas Danielle was (and is) usually made fun of for her vocabulary and love of words.

Miss Bowers is tougher than Danielle, because Miss Bowers has realized that sometimes when someone says something to you that's rude, or mean, or treats you disrespectfully, it's not personal. Danielle still has trouble realizing that. Miss Bowers also deals with confrontation better than Danielle--if someone (by someone, I mean students) is rude, mean, disrespectful, hurtful: Miss Bowers has to deal with it, so she does. Danielle avoids confrontation at all possible costs.

And yet, it actually isn't a dual personality. Being Miss Bowers has made Danielle a better person, I think. I hope that I'm stronger, that I'm not as shy, that I'm more comfortable with strangers, that I'm better able to stand up for what I believe in. Being Miss Bowers has taught me to pray without ceasing, has taught me that I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me, but I can do very little on my own power. I think I'll be in the teaching profession for a long time yet, but if I ever decide that it's no longer the career path for me, I think Miss Bowers will stay a part of my persona for a long, long time after. And, I'm glad, because I kind of like her.

Goals for the "New Year," Part I

The start of a school year is always more like a "new year" for me than January 1st. I've never really felt inspired at the beginning of the calender new year because there's no real distinction, as a student and now as a teacher. But the beginning of a school year is a different matter altogether--there's been an entire summer of thinking and preparing, and perhaps for some, dreading, but whatever you believe about school, you come with a blank slate and a new start. New students, new teachers, new possibilities in the clean, unwrinkled loose leaf paper in your binder, or in the fresh, unmarked rows and columns of your grade book.

And, so, every start of the school year (I say this as if I've had many, many of them but I've had only three as a teacher) I ask my students to write down their goals and dreams and hopes for the year ahead. I don't know if they always take it seriously, but I think a few do, and that's enough for me. Some of the goals that they posted on the bulletin board this year stated:

"Never fail a test" or
"Graduate" or (and my personal favorite)
"Get my teachers to bake stuff for me" (this was by the same student who wore a white t-shirt yesterday that had written in permanent marker on the front "I is a senior").

Okay, so not entirely challenging goals, but most were quite sincere.

So, what are my goals for the upcoming year? What do I want to accomplish? What areas do I need to grow? How can I become a better teacher? How can I become a better person? How can I become a better Christian? So, here are a few of the myriad of possibilities that crowd my brain as I stare at that fresh blank page in my grade book and at that bulletin board filled my students hopes and dreams:

1. Get past chapter one of Bonhoeffer's "Cost of Discipleship" (I've started it at least twice).
2. Turn my grading around faster--don't leave it till the last, embarrassing minute.
3. Get to bed by 10:00 as many school nights as possible.
4. Avoid staying at school to work past 10:00 pm (I realize this counter-acts the previous one, but oh well)
5. Get organized: by sorting my giant file folders from last year, and by keeping up with my paper work from this year
6. Read the "PPS" every week, even if it is an attachment. :) And then, pray.
   
7. Stay in better touch with my supporters.
8. Keep up with my attendance on RenWeb...
9. Do a better job of contacting parents of students who are struggling.
10. Teach more grammar!
11. Find a prayer partner.
12. Bite my tongue.
13. Write to my far-away friends.
14. Get to know my students better outside of the classroom context.
    
15. Spend more intentional time with my brother and sister.
16. Become a better listener.
17. Eat more vegetables.

Okay, enough for a Part I. I'm going to keep musing...and keep sharing.

What, I wonder, are some of your goals?

Test 1...2...3

I promise this is the last one for the day! I am simply testing to see if my blog is importing all on it's own to FB...or visa versa, however it works.

Okay, I'm off to bake a cake and cook taco meat. Strange combo, I know, but I'll just let it be a mystery...

A Note on These Notes

If you're on FB and reading these notes, I'm attempting to import my blog "Becoming Miss Bowers" to appear on my FB notes. So, some of them are a bit old. Feel free to read them--but stay tuned for hopefully more current updates! Or, just go straight to the originals:

http://missbowers.blogspot.com/

The Deliquent Blogger

I'm thinking about changing the name of this blog to the Delinquent Blogger. But, then I'm afraid people might think I'm in "juvy" or something (I can't even spell "juvy"). Although, I may get more hits on the blog, that way.

I've decided that I'm going to try to maintain this blog...famous last words, I know. (Sorry, I'm usually most snarky when chatting with myself.) I heard a quote recently that said in order to become a "master" in some area, whether music or art or some other skill, you need to put in 10,000 hours. Ten Thousand hours. That's quite a daunting amount. So, some day, I'd like to write "for real": as in, write a book or at least get a short story published. So, while I'm not going to post creative fiction, I should write a bit, every day. Maybe by the time I'm fifty, it will add up to 10,000 hours. So, beware as you read: you are not reading the works of a master. You are reading someone who likes to use to many dashes in her writing--and knows it; someone who probably has too high of an appreciation of the semi-colon and sprinkles it liberally through out, and, someone who should know better when it comes to grammar, but generally goes with her gut rather than pull out the dusty grammar textbook. (I promise, Dr. Bressler, if you should ever read this, which I desperately hope that you don't: the only reason it's dusty is because I live in Africa. It sits on myself at school, and I use it somewhat frequently...)

The other reason I want to try to maintain this is because I tell my students that we should write every day, and even though we don't, I still tell them we should. So, here's a taste of my own medicine for better or for worse.

But don't expect me to post more than once a week...or every two weeks.

Tech Frustrations, Part II

(So, I'm an atrocious blogger. I can't even call myself a blogger, but at the same time...I want to have a blog. I want to be kind of cool and trendy, but I'm really bad at blog upkeep and I'm really not cool and trendy. Just goofy. Oh well, so I'll post once a year, and that will be that. )

I was reading through one of my posts from about a year ago, towards the beginning of the school year, and I had to laugh and sigh, a bit. It was about my frustrations about technology...but what it was really about was my frustration with myself: that when I spend time with God in the morning, I can still come so easily undone by 1st period. How can little things like printers not working, or running late for staff devotions throw me off so much that I feel like I didn't pray for half an hour this morning? Today was "one of those days" and I simply could not get a handle on my entire day. I guess God is still teaching me...that I don't just need to intentionally consider His presence and relationship with him in the mornings, while all is calm, and I'm hold a delicious mug of coffee in my hands, and the morning is cool and filled with possibilities...it's when the photocopy jams, the power goes off...again, my students don't listen to me, and I'm just running 1/2 a period late: that's when I need God, too. In the everyday, in the mundane, in the ordinary, in the hectic moments.

I'm still not sure how to not unravel by 1st period, other than constant prayer throughout the day, asking for patience. Twice I had to stop and pray at the computer in the teacher work room to stop freezing...and for patience and perspective (that it simply wasn't the end of the world, even if class was starting in 5 minutes). Maybe that's how it's done--constant prayer, constant dialogue with The Creator (which is totally awesome).

I hope God teaches me a lot about prayer this year.

Danielle Needs...

I tried that google search game. The funny thing about it is that other Danielle's have tried it, too, so they posted their needs on their blogs. Oh, well, I think mine is a bit different. I skipped some gibberish ones, too. What can I say? I like proper sentences.

1. Danielle needs a cheap, cheap notebook.
2. Danielle needs a makeover.
3. Danielle needs a nudge.
4. Danielle needs a hubby.
5. Danielle needs water.
6. Danielle needs our prayers.
7. Danielle needs a new hairstyle.
8. Danielle needs to go to bed, now!
9. Danielle needs to be re-evaluated.
10. Danielle definitely needs to take a trip to chicagoland!

My favorite is: "Danielle needs a hubby." Go figure. Maybe the universe is listening... :P

Rain: God's Glory in Senegal

All of my life I have loved African Rain, mostly because it is a rare phenomenon, even in rainy season in Mali and Senegal. As a child, when it rained, I would run out into the downpour, dancing and splashing until the storm was over. Rain in Africa is an entirely different thing than rain in America--I feel guilty about not loving rain when I live in North America, but North American rain, especially in the Fall, is gloomy, like something out of a Hawthorne novel. But African Rain is exuberant and delightful, like a P.G. Wodehouse novel. (I'm an English teacher--I have to have some literary analogy, right?).

In August, an unusual thing happened: it rained every day for about 16 days. Every day, we had a storm. This does not happen in Senegal, especially in Dakar. No one really understood it, and although it clogged up the streets with mud puddles and impossible traffic jams, and meant our laundry never dried, we loved it. How could we not?

This is the month of Ramandan, a month of prayer and fasting for Muslims. One night of Ramandan is particularly special, because it is the night that Mohamed is supposed to come and visit in dreams (the "anniversary" of the revelation of the Qu'ran to Mohamed). And so, the people pray for dreams of Mohamed. (On a side note, this is often the night that many muslims have Jesus dreams--but that's another blog). This special night happened a few days ago, and in some parts of the city, there was a particular group of Muslims, called "Bi-Falls," who prayed all night in accordance with their religion on this night of power--a group of over 500 men. They were flagelating themselves (beating themselves), cutting themselves with knives, and inflicting other self-torture (think of the prophets of Baal), all in order to convince Mohamed to visit them in a dream.

Connected with this night of power, the big Marabou's (the islamic religious leaders) said that it would not rain again in Senegal. I am not sure why--to prove their power? As punishment for something? I don't know, exactly. Sorry to not have that detail. But, when we heard this (and it had been many days since no rain) we began praying because we could not let Satan win.

And, yesterday morning, in answer to our prayers, about 8:00 AM, the storm began to blow. The clouds began to pile up, darker and darker over Hann Park, and the cool pre-rain breezes began to breathe across the city. Around 8:30, the first rain drops started to fall, and they fell faster, and faster, and faster. When the bell rang, the students came streaming out of their classes, twirling and dancing and reveling in the rain drops. They ran around, cheering and whooping for joy at the rain. When it rains in Africa, there is dancing and celebration. Two of my AP Lit. students begged me to let the class take a lap around the court in the rain, so I said yes, and as the rain poured down in steady, but gentle streaks, my seniors ran around the court again and again, leaping and laughing in the rain.

I always begin my classes with a reading of a psalm, and as I opened my Bible to read to them that morning after their Rain-Laps, the power clicked off, and it was dark in our room, but the rain streamed down outside, and I read by the dim light of the window. And this was the Psalm:

Psalm 29

A psalm of David.

1 Ascribe to the LORD, O mighty ones,
ascribe to the LORD glory and strength.

2 Ascribe to the LORD the glory due his name;
worship the LORD in the splendor of his ^[a] holiness.

3 The voice of the LORD is over the waters;
the God of glory thunders,
the LORD thunders over the mighty waters.

4 The voice of the LORD is powerful;
the voice of the LORD is majestic.

5 The voice of the LORD breaks the cedars;
the LORD breaks in pieces the cedars of Lebanon.

6 He makes Lebanon skip like a calf,
Sirion ^[b] like a young wild ox.

7 The voice of the LORD strikes
with flashes of lightning.

8 The voice of the LORD shakes the desert;
the LORD shakes the Desert of Kadesh.

9 The voice of the LORD twists the oaks ^[c]
and strips the forests bare.
And in his temple all cry, "Glory!"

10 The LORD sits ^[d] enthroned over the flood;
the LORD is enthroned as King forever.

11 The LORD gives strength to his people;
the LORD blesses his people with peace.

As I read it, thunder crashed triumphantly, and lightening flared victoriously, for God had shown His power, His majesty, His Awesomeness.

And, this morning it rained again, another gentle reminder to the people of Senegal that Yahweh is the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords, the God enthroned above all other Gods.

To him be the power, and the glory, and the honor FOREVER. Amen.

Thankful, part I

I wrote a post on how frustrated I was the other day. And, then, I started thinking about all the things I love about my work, and my life here in Senegal--thinking on the many blessings that God has provided.

• Getting to see my brother and sister every day.

• Morning greetings from my students.
• Walking to school and watching the sun rise above the park.
• Running water in the Sandcastle.
• Access to an English library.
• Bright smiles.
• Laughing with my students.

• Grading student's poetry.
• Teaching people how to write
• Watching Christian run across the court at 7:55 AM with a standing fan.
• Edam Cheese.
• Fast Internet--and a laptop.
• Coca-Cola.
• The ocean.
• Cool, shady trees.
• Jack Johnson (okay, so, he's not technically a "Senegal" blessing but I discovered him since I've been here, and I just really like him very much.)
• Being able to go to IBC (International Baptist Church of Dakar)
• The IBC choir--it's just so much fun to listen to!
• Watching the Varsity Girls Volleyball team.
• Coffee
• The Caddie (the near-by grocery store)
• Cold Water
• Having a maid so I don't have to worry about laundry and sweeping and stuff.
• Zucchini Muffins
• Electricity
• Early, crack-of-dawn mornings with Jesus
  
• Being able to be a Christian teacher--as in, I don't have to consciously not incorporate Christian teachings and beliefs into my curriculum.

I'm also thankful that it's Thursday, that it's a short week, that tomorrow I get to go to the Meridian for staff retreat , hang out with senior girls in the evening, and eat yummy food. As Pastor Baafi says--"God is good--all the time. And all the time, God is good."