21: Back to School

Today was a preparation day for the math term test tomorrow.  It was long.  That was the only thing planned for the day.  So for the last 25 minutes of the day Erlend decided that he was going to put on a Donald Duck cartoon.  It was Donald Duck in Numberland or something like that.  The video talked about how mathematics is in everyday life, specifically in music and in nature.  Looking around I found that most of the students were engaged in the cartoon.

The other thing that was interesting in the review was that I learned how students are taught about canceling things out if there are fractions.  The kids were really good at prime factorization of numbers.  That is an easy way to reduce a fraction because there are only prime numbers in that factorization.  Then you just cancel all the same factors.

That touches on the teaching strategy that students are able to write and then rewrite expressions in different ways.  They then understand that sometimes it makes more sense to write an expression in another way.  For example: 10 is 10 or it is 2+8 or 2 x 5 or any number of things.  It just depends on the rest of the expression that you would really want to know the best way to express the number.

After school we played volleyball first with Stein and some students from his school.  That was fun and fairly intense.  Everybody really seemed to have a good time.  Then at 9:45 we played volleyball again with an older group.  That was also really fun.  I was really happy with how I played.  I got some good blocks and some good spikes.  Goals achieved.  I also scared some people by how hard I hit the ball when I spiked it.

20h: Easter Week - Sunday - Krakow, Bergen, Rosendal

Happy Easter.  Again we were kind of pressed to get to the bus station since we weren’t exactly sure about things getting to the airport and what not.  We grabbed the plate with two rolls and I downed a cup of milk and then we were off.  The offices at the bus station were all closed and there weren’t many people around to ask for help.  But we found the bus number that we needed and the machine that we could buy tickets from.  The machine was kind of dumb and wouldn’t take the 10 zloty bills the first time.  This caused Kylie and Ashley to be really stressed.  We eventually did buy our tickets and get on the bus with plenty of time to spare.

20g: Easter Week - Saturday - Krakow

Famous Polish statue in Old Town

It was nice to be able to wake up and then not be rushed to get on a bus.  This time we were able to eat breakfast and really enjoy it.  Today we went on a walking tour in the morning and then on a Jewish quarter tour in the afternoon.  It was a lot of walking.  According to my Jawbone we walked about 14 miles today.  We were pretty tired.

To be honest I don’t remember much of what was shared in either tour.  It would have been nice to have seen Schindler’s List before going on the Jewish Quarter tour because that was referenced a bunch in the tour.  It was nice to learn about the dragon of Krakow in the first tour.  There was this cool statue of a dragon that literally breathes fire that Nika (tour guide) explained the legend behind.

20f: Easter Week - Friday - Krakow, Auschwitz

Today was our first (full) day in Krakow, Poland.  We had to wake up early in order to get on a bus to go to Auschwitz.  I was having a nightmare and I realized it so I just woke up.  Luckily it was like 7:25 and so I was only waking up like 10 minutes before my alarm.  I was dreaming that I was teaching but then whatever lesson I was teaching I hadn’t prepared well and things weren’t organized and it was just horrible.  Woke up and got ready super quick and then went upstairs for breakfast and get our premade lunch.  We had the cocoa puffs again with milk but we really had to eat and run.  We also had to take the lunch (a normal roll with ham and cheese and a sweet roll) and put it together hastily.  Then we were off to the races to get to the bus station.

We hurry to the train station/mall and then realize that we needed to keep going through and actually find the bus station.  By the time we find the Kassa it is 8:30 which is the time that the micro-bus leaves.  So I paid for tickets on the 9:00 bus and everything was cheeky-pookie.  We got on the bus and on the way there a couple people that had to stand.  The guy and girl nearest to me played the 20 questions game.  I ended up taking a nap and listening to music and playing the game flow free for a while.

20e: Easter Week - Thursday - Ostrava, Krakow

After waking up we ate our small breakfast that we had bought the previous day in the supermarket in Prague.  I enjoyed my sweet rolls with jam and tangerines.  We got checked out of the hotel and then were off and on our way.  We weren’t really sure about the buses so we just walked from the hotel back to the city center.  Then we looked around for a grocery store for food and they were nowhere to be seen.  We decided that there would be food at the train station so that was our new goal.  Get to the train station.  We looked at the signs by the bus station and found a route that would work.  But then another bus came and it had the name of the train station on it so we ended up just taking that bus instead.

We get to the train station and Ashley goes up to the cashier and asks for information.  The woman then says, “Opposite kassa” a bunch of times getting louder each time she says it.  Ashley didn’t know what she was meaning but I got it.  She was saying, “Opposite register” so I pulled Ashley aside and we went to the place we needed to.

20d: Easter Week - Wednesday - Prague, Ostrava

The key to the luggage room. (So that it is
easy to find and hold onto) 

We woke up and had the cocoa puffs and the orange juice again this morning.  It is just so easy.  We also got our sandwiches from the hostel and put everything in the luggage room because we had to check out of our room.

Today was the day that we had the walking tour with Derek.  But before that we walked to the Old Town Square and went to the top of the tower that they have there.  It was cool to be able to see all the different places that we had been for the past two days all laid out with distances.  It was cool.  I think there are some pretty good pictures from that morning.  I was concerned though.  My iPhone turned off and wouldn’t wake up.  Then even when I plugged in my mobile charger it didn’t do anything.  So after the tower we stopped at a gift shop on the way back to the hostel and got a postcard and then I stayed at the hostel to get my phone to charge.  Kylie and Ashley went to the post office to send postcards.  It was at this time that we meet these two Americans that were traveling Europe after graduating from college.  They had already been traveling for 3 months and were hoping to travel for another 3 months.  I think that that would be really hard to do.  It is a taxing thing to continually stay in hostels and always be on the road with a big backpack because you know that they have a big backpack since they have been gone for so long.

20c: Easter Week - Tuesday - Prague

Prague was beautiful in the morning.  The one nice thing about that first room was that it had a beautiful view of Prague in the morning.  Love it! 

We got breakfast (cocoa puffs and orange juice) from the hostel for breakfast along with a sandwich for lunch.  I don’t think that it would be hard for the hostel to provide that but it does make things really easy for the travelers.  That way they don’t have to spend money for breakfast.