Less than pleased to find Proust in the Pere Lachaise Cemetery in Paris.
To have students interested in reading it is important to avoid books such as Remembrance of Things Past and The Scarlet Letter. Books need to be age appropriate, entertaining, and applicable for the students. It is imperative for students to know the relevance of reading the text. All of the texts I truly loathed seemed very irrelevant in my studies.
I share the view of Oscar Wilde, “If one cannot enjoy reading a book over and over again, there is no use in reading it at all.” Reading for students needs to be enjoyable and should never be more painful than being skinned alive like reading Proust is. Teachers need to be less hung up on finding texts that others have been deemed to have a particularly outstanding literary importance and find texts that will be more enjoyable to the students. Perhaps students could have options of what they read in class. Maya Angelou, a renowned poet in our time has said, “Any book that helps a child to form a habit of reading to make reading on of his deep and continuing needs, is good for him.” It doesn’t matter if this is Captain Underpants or Tom Sawyer; the importance is that the child is reading. Reading is at the foundation of our society. I think that you can help students to see themselves as readers by letting them see you as a reader, encouraging reading, and providing opportunities to read. You can take opportunities to read to your class, let them know what you have been reading over the weekend, as well as have books related to your subject that students can look at when they have completed assignments early. Teachers can also create activities which center on student reading.
This antidotal text describes efforts to read Proust rather well:
Crawling Up Everest
By Russell Baker
On July 18 the two of us set out together to read Remembrance of Things Past by Marcel Proust. We have been reading it fairly steadily ever since, thanks to our stocked kits of smelling salts, and are determined to keep on reading until we either finish or die in the attempt.
Our first diary entries--of a Shackleton's expedition in literature--are presented below because this is a moment that cries out for public examples of heroism to remind us again of the greatness of which Americans are capable.
Few deeds can be more heroic than an attempt to read Remembrance of Things Past from beginning to end. Some persons will quarrel with this. Some will argue that true heroism lies in sitting through all of Wagner's Die Valkyrie. Others will hold that it consists in enduring a festival of Andy Hardy films. Every man has his Everest. None is so formidable as Remembrance of Things Past.
Remembrance of Things Past is longer than Everest is tall. When all seven volumes are piled together the stack is more than six miles tall. This great length is due not only to the incredible number of strained similes contained in the novel's seven volumes, but also to the dense layers of tedium packed into almost every paragraph.
Reading it is a feat to test Hercules, Washington, Lindbergh, John Glenn or John Wayne. "Life is too short and Proust is too long," Anatole French is said to have explained when asked why he had not read it. Perhaps so.
To help in the struggle I have retained a Sherpa reader who is highly prasied among his countrymen for his ability to read anything. His name is Tenzing. Once Tenzing read the inaugural address of Warren G. Harding in its entirety, and to show that this was not a fluke, went on to read The Last of the Mohicans almost halfway through.
To protect ourselves against the temptation to cheat by skipping several volumes, we are reading aloud, every last word. The opening diary entries follow:
July 18: Would anyone believe 12,000 words about a man who had a hard time going to sleep when he was a boy? We read twenty-two pages of this before Tenzing gets ugles and say I have betrayed him by not telling him that this is a plot to bore him to death. Fortunately, I am asleep by this time and cannot take offense.
July19: Another twenty pages today. The narrator--Proust, I suppose--still couldn't get to sleep. In a sudden flurry of narrative action Proust drinks a cup of tea and eats a cookie, which remind him of his boyhood, especially an aunt and a church he associates with that age, and an inability to go to sleep.
July 20: Only six pages tonight. Proust remembers the church again and, in a plot complication, recalls a stained glass window. Tenzing revives my heartbeat with brandy after seven hours of reading the paragraph on pages forty-nine, fifty, and fifty-one. Our medical team pleads with us to turn back.
July 22: Our first crisis tonight. Lifting the book to begin, I was seized with acute indolence, which the doctors say is common in the tertiary stage of tedium gravis. It was brought on by my conviction that Proust was going to remember the church's steeple while my life ebbed away.
Recovered enough tonight to read again. Proust tells absolutely everything about a meal that was prepared when he was a boy--asparagus, chicken, potatoes, marrow, spinach, apricots, roast leg of mutton, biscuits, preserves, coffee, cream, pepper and salt, bread, butter, knives, folks, spoons, table cloth ... Tenzing says I must get a grip on myself.
July 23: Tonight we read for three weeks and finish nine pages. Proust reads in his garden and remembers veal.
July 24: Hurrah! Seventeen pages in just thirty-two hours tonight! Proust thinks of an invalid aunt and a musician who rather thinks he would like to play for some guests but is too shy to mention it.
July 25: Tenzing is in a deep depression. "That rotten Proust is going to think of the church again," he predicts at dinner. "Compared to Proust," he tells me, "Uncas, Chingachgook and Warren Harding are as much fun as Mae West." I take Tenzing to see an old Terry Thomas movie, which reminds both of us of brussels sprouts.
July 26: Refreshed by our night off, we plunge through twenty-seven pages about Proust's boyhood passion for hawthorn blossums. Tenzing collapses in hysteria, cursing hawthorn blossums, spinach, church steeple and stained glass windows.
Our medical team order us to take a week off. With 60,000 words behind us we have barely dented the book, but we feel heroic and American. Next week, says Tenzing, who has peeked ahead, the plot will thicken. He believes Proust is about to take a walk in the country. I already begin to look forward to it. Or is it merely anticipation of the ticket tape parade up Broadway?
Friday, October 11, 2013
Blog #3: Affective Dimensions of Reading
Affective Dimensions of Reading
I consider myself a good reader. I like reading and I generally don't find difficulty in reading. I’ve been reading since I was young. My mother used to read us children The Great Brain as we ate breakfast. She encouraged me to read and helped me to grow my own collection of books; I loved reading The Bearstein Bears and still own quite the collection of the series. Now I enjoy reading junior fiction. I relish in stories of fairy tales, princesses, and that sort of thing. I like reading when it is for my own enjoyment and personal pleasure. I also don’t mind reading textbooks if they are particularly interesting (but one can only read so much textbook in one day).
I enjoy reading except when it is something that I don’t like to read that is forced upon me because I naturally don’t read things I don’t like to read, like obituaries. I only read the comics in the newspaper, and that is a tendency of persons who are more likely to be depressed, but I completely understand why they don’t read the rest of the paper. I dislike very much historical fiction. I also don't enjoy analyzing texts. My most unpleasant reading experience with French literature was very unpleasant, rather painful, and I’m quite sure I am still scarred from the experience. While studying in France I took a French literature class in which the professor took enjoyment in torturing us by requiring us to read À la Recherche du Temps Perdu, (Remembrance of Things Past is the English title, not that you should read it unless you wish upon yourself a slow and painful death) by Marcel Proust. I hate Proust. I respect that he has some writing skill, but really when your skill is putting to sleep through fifty pages about how you can’t sleep one night, no one wants to read on and find a sentence that is NINE HUNDRED FIFTY-EIGHT words long. Proust drags you through time so slowly that to quote Proust himself, "An hour is not merely an hour.” No, it is much more painful and drags you slowly, ever so slowly through the coals of hell. See the end of this post for an excellent piece on the attempt to read Marcel Proust.
Less than pleased to find Proust in the Pere Lachaise Cemetery in Paris.
To have students interested in reading it is important to avoid books such as Remembrance of Things Past and The Scarlet Letter. Books need to be age appropriate, entertaining, and applicable for the students. It is imperative for students to know the relevance of reading the text. All of the texts I truly loathed seemed very irrelevant in my studies.
I share the view of Oscar Wilde, “If one cannot enjoy reading a book over and over again, there is no use in reading it at all.” Reading for students needs to be enjoyable and should never be more painful than being skinned alive like reading Proust is. Teachers need to be less hung up on finding texts that others have been deemed to have a particularly outstanding literary importance and find texts that will be more enjoyable to the students. Perhaps students could have options of what they read in class. Maya Angelou, a renowned poet in our time has said, “Any book that helps a child to form a habit of reading to make reading on of his deep and continuing needs, is good for him.” It doesn’t matter if this is Captain Underpants or Tom Sawyer; the importance is that the child is reading. Reading is at the foundation of our society. I think that you can help students to see themselves as readers by letting them see you as a reader, encouraging reading, and providing opportunities to read. You can take opportunities to read to your class, let them know what you have been reading over the weekend, as well as have books related to your subject that students can look at when they have completed assignments early. Teachers can also create activities which center on student reading.
This antidotal text describes efforts to read Proust rather well:
Crawling Up Everest
By Russell Baker
On July 18 the two of us set out together to read Remembrance of Things Past by Marcel Proust. We have been reading it fairly steadily ever since, thanks to our stocked kits of smelling salts, and are determined to keep on reading until we either finish or die in the attempt.
Our first diary entries--of a Shackleton's expedition in literature--are presented below because this is a moment that cries out for public examples of heroism to remind us again of the greatness of which Americans are capable.
Few deeds can be more heroic than an attempt to read Remembrance of Things Past from beginning to end. Some persons will quarrel with this. Some will argue that true heroism lies in sitting through all of Wagner's Die Valkyrie. Others will hold that it consists in enduring a festival of Andy Hardy films. Every man has his Everest. None is so formidable as Remembrance of Things Past.
Remembrance of Things Past is longer than Everest is tall. When all seven volumes are piled together the stack is more than six miles tall. This great length is due not only to the incredible number of strained similes contained in the novel's seven volumes, but also to the dense layers of tedium packed into almost every paragraph.
Reading it is a feat to test Hercules, Washington, Lindbergh, John Glenn or John Wayne. "Life is too short and Proust is too long," Anatole French is said to have explained when asked why he had not read it. Perhaps so.
To help in the struggle I have retained a Sherpa reader who is highly prasied among his countrymen for his ability to read anything. His name is Tenzing. Once Tenzing read the inaugural address of Warren G. Harding in its entirety, and to show that this was not a fluke, went on to read The Last of the Mohicans almost halfway through.
To protect ourselves against the temptation to cheat by skipping several volumes, we are reading aloud, every last word. The opening diary entries follow:
July 18: Would anyone believe 12,000 words about a man who had a hard time going to sleep when he was a boy? We read twenty-two pages of this before Tenzing gets ugles and say I have betrayed him by not telling him that this is a plot to bore him to death. Fortunately, I am asleep by this time and cannot take offense.
July19: Another twenty pages today. The narrator--Proust, I suppose--still couldn't get to sleep. In a sudden flurry of narrative action Proust drinks a cup of tea and eats a cookie, which remind him of his boyhood, especially an aunt and a church he associates with that age, and an inability to go to sleep.
July 20: Only six pages tonight. Proust remembers the church again and, in a plot complication, recalls a stained glass window. Tenzing revives my heartbeat with brandy after seven hours of reading the paragraph on pages forty-nine, fifty, and fifty-one. Our medical team pleads with us to turn back.
July 22: Our first crisis tonight. Lifting the book to begin, I was seized with acute indolence, which the doctors say is common in the tertiary stage of tedium gravis. It was brought on by my conviction that Proust was going to remember the church's steeple while my life ebbed away.
Recovered enough tonight to read again. Proust tells absolutely everything about a meal that was prepared when he was a boy--asparagus, chicken, potatoes, marrow, spinach, apricots, roast leg of mutton, biscuits, preserves, coffee, cream, pepper and salt, bread, butter, knives, folks, spoons, table cloth ... Tenzing says I must get a grip on myself.
July 23: Tonight we read for three weeks and finish nine pages. Proust reads in his garden and remembers veal.
July 24: Hurrah! Seventeen pages in just thirty-two hours tonight! Proust thinks of an invalid aunt and a musician who rather thinks he would like to play for some guests but is too shy to mention it.
July 25: Tenzing is in a deep depression. "That rotten Proust is going to think of the church again," he predicts at dinner. "Compared to Proust," he tells me, "Uncas, Chingachgook and Warren Harding are as much fun as Mae West." I take Tenzing to see an old Terry Thomas movie, which reminds both of us of brussels sprouts.
July 26: Refreshed by our night off, we plunge through twenty-seven pages about Proust's boyhood passion for hawthorn blossums. Tenzing collapses in hysteria, cursing hawthorn blossums, spinach, church steeple and stained glass windows.
Our medical team order us to take a week off. With 60,000 words behind us we have barely dented the book, but we feel heroic and American. Next week, says Tenzing, who has peeked ahead, the plot will thicken. He believes Proust is about to take a walk in the country. I already begin to look forward to it. Or is it merely anticipation of the ticket tape parade up Broadway?
Less than pleased to find Proust in the Pere Lachaise Cemetery in Paris.
To have students interested in reading it is important to avoid books such as Remembrance of Things Past and The Scarlet Letter. Books need to be age appropriate, entertaining, and applicable for the students. It is imperative for students to know the relevance of reading the text. All of the texts I truly loathed seemed very irrelevant in my studies.
I share the view of Oscar Wilde, “If one cannot enjoy reading a book over and over again, there is no use in reading it at all.” Reading for students needs to be enjoyable and should never be more painful than being skinned alive like reading Proust is. Teachers need to be less hung up on finding texts that others have been deemed to have a particularly outstanding literary importance and find texts that will be more enjoyable to the students. Perhaps students could have options of what they read in class. Maya Angelou, a renowned poet in our time has said, “Any book that helps a child to form a habit of reading to make reading on of his deep and continuing needs, is good for him.” It doesn’t matter if this is Captain Underpants or Tom Sawyer; the importance is that the child is reading. Reading is at the foundation of our society. I think that you can help students to see themselves as readers by letting them see you as a reader, encouraging reading, and providing opportunities to read. You can take opportunities to read to your class, let them know what you have been reading over the weekend, as well as have books related to your subject that students can look at when they have completed assignments early. Teachers can also create activities which center on student reading.
This antidotal text describes efforts to read Proust rather well:
Crawling Up Everest
By Russell Baker
On July 18 the two of us set out together to read Remembrance of Things Past by Marcel Proust. We have been reading it fairly steadily ever since, thanks to our stocked kits of smelling salts, and are determined to keep on reading until we either finish or die in the attempt.
Our first diary entries--of a Shackleton's expedition in literature--are presented below because this is a moment that cries out for public examples of heroism to remind us again of the greatness of which Americans are capable.
Few deeds can be more heroic than an attempt to read Remembrance of Things Past from beginning to end. Some persons will quarrel with this. Some will argue that true heroism lies in sitting through all of Wagner's Die Valkyrie. Others will hold that it consists in enduring a festival of Andy Hardy films. Every man has his Everest. None is so formidable as Remembrance of Things Past.
Remembrance of Things Past is longer than Everest is tall. When all seven volumes are piled together the stack is more than six miles tall. This great length is due not only to the incredible number of strained similes contained in the novel's seven volumes, but also to the dense layers of tedium packed into almost every paragraph.
Reading it is a feat to test Hercules, Washington, Lindbergh, John Glenn or John Wayne. "Life is too short and Proust is too long," Anatole French is said to have explained when asked why he had not read it. Perhaps so.
To help in the struggle I have retained a Sherpa reader who is highly prasied among his countrymen for his ability to read anything. His name is Tenzing. Once Tenzing read the inaugural address of Warren G. Harding in its entirety, and to show that this was not a fluke, went on to read The Last of the Mohicans almost halfway through.
To protect ourselves against the temptation to cheat by skipping several volumes, we are reading aloud, every last word. The opening diary entries follow:
July 18: Would anyone believe 12,000 words about a man who had a hard time going to sleep when he was a boy? We read twenty-two pages of this before Tenzing gets ugles and say I have betrayed him by not telling him that this is a plot to bore him to death. Fortunately, I am asleep by this time and cannot take offense.
July19: Another twenty pages today. The narrator--Proust, I suppose--still couldn't get to sleep. In a sudden flurry of narrative action Proust drinks a cup of tea and eats a cookie, which remind him of his boyhood, especially an aunt and a church he associates with that age, and an inability to go to sleep.
July 20: Only six pages tonight. Proust remembers the church again and, in a plot complication, recalls a stained glass window. Tenzing revives my heartbeat with brandy after seven hours of reading the paragraph on pages forty-nine, fifty, and fifty-one. Our medical team pleads with us to turn back.
July 22: Our first crisis tonight. Lifting the book to begin, I was seized with acute indolence, which the doctors say is common in the tertiary stage of tedium gravis. It was brought on by my conviction that Proust was going to remember the church's steeple while my life ebbed away.
Recovered enough tonight to read again. Proust tells absolutely everything about a meal that was prepared when he was a boy--asparagus, chicken, potatoes, marrow, spinach, apricots, roast leg of mutton, biscuits, preserves, coffee, cream, pepper and salt, bread, butter, knives, folks, spoons, table cloth ... Tenzing says I must get a grip on myself.
July 23: Tonight we read for three weeks and finish nine pages. Proust reads in his garden and remembers veal.
July 24: Hurrah! Seventeen pages in just thirty-two hours tonight! Proust thinks of an invalid aunt and a musician who rather thinks he would like to play for some guests but is too shy to mention it.
July 25: Tenzing is in a deep depression. "That rotten Proust is going to think of the church again," he predicts at dinner. "Compared to Proust," he tells me, "Uncas, Chingachgook and Warren Harding are as much fun as Mae West." I take Tenzing to see an old Terry Thomas movie, which reminds both of us of brussels sprouts.
July 26: Refreshed by our night off, we plunge through twenty-seven pages about Proust's boyhood passion for hawthorn blossums. Tenzing collapses in hysteria, cursing hawthorn blossums, spinach, church steeple and stained glass windows.
Our medical team order us to take a week off. With 60,000 words behind us we have barely dented the book, but we feel heroic and American. Next week, says Tenzing, who has peeked ahead, the plot will thicken. He believes Proust is about to take a walk in the country. I already begin to look forward to it. Or is it merely anticipation of the ticket tape parade up Broadway?
Sunday, September 29, 2013
Blog #2: Connecting School & Home Experience
Connecting School and Home Experiences
In junior high I started studying French as well as playing competition soccer. In ninth grade I joined the high school cross country team. I enjoyed taking French because it was a fun class for me but my life really was sports. I identified myself as a runner. While running I got a few stress fractures, had to wear a boot, and sit on the sideline. I kept on waiting and waiting, but my legs simply became more and more painful. My running coach recommended I go see a sports medicine doctor. I had multiple tests run over multiple visits including a MRI, nerve testing, and a very memorable compartment pressure test which involved needles the size of pencils. No one knew what was wrong, but they knew one thing: I was not to run anymore. I was devastated. I cried for two weeks straight. I felt that my identity had been ripped out from under me and that I had nothing.
It was that summer in 2005 that I first went to France. My uncle was gracious enough to take his three nieces (two of which were graduating and I because I was the only other niece) to Paris for a week. Paris was simply magical. I didn’t think once about running. There I realized that the sun still came up every morning and that life went on with or without running, with or without everything that was familiar to me. That first experience in France was pivotal for me and has pushed me to become a teacher. If I can help students to learn that there is a world out there bigger than them it is worth it to me to teach. I want to help students get out of their heads and their little worlds and realize that there is more to life than high school, sports, drama, or girls. There are other countries, other people, other cultures, other foods, other ways to do things “right.” I want to help students discover the world in which they live and how they fit in that bigger context.
Studying abroad in France also shaped my thoughts on the French people. It is one thing to visit the city of love for a week, and an entirely different matter to live in a French city for a year on your own. I loved speaking with them, eating with them, spending time with them, and taking classes from them. I learned a lot about the culture and the people there whom I respect. I understand why they can be annoyed with Americans (I began to be annoyed with Americans towards the end of my stay- we are so annoying and disrespectful!), why they may appear cold, as well as what is important to them. Having such an in-depth understanding of the people will help me in my teaching because I will be able to debunk myths and help students to understand why people do things and act differently than they do. This is a critical skill to learn in our ever growing multi-cultural society.
Culture is something so complicated yet beautiful and I feel that many problems in the world would be resolved if we could learn to understand others. Learning to communicate in a different language also helps people to understand others better and how they think. This knowledge and these skills are part of the foundation of my teaching.
For those of you who are wondering what happened to my legs I can run again. I found out I had a rare syndrome that cut off my blood supply. Here is a picture of what my legs looked like after surgery.
Tuesday, September 17, 2013
The Engagement
Stuck on You
Leighton flew up to Utah on Friday, September 13th. My parents picked him up and I drove my aunt Becky and my grandmother down to Brigham City where we went and had lunch at Maddox together. We then did some car switching so Leighton and I could go up to Island Park, Idaho (about 20 miles from West Yellowstone) in the same car. We stopped by the gorgeous waterfalls of upper and lower Mesa Falls. We got to Island Park in time to make dinner and watch a movie.
Saturday morning my parents kicked us out of the house and sent us off to Yellowstone. While I was in the shower my mother was telling Leighton all the good places that we could go in Yellowstone and Leighton really liked the sound of Norris Geyser Basin so he planned our Yellowstone adventure that we would end there. We packed our lunches, our rain coats, and umbrellas and headed off.
We talked a lot as we enjoyed going to lots of different places. We saw many elk as well as rivers, swimming holes, mountain ranges. When we were at Firehole River I thought Leighton was going to propose and I was really nervous. He didn’t propose there, but I did find the ring box in his jacket while we were getting out.
Note: Now don’t think this isn’t romantic; Leighton and I went ring shopping in July but I never knew that he bought the ring and carried it around for a month until the last day of our summer when he told me (and showed me!). I’ve been dying to have it ever since so we all (parents included) kind of knew that it was coming the next time we saw each other. I think it turned out perfectly too because I don’t do well with change, so I had some time to stew and mentally prepare. Bless Leighton’s heart though; he got so much teasing.
We then went to Old Faithful to have lunch. I started teasing Leighton about how he could propose there (I had already told him I did NOT want to get engaged there.) “My love for you is more faithful than Old Faithful!” I told him. We continued the cheesy Yellowstone pickup lines throughout the day. It was raining and cold so our picnic lunch turned into an in-the-car lunch. We meandered around the gift shop and the lodge while we were waiting for Old Faithful. Leighton’s friend Marc called while we were waiting for Old Faithful to go off so I answered it and told him Leighton was busy trying to figure out when to propose.
It was slowly getting more rainy and later in the day so we decided to stop at the smelly paint pots with a whole bus of Asian tourists as well as Gibbon Falls, another giant waterfall and walked across the mini wall of China. We then went to our last stop, Norris Geyser Basin. It was raining again and I think we got the last parking spot. Leighton turned to me in the car and said, “I was going to propose to you here but the weather isn’t good and there are all these people…” I told him that that is okay and that he could propose a different day but that we might as well go see the geysers since we were there. He put on his bright orange waterproof jacket, I left the Canon Rebel in the car, and we went out on our last adventure in Yellowstone. We started walking around the Porcelain Basin and the rain stopped. We found ourselves alone and there was a bench. Leighton wanted to sit on the bench so I knew something was coming. He prefaced his proposal with the fact that we had already picked a date and a temple, that he had my dad’s blessing, and that he now wanted to formally ask me. He got down on one knee and told me that he loved me so much. He then asked, “Mari Lisa Lindstrom, will you marry me?” I fought back the tears gave him a hug and then whispered in his ear, “Yeah.” He slipped my super cute ring on my finger (finally! He had been teasing that I could just wear it and he’d propose later) and then people came by again.
We drove back home and ate dinner. After about three minutes dad burst out and said, “So, is there an announcement you two want to make?” I was waiting to see if they noticed the ring. I guess they did. We went swimming after dinner and it wasn’t as romantic as we were hoping. Cue 7-year-old girl, “Are you guys in love? That’s gross.” Cue four-year-old Maxwell, “Do you guys want to see a magic trick?” “Yes.” SPLASH!
It was a wonderful day even if everything wasn’t ideal. What is wonderful is finding someone who can love me like Leighton does. Leighton wishes that he waited until Sunday (we went on the most beautiful walk and sat on a dock and watched a moose and a bald eagle). It was so beautiful and calm and indescribably beautiful. Now we’re engaged and we are going to be sealed forever and ever.
I love Leighton because he is so wonderful and just loves me so much. He always tucks me in the blanket and makes me his priority every waking moment I am around him. He puts up with me when I am grumpy and laughs at my angry face. He eats my sandwiches when I don’t like them and he knows how many carrots I eat for lunch. I was in the back seat when he was driving us and my grandma and Becky home and he reached back and held my hand while driving. For four hours straight. Just so he could hold my hand and let me know he was thinking of me. That’s love to me. Leighton is love.
Monday, September 2, 2013
Blog #1: Introduction
About Me
Me in France in 2010
My name is Mari Lindstrom and I am not a True Aggie. I am currently a super-duper senior at Utah State University. I am double majored in French Education and School Health, both with an emphasis in Secondary Education as well as a minor in linguistics. I claim to be trilingual through knowing English, French, and Latvian fluently. I have a university diploma in French as a Foreign Language from the University of Nantes. I served a LDS mission in the Baltic States from 2010-2012. I am a NFL member and I’m not talking about the football league.
My interests include: Running, reading, cooking, traveling, guitar playing, and ceramic making.
My First-Choice Discipline
I first began taking French in eighth grade. I had heard that many colleges required two years or more of foreign language study. At my junior high all of the Spanish teachers spoke very poorly, the German teacher scared the whole entire student body as well as teachers and that left French as the only possible language to take. I soon fell in love with the language and the culture. I continued taking French in High School and had the best French professor I have ever met. He was not only humorous, kind, and hip, he also knew French very well, spoke the target language with students, told stories of his own experiences, brought in French food, and taught grammar like it was nobody’s business. It was this high school French professor, Mr. Miller, who inspired me to become a secondary educator.
What is French to me? What is French to you?
French to me can be a way of life. French to me is a way to see the world through different eyes. I feel that one has to have an intimate experience with France, to be in France, to know what French is- the sound, the smells, the sights, the food (most definitely the food), the people, what is spoken and unspoken. To me French is also a beautiful form of communication. French is a personality, a way of life, it is so encompassing.
I feel that this clip from the film, “Paris, Je t’aime,” describes these sentiments better than I can.
Literacy
Literacy is complicated. I wouldn’t say that I have a specific definition of literacy. It, like French, is something different to each person. To some it is being able to read, write, spell, listen, and/or speak. To others it is to be able to perform specific tasks (functional literacy). To others it is more of a cultural literacy where one knows idioms and other specifics about a particular culture. Also worth mentioning is critical literacy which defines literacy as being able to critically analyze and view information differently.
Literacy in French to me includes several facets. First and foremost is the simple reading, writing, spelling, listening to, and speaking in French. This bleeds into the hope that students become functionally literate in a French-speaking culture- that they are able to ask for directions, order food, etc. all in French, the target language for functional literacy. Beyond that, which in some ways I feel is more important and one of the overarching reasons languages are offered, is to create what I’ll call a cultural-critical literacy. Through studying a culture a student can learn to analyze and view not only French, but their own culture differently.
Teaching languages to adolescents provides them with a different point of view and helps them to be more tolerant of others. Taking French language classes truly opened up my eyes to the world around me. It helped me to get out of that teenage “spotlight” effect and realize that there is an entire world out there besides my life—a world that is big, beautiful, and diverse. I want to make language & culture learning an interest for my students. I want to help them discover passion and respect for cultures and people different from them. My French classes helped me improve my grades in other classes and created within me a desire to reach out and be more inclusive. I want to provide students with a safe learning environment where they can learn that we are all different and that it isn’t bad to be different.
I want to show students the world of possibilities that lie before them. I simply want to be the teacher that every high school student wishes they had; one who is intelligent, enthusiastic, caring, motivational, and unforgettable. Teachers really do make a difference and I want to be that one teacher that we all remember who made a difference in our lives. By teaching children well a legacy of future leaders who can help to stabilize our decaying world is created. Every day we are in need of more and more strong and talented people leading out in our community and I want to help shape our future’s leaders. My teaching philosophy is to teach French and to teach it well. I believe in allowing all children an equal opportunity to succeed in my classroom. I believe that this can be achieved by striving to attain as many forms of literacy in the classroom as possible.
Critical literacy through a cultural perspective: A different way to create change. Are French people wrong for going on strikes?
Me in France in 2010
My name is Mari Lindstrom and I am not a True Aggie. I am currently a super-duper senior at Utah State University. I am double majored in French Education and School Health, both with an emphasis in Secondary Education as well as a minor in linguistics. I claim to be trilingual through knowing English, French, and Latvian fluently. I have a university diploma in French as a Foreign Language from the University of Nantes. I served a LDS mission in the Baltic States from 2010-2012. I am a NFL member and I’m not talking about the football league.
My interests include: Running, reading, cooking, traveling, guitar playing, and ceramic making.
My First-Choice Discipline
I first began taking French in eighth grade. I had heard that many colleges required two years or more of foreign language study. At my junior high all of the Spanish teachers spoke very poorly, the German teacher scared the whole entire student body as well as teachers and that left French as the only possible language to take. I soon fell in love with the language and the culture. I continued taking French in High School and had the best French professor I have ever met. He was not only humorous, kind, and hip, he also knew French very well, spoke the target language with students, told stories of his own experiences, brought in French food, and taught grammar like it was nobody’s business. It was this high school French professor, Mr. Miller, who inspired me to become a secondary educator.
What is French to me? What is French to you?
French to me can be a way of life. French to me is a way to see the world through different eyes. I feel that one has to have an intimate experience with France, to be in France, to know what French is- the sound, the smells, the sights, the food (most definitely the food), the people, what is spoken and unspoken. To me French is also a beautiful form of communication. French is a personality, a way of life, it is so encompassing.
I feel that this clip from the film, “Paris, Je t’aime,” describes these sentiments better than I can.
Literacy
Literacy is complicated. I wouldn’t say that I have a specific definition of literacy. It, like French, is something different to each person. To some it is being able to read, write, spell, listen, and/or speak. To others it is to be able to perform specific tasks (functional literacy). To others it is more of a cultural literacy where one knows idioms and other specifics about a particular culture. Also worth mentioning is critical literacy which defines literacy as being able to critically analyze and view information differently.
Literacy in French to me includes several facets. First and foremost is the simple reading, writing, spelling, listening to, and speaking in French. This bleeds into the hope that students become functionally literate in a French-speaking culture- that they are able to ask for directions, order food, etc. all in French, the target language for functional literacy. Beyond that, which in some ways I feel is more important and one of the overarching reasons languages are offered, is to create what I’ll call a cultural-critical literacy. Through studying a culture a student can learn to analyze and view not only French, but their own culture differently.
Teaching languages to adolescents provides them with a different point of view and helps them to be more tolerant of others. Taking French language classes truly opened up my eyes to the world around me. It helped me to get out of that teenage “spotlight” effect and realize that there is an entire world out there besides my life—a world that is big, beautiful, and diverse. I want to make language & culture learning an interest for my students. I want to help them discover passion and respect for cultures and people different from them. My French classes helped me improve my grades in other classes and created within me a desire to reach out and be more inclusive. I want to provide students with a safe learning environment where they can learn that we are all different and that it isn’t bad to be different.
I want to show students the world of possibilities that lie before them. I simply want to be the teacher that every high school student wishes they had; one who is intelligent, enthusiastic, caring, motivational, and unforgettable. Teachers really do make a difference and I want to be that one teacher that we all remember who made a difference in our lives. By teaching children well a legacy of future leaders who can help to stabilize our decaying world is created. Every day we are in need of more and more strong and talented people leading out in our community and I want to help shape our future’s leaders. My teaching philosophy is to teach French and to teach it well. I believe in allowing all children an equal opportunity to succeed in my classroom. I believe that this can be achieved by striving to attain as many forms of literacy in the classroom as possible.
Critical literacy through a cultural perspective: A different way to create change. Are French people wrong for going on strikes?
Monday, July 8, 2013
The Last Toast to Us.
The Last Toast to Us.
We fit, like a pair of old running shoes or that favorite pair of jeans. Two peas in a pod. Peanut butter and jelly. Right shoe, left shoe. You get the idea. Together a complete whole, more exciting and meant to be together and just not quite complete nor functional when apart.
I should have seen it sooner. Put one and one together. It crept up on me I guess. I didn’t realize until my best friend was getting married that I had already lost her. Just think of it as being let go, that life's going in a different direction, that my body's part of a permanent outplacement. I’ve been demoted, let go, fired, she’s moved on; she has a new best friend. Don’t get me wrong, he’s great and I’m so happy for her, I just forgot about the part that she would move on and I wouldn’t be moving with her. If I had one person to be with on a deserted island, it’d be her. I like to think that back in the day she’d pick me, but now she’d pick prints charming. We used to not be able to live without each other, used to make ourselves laugh until we peed our pants, and went on the most awesome adventures. Sisters, connected at the hip, inseparable. You invite one to a party and know it means you are inviting the other. But my best friend is upgrading to a different kind of lifelong best friend. She won’t need me anymore, she’ll have her Prints Charming to make her laugh when she is sad, make her soup when she is sick, go running with her, take her on adventures, and take care of her.
I’ll fade into the background like those faded old photographs that frame my walls of the good old days. A distant memory past. We’ll still be friends, catch up when it is expected, reminisce about the old days and those good times we once had. But there won’t be any more old days to talk about from now on because she’s already gone. So let’s toast to us. We had some good times and some great dreams but it’s time to grow up and move on with life because life always does move on, even if we aren’t ready for it. So a toast to us. Peanut butter and jelly. Sisters. Friends. Adieu. Anyone seen a left shoe? I lost mine.
“Someone Like You” by Adele
has been my favorite song of late. Switch the lyrics up a bit and it isn’t bad about talking about our friendship.
I know that you're settling down
That you found a boy and you're married now.
I heard that your dreams came true.
You know how the time flies
Only yesterday was the time of our lives
We were born and raised
In a summer haze
Bound by the surprise of our glory days
Nothing compares
No worries or cares
Regrets and mistakes
They are memories made.
Who would have known how bittersweet this would taste?
Old friend, why are you so shy?
Ain't like you to hold back
I hate to turn up out of the blue uninvited
But I couldn't stay away, I couldn't fight it.
I had hoped you'd see my face and that you'd be reminded
That for me our friendship isn't over.
Never mind, I'll find someone like you
I wish nothing but the best for you too
Don't forget me, I beg.
Never mind, I'll find someone like you
I wish nothing but the best for you.
Sunday, May 12, 2013
We all make mistakes. I just hope yours isn't your front tooth.
The curious case of getting a crown for a tooth.
Worst mistake of my life. Since I killed my tooth (too many soccer balls to the mouth) in 8th grade my lovely front tooth has been more yellow than my other teeth. Me, being the vain person I am, have tried internal and external bleaching to no avail. My wise dental friend said a crown would look so much better. I believed her and felt it was wise to take advantage of my parents’ insurance and get my front tooth crowned. I made my appointment.
The doctor neglected to tell me some things like…your face will be numb for 5 hours, I’m going to shave off basically all of your front tooth, this is not reversible, you can’t floss, you can’t bite with your front teeth, or even wear your retainer. Umm…so if I can’t wear my retainer for a month my 3 years of braces and thousands of dollars just goes down the drain..right? No big deal. Nevermind the imminent threat that temporary crowns have a tendency to pop off at inconvenient moments, like in public. Oh. Fast forward nineteen hours from leaving the dentist office and I’m eating a sandwich. By eat I mean I am on my third bite and POP! Was that my tooth? Why yes it was. Is the dentist busy for the next several hours. Oh. So I’m supposed to go around with my fake tooth hanging out at work. Oh okay, no worries. The dentist fixes my tooth (it feels much more secure might I add) and he tells me to just eat oatmeal for a month. Out of a straw. New weight loss program?? I think so.
Now I shouldn’t neglect mother. Mother thought it was very funny because it was the end of the world. I had made a terrible mistake, I want my old tooth back and it is in the dentist rubbish bin. Never mind the fact that I mourned my lost tooth with tears, my mother laughed. And laughed. Even at night prayer when I wasn’t doing anything she burst into a fit of laughter that lasted longer than the prayer.
Let’s not forget Hal. He is the tooth color matching guy. My teeth are apparently off the charts white. And transclucent. He said he’ll have a hard time matching it and doesn’t think he’ll get it right on the first time. Hal has been doing this for 35 years and the PRINCE of Saudi Arabia has used him. The Netherlands have used him. And he doesn't think he’s going to get my tooth right. Has my regret increased? Yes. Do I think it will look better than my old tooth? No. Biggest mistake ever.
To look on the positive side I do appreciate front teeth. Always chewing with the side and avoiding certain foods and not flossing sucks. Things I never thought I’d be grateful to do.
We all make mistakes. I just hope yours isn't your front tooth.
Sunday, May 5, 2013
May the Fourth be with you!
A long long time ago in a galaxy far away Saturday was MAY THE FORTH be with you (get it…May the force be with you…May Fourth). Naturally, a party needed to happen. I slaved away in the kitchen all day (after a morning run and labeling the tulips). Party food included: pizza the hut, pretzel light sabers (with chocolate and caramel), the dark side salad, wookie cookies (no bakes), Chewbacca croutons, padme popcorn, vader veggies, C-3PH2O, and so on. I dressed up as Princess Leia, Tatjana as Yoda, Amber as a Padawan, and Tyler as Darth Maul. After our delicious dinner we watched Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back. Tyler and Amber fell asleep but were very awake for their tickle war after the movie. Tatjana and I just watched and laughed. We then proceeded to talk for about two hours even though we were all ready to go to sleep. Aren't friends great?
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