My Kidlets

Story Inuksuk I did with my grade 6's

Bulletin board of my kid's work 

Kindergartens :)

Delano wasn't really ready for this picture

My girls working hard

Mr. Kevin

My kindergartens and their hand turkeys

My charming grade 4/5 class...

Grade 6E haha

6L...Love this class

Jassie (in the middle) being attacked

John choosing to work during game day..go figure

Breaking News

So today I did something I never thought I would ever do in a million years. During my afternoon off I got roped into cleaning, slicing and preparing a caribou for dinner. I guess you only live once, so why not. I have gone 28 days avoiding any type of wild meat and on my second last night in Pond Inlet my luck has finally worn out. A small part of me knew this day would come. I will be polite and try it, but I make no promises of actually liking it. Wish me luck!

Dance Dance

Yesterday I experienced a brawl in my classroom. I have seen them take place on the playground, but never during instruction time. Thankfully Kate was still in the classroom because it took the two of us to break it up. Unlike the South when you tell the kids it is "enough" or to "break it up" they do not stop. You literally have to grab the kids and physically pull them apart, which is a new concept to me. A few punches made contact with me during the process. Keep in mind these two boys are ten. This is a good illustration of underlying issues within the community at work. Also, tempers seem to be flaring quite easily these days because the sun is staying out longer and quickly approaching 24 hours of sunlight. Therefore children are getting less and less sleep. A large majority are only getting two hours a night.

Today I got off school early. It was only half a day because the furnaces are broken. Under the health and safety regulations it was too cold to work and have the children attend classes. Everyone was going around with their coats on shivering. When the announcement came on informing the teachers and students of this I was surprised at how calm the students were. If that were down South the building would have been filled with chaos and cheers. The children here were silent and carried on with their work like it was no big deal. Although it is nice to have an afternoon off, I am sad that it is time I am unable to spend with my students. They better have it fixed by tomorrow because if not I will go knocking from door to door to say good bye to my kids.

The rest of today will be spent getting some last minute things done before my departure because tomorrow is a busy day. My kids discovered I am a dance teacher and want some lessons and the staff at Ulaajuk is having a celebration for me after school filled with food and traditional games. It is going to be a fun day, but I am dreading saying good bye to my kids. I tear up just thinking of it.

Zap!

Clearly the internet is back on. Thank the lord because I felt so out of contact. Now trying to remember what happened over the last few days is going to be a challenge. Hopefully I remember everything, but if I don't I blame the internet for interrupting my daily blogging.

Let's start off by saying that Sarah and I are famous. We made the local newspaper. Mind you it is just our faces in the crowd and Sarah's is covered by her camera, but non the less we are there. I don't think I have ever been in the paper before. The picture was taken the night we attended the hip hop show at the town hall. We are very proud of our feat and have both acquired a copy for a souvenir to bring home and show off.

Friday night was a bit of an awkward night, I am not going to lie. Sarah and I were both tuckered out and were just taking it easy. We heard a knock on the door and Dave and Pat, our hosts, answered it. It turned out to be two of my students who came wanting to visit. If I had answered I would have said no. We have learned down South that this is not acceptable and this aligns with my personal beliefs. It is not my house so it was not my decision in this situation, but it would not have been my choice to let them in. Apparently visiting teachers is quite common for students to do up here. The words "Law Suit" kept flashing in my mind. I guess this is just another difference in culture. On the same note, it was nice to see them and having some good clean fun. These two particular boys are quite the behavioral issues at school and know way too much information for their age so it was refreshing and heart warming to see them chat in a normal setting and sit and play Lego, even though it stepped outside my norm.

On Saturday Sarah and I ventured to the dump. The local Inuit call the dump Canadian Tire. After going there I can see why. People throw out so much stuff. There were basketball nets, cars, snowmobiles, etc. You name it, it was there. One section of the dump was reserved for the actual bags of garbage and it ends up being burnt. The most surprising part of this visit was a large frozen pond we came across with a brownish tinge to it. Turns out it is the sewage lagoon. It actually did not smell, but can probably be classified into the grossest things I have seen. It is a giant pond full of poop and that is what I renamed it. Our host said it is frozen enough to skate on. I'm thinking I will not take the chance to find out. After the dump we visited the library/museum. I have posted some pictures from there. There were tons of artifacts, books and photos that I really enjoyed looking at. My favourite would have to be the statues of the Inuit people. They were so real. The art done on them was amazing. I was just waiting for them to pop their eyes open and scare the living out of me. Kind of eery, but neat!

Last night we saw a high speed chase outside our house window. We saw a loose dog from one of the dog teams coming towards the shore. He picked up a piece of someone's seal they had hunted and began to run away with it. All of a sudden the dog stopped and dropped the meat. Out of no where came a man on a snowmobile. I do not know if it was the owner of the dog, or the owner of the seal, but who ever it was they were not a happy camper. He came flying towards the dog with no intention of slowing down and boy did that dog run for dear life. The dog luckily got to the team before he was caught and mingled himself in so the man couldn't pin point him. I guess the people here can be quite harsh on the dogs, or so I am told. Anyways, soon after the man left the same dog went back towards his dropped meal and started on his merry way again. Dumb as a door nail or brave, I have not decided. To top it all of this dog did not even end up eating it. A larger dog came by and stole it from him. This is the entertainment of the North. It is better than television.

Static in the North is crazy. I think this is partially due to how dry and cold the air is. I have learned that before opening a door or touching anything metal to rub my hands on something wood. This minimizes and sometimes prevents being shocked. My kids must be accustomed to living with shocks because they look at me like I have two heads when I do this. This must have tipped them off that I do not like shocks, but really who does. Keep in mind when I say shocks I am talking about the stop your heart kind of shocks up here. Anyways, my lovely little angels (a few kids in particular) now shock me on purpose when I least expect it. They rub there feet along the carpet (they barely ever wear shoes, another part of their culture) and make sure I get the zap. 

I'm sure I have missed something and if I have and remember I will include it in my next post. That's all for now!

Picture Updates

The junk yard...aka Canadian Tire as they call it here

The sewage lagoon..or as I renamed it "the poop pond"

The gas station

My seal pup

This is a statue, but boy did she look real

Killed a caribou with this fella

Name of the museum we went to

Entry to the junkyard...says enter at own risk: hazardous waste

I want one of these...the baby and the coat!

Culture Shock

Today we learned that the town will be loosing internet for the week end. The only places that will have internet are the schools, which really is no help since they will be locked for the duration of that time. This means blogging for Sarah and I might not occur over the next few days. I think the both of us are going into a bit of culture shock. I guess this shows how dependent society has become on technology and will have a valuable lesson at the end, or so I'm told. However, I'd prefer to keep the internet. I think it would be different if I were at home, but being up here I'd like to be able to say in contact.

Today was writing day in the ESL classroom. Sometimes it can be like pulling teeth, but that is the case in most places. I have noticed improvement in their writing even during the short time I have been here. Although still struggling with English, it is amazing how quickly these children are learning. Expectations here are a lot lower for each grade. For example, grades twos are expected to write one good sized sentence. At home, my previous grade two classroom would be expected to write five to six sentences or more. This is understandable though considering it is their second language and sometimes I find myself having to remember this.

Today it hit me that in a little more than a week I am going to be leaving these kids. Yes I love the scenery, the way of life and the people, but the kids are going to be hard to say good bye too. It's amazing how much you can care for these kids after such a short period of time. I am excited to go home, but I am not looking forward to next Friday. It is going to be much harder than I anticipated.

Our last week end is quickly arriving and Sarah and I have quite a few things remaining on our Northern bucket list. We want to go sledding, to flow-edge, the market, souvenir shopping, on a ski-doo ride and to the dump. Yes the dump, don't judge us! We hope to accomplish them all this weekend. When the internet returns on Sunday evening or Monday I will be sure to write a lengthy blog about our adventures.

Here and There

The dead seal....this picture doesn't show how huge he truly was

Getting ready to ride the qamatiik

The whip...this kid almost got us a few times

Our team for the afternoon

One of the many times they were stopped when going warp speed

This is the dog I wrote about, he was my favourite

My baby

Chilling....Literally

I want to start off by saying that today is the coldest day we have had since we've been here. With wind chill it is minus forty something. I have a chill I can not get rid of. I don't think I've ever been this cold. To top it all off today was my day for recess duty. Not just one recess, but both! Just my luck. One of the kids told me I looked like a turtle hiding in my hood. I tried to even wear my mittens teaching today, but the kids made fun of me too badly. They think it is funny I haven't climatized yet.

I was talking to my kids today and telling them that I wanted to go sledding this weekend. They thought that it was pretty amusing that someone my age wanted to do such a thing. I asked them if they had sleds I could borrow and they informed me that I would not need one. I guess they use cardboard covered in garbage bags mostly. One little shrimp of a kid told me that I probably had enough weight behind me to just slide right down on my butt without anything. He's lucky he followed it with a huge grin and a "just kidding". He knew another snow ball would be headed his way. I think Sarah and I will try out the cardboard and garbage bag idea and see if it has the speed they promise. It could turn out interesting on the hill I want to conquer. It is like the comacozie of hills.

I am still teaching one hundred percent. In some classes I am working on fairy tales, others I am working on sequencing, some on writing, some on phonics and some on wrap up activities for novel studies. Getting to do such a broad spectrum of stuff in one day is one of the things I really like about the ESL classroom. Not only does it make the day go by fast, but I am learning so much in such a small span of time. The resources I have been collecting are amazing. I have a pile of them that I have been working with that Kate has copied for me to keep and bring home. Something I learned today is that in ESL when writing on the board the teacher needs to dramatize punctuation to the point where it is almost ridiculous. This is necessary though, especially in Inuktitut, because they do not have or recognize punctuation. They will just skip right over it when reading and writing. Since I have made this change I notice a difference in their written and verbal work.

On a side and final note for the evening, I learned a handy little trick today. Dry erase marker will remove permanent marker. I didn't believe it, but I tried and tested it and my friends it is true. So when one of those little darlings happens to write on your white board with the wrong marker, do not fret.

Dog Whisperer

Yesterday Sarah and I were able to cross off another item on our Northern bucket list.  The mayor of Pond Inlet took us out with his dog team. We were not only able to experience the ride itself, but we were able to see the preparation that goes into getting the dog team ready to go out. No wonder they charge so much for a trip, there is a lot of work that goes into it. I expected him to use a whip to control the dogs and even though he did have one he barely used it. He seemed to mostly control the dogs with words. It was like he was the dog whisperer. I’m not quite sure what he was saying because it was all in Inuktitut, but whatever it was they always seemed to know exactly what to do. It was amazing. During our trip we caught up to another dog sled team. This excited our dogs and made them speed up. We almost crashed into the other sled on numerous occasions. The man who took us out, Jacob I believe his name was, had to use a metal anchor that goes into the snow/ice to slow them down and stop them to prevent this. Although this was terrifying it was also quite fun. We stopped and talked to the people on the other sled for awhile. Turns out they were on the airplane we were on when we arrived here and that they were just babysitting the team. The team of dogs they had were quite young. They were only about one or two years old and just learning how to run properly in a pack. They were so cute though. She told us that one dog was named Gadhaffi. When we asked why, she replied by saying that the owner named him that because he didn’t like him. One of the dogs, which you will see pictures of, was hilarious. He would refuse to sit on the snow like the rest of the pack. He would park his butt on top of the guy next to him like he was too good for the ground. The other dog just let him do it too. It was a really fun day on the land and an experience that is not common even for people that live here. Our host Pat who has lived in Pond Inlet for over thirty years has not even had this opportunity yet. We were very lucky.

Today we had a professional development day at the school. Here they call them “O” days. Not really sure why. The staff from both the high school and elementary school got together to discuss the IQ principals. This is something that we began to learn about in Nick’s class, but was interesting to see in application to the schools. I feel like I have a much better understanding of it now and even though it is created and based on Nunavut I feel like I can take home and apply a lot of it to the Southern schools as well. It was a very informational day.

Some random stuff:

1.    The air is super dry.  Your nose may possibly feel like it is constantly congested, which mine has. I have almost considered Sarah’s home remedy of pouring warm salt water up it. After seeing her attempt it I am going to hold off for as long as possible.

2.    Kids up here refer to their teachers and administration by their first names. This would bother some people, but to me it just seems natural.

3.    I have learned that crayola markers are not as safe as they are advertised. This past weekend part of my preparation for the next week was coloring Jolly Phonics sheets for the kindergartens and I had an incident. One marker decided to leak all over my duvet and by my duvet I mean my host’s. And of course it had to be bright orange of all colors. For washable markers they are not that easy to get out. It took a lot of time and a lot of stain remover, but all was well in the end. Just an fyi for all you elementary teachers. Color at the table!

Hey Mandy...April Fools

Well, where to start, where to start? I guess I will start with my Hamlet day experience. I still haven’t got a definite answer to what Hamlet Day actually celebrates, but from what I have gathered it has something to do with the signing of the papers of Nunavut. The day began well, I got to sleep in. Things in this town usually don’t begin to after noon anyways. Before that time on any day it is rather lifeless. The festivities were to begin at one o’clock. Here however that means two o’clock or later. In Pond Inlet there doesn’t seem to be schedule. No one seems to go by clocks here. It takes a bit of adjusting to get use to. The festivities took place outside on the lake. When we arrived there were people everywhere. It seemed like everyone and their dog were out. The first game I observed was a game well known to the Inuit apparently. They take turns using a whip, probably about 12 feet long or more, made of caribou hyde to whip a pop can quite a distance away. Anyone who was able to knock the can over in three tries won a prize. I did not try because the lines to do so were quite long, but even if the opportunity did arise I don’t know if I would have because knowing me I would have accidently tangled myself into the whip or hit some innocent kid walking by. It was better for everyone that I simply observed. While watching a group of my student’s sat with me and chatted for a bit, while a few of the more mischievous ones decided to hide behind a hill and throw snowballs. It was amusing because they did not expect me to catch them doing so or throw a snowball back.

Later that evening, more festivities took place at the “C Hall”. These activities were more for the adults, although there was no lack of kids. I was able to see a few activities through my mob of kids that surrounded me for the evening. One activity was a dance. A person on the microphone directed people and anyone who was the last to what was being said or did not do so was out. During one part the announcer said “stand neck and neck with someone”. Of course this was in Inuktitut. I was wondering what the heck I would have done if I was participating and someone tried to come in for that action because I would have had no sweet clue what was being said and what the directions were. Probably would have made for a good laugh. During another activity participants were given cards. The outer circle would walk around the inner circle holding out their cards for them to see. When the music stopped the inner circle of people had to grab a card off the floor and run to find their match in the outer circle. The last person to do to this, as well as their partner, were eliminated. It was really amusing to watch. The atmosphere of the whole place was just so energized and comforting. Most of my time however was spent talking to my students who were there. I was so wrapped up in Hamlet Day that I forgot it was also my least favourite day of the year…April Fools Day. Lets just say that my kids did not forget. They had me convinced of a million things. Such things as there was a snowmobile accident in the town earlier that day, that one of them caught a seal, that one of them was moving, that I was growing a grey hair on the top of my hair, etc. Each time however it was followed by a chant of “Hey Mandy, April Fools!”. I am so gullible. You would of thought I’d catch on. I told them that before I left I was going to get them back for their little pranks and mark my word I will. I also tried to convince them that they all had detention, but apparently I am not as convincing as them. I guess they have a few things to teach me.

So today Sarah and I walked to one of Pond Inlet’s grave yards. We had to conquer a big mountain to get there, but it was worth it. I was surprised to see how many young people were buried there. Lots of infants, small children and young adults. Most graves were engraved in Inuktitut so they were hard to understand. On the way home I decided to not risk venturing down the huge mountain and fall and break my neck so I resorted to my childhood. I laid down and rolled all the way down. I’m not going to lie a large part of it was because I was far too lazy to walk. I will also openly admit that it was loads of fun. Sarah and I have also mentioned to our hosts that one of the things we were interested in doing while here was going out on a dog sled ride. We were told that it was going to run us a pretty penny, probably a few hundred dollars. Although it would probably be worth it for the experience we let go of the hope because we were just not willing to dish out that kind of money. However, today our host managed to hook us up. He talked to the mayor of Pond Inlet who has a dog sled team and arranged to have him take us out tomorrow for fifty bucks each, which is an awesome rate. We are so excited to go. We will make sure to get lots of pictures and wear lots of socks. Frost bite/wind burn will not strike me twice.

Some random things I am unsure how to fit into the rest of my paragraphs today:

1. In the elementary school, the teachers teach their own class gym. I cannot envision myself teaching gym. Not only do I not know how to play most sports, but I believe it would be a hazard to myself and my students.
2. Drinking water is delicious here. We drink iceberg water. They actually travel out to an iceberg gather chunks of it and melt it down. It is so good. I am dreading having to go back to city water. It can't even compare to this.
3. I saw another dead seal today. It was right next door to us. It has been sitting out there all day. They better take it in soon or the local dogs and other animals will get into it. Man those things are MASSIVE up close. I learned today that they have little claws, I always thought they just had little flippers.
4. The nurses up here have a lot more duties and responsibilities compared to the nurses at home. Not to say they are anymore important here and that the nurses aren’t valuable at home because they are. Up here however they are basically like doctors.

Hamlet Day?

Today was a great day at school. Lots of learning and laughs going on, as seen in the pictures I posted. Some of my grade six boys decided to have a hair show today. It was one of those things you kind of had to be there for, but it was hilarious!
We have a four day long weekend due to Hamlet Day tomorrow and a PD day on Monday. I asked numerous children today what Hamlet Day is and what is included in the celebrations and no one seems to have a definite answer. The only concrete thing I can get out of them is that if I go I will get a hot dog. It boggles my mind how this is one of there biggest celebrations and I can't seem to get the scoop from anyone. Sarah and I plan to participate in whatever festivities are going on tomorrow for this holiday. I am hoping to be able to take part in some traditional games and be able to socialize with members of the community. It will be nice to get another taste of a function within the community outside of the school. I am guessing that traditional food will most likely be included in some aspect of the day. I have managed to dodge the caribou and seal meat so far and plan to continue to do so tomorrow. However, out of respect I will try it if it comes down to it. I will pull out every trick before getting to this point though. So far so good! I will keep you posted on the adventures of this weekend.

A Day In Ullajuk

Nice hair Siglu

Still haven't mastered rotating on here

Add caption

Jassie's lovely do

Armond destroying my masterpiece

My kids are very self sufficent

The boys

Pictures From My Northern Adventure

The iceberg...it had a blue tinge to it

One of the dog sled teams on the ice...they protect the town from polar bears

Pond Inlet getting further away

and further

Trying to figure out my camera

Riding on a qamutiik

The iceberg from far away

My favourite picture

The picture of us at the end of the trip is on our host's camera. It is coming soon. The change in our expressions from the beginning of the trip to the end of the trip is priceless!