School and Summer et al.

School year is coming to an end. The kids are going to a week of camp, they will learn outdoor skills, kayaking, sailing. So much fun, and they get to go together-nice they will both be in 6-11 group! Swim lessons and gymnastics break in July, then start again in Aug. We are camping on the Pacific rim in Aug too, breathtaking is the best description of the scenery there, I can't wait. I am always glad for the school year to end, then glad again when it starts! I am SO looking forward to fall, can't wait for that whole season, my fave time of the year really stretches here like in Ontario. The kids and I are buzzing with plans for crafts, decor and activities already! I need to figure out our summer crafts and outings, to keep ourselves busy once my course wraps. Trampoline is now up too so yahoo!

I am seeing an end in sight, big paper just needs last edits.

So much writing, discussions, my brain is in that "considering concepts even when half awake" mode. I mull over documents and theories when i am sleeping. I wake up to go to the bathroom at 4 am and I am thinking about my work. Two excerpts from colleague discussions, I wrote:

"Another reason for this term could possibly be an attempt to help students to become a part of their own educational process, and have ownership of the skills they have developed. Considering the meaning of the word facilitation, applied to this concept, students are essentially acting to guide their own process. It is treating them like the adults that they are, and given the varied demographic of many nursing students today, this is likely an approach much appreciated by the older students in particular who might find the "test" or "exam" likened to high school and not fully appreciating the skills they have acquired."

Another discussion, I wrote:
"I also feel that the idea of collaborative learning is very valuable. Collaboration involves active learning on the part of both the teacher and learner, and I am a firm believer that when the learner is actively engaged, it has more meaning for them and they have a sense of ownership in their educational process. The teacher also has the opportunity to learn form the life experiences of their students. As described by Bankert & Kozel (2005), when the teacher and learner engage as "sharing contributors to the educational experience, a sense of closeness and unity developed along with feelings of shared responsibility for nurturing caring relationships with one another". This transformation of traditional roles can become a method of discovery as both the teacher and learner develop new interactive roles, and interactive relationships emerge."

In some ways less dry than pharmacotherapeutics, but then again not. My focus is more theoretical this time, less medical. I am honestly having a good time, and getting good feedback. It is a mix of anxiety and jubilation.

I think hon and I shall have a glass of vino and watch the sun go down, kids are tucked in!