Graduation, Prom, and my Birthday!

     This past Friday we had preschool and high school Graduation, prom, and it was also my 24th birthday! It was a pretty crazy weekend. We had 8 graduates this year, which is a lot for a school that has just over 100 students. Our graduation went just about the same way as any other graduation, but it was probably a little shorter and we had high school and preschool at the same time. We did a lot of the decorating on Thursday night and then put up the finishing touches between graduation and prom.

Filling up the balloon net.

The balloon crew!

Making all the walls look nice.

Everyone working hard to make the gym look great!

And the balloon net is up!

Cue graduation song...

The set up.

Cake!

Our graduates, you did it!

Oh the anticipation is killing the little ones...

There they go.

Brett, our awesome principal!

The guest speaker was a teacher from last year that came back just to speak at graduation.

Congratulations Class of 2015!

     Now time for the fun! Prom in the village is a little different then what most of us are familiar with. Typically, just Juniors and Seniors get to come to prom, you dress up all fancy, get dinner, have the grand march, etc. Here in Eek everyone from 2nd through 12th grade gets to come to prom. Obviously the younger students only get to be there for certain times. Even the community is allowed to come and hang out. We had snack type foods and pizza out to eat during the dance. It was a lot of fun to see all the students dressed up and having some fun! Even the teachers had a great time!

This is a little area where everyone can sit and eat.

The gym is looking fancy!

All the decorations turned out really nice.

The DJ corner.

We had a little limbo competition and the kids loved it!

 Almost all of the kids participated, even high schoolers.

Ashley and I in the photo booth.

Lynn, one of the graduates, and I.

This is the majority of my students, I was able to drag them away from 

the dance floor long enough for a picture.

Just us teachers being goofy!

The aftermath, the picture says it all...

     After graduation was over, Ashley and I went to a throwing party. What is a throwing party you ask? A throwing party is basically where a bunch of people stand outside someone's house and the person who lives there throws a bunch of things to the people to catch and whatever you catch you get to keep. This one was held by one of the graduate's mother. They have throwing parties to celebrate things like graduating, when youngsters catch their first fish, or a first kill on a hunt. They will throw anything from candy, to small household items, and even new honey buckets. It was a great experience and a lot of fun! It can also be just a tad dangerous, I got hit in the forehead with a small candle (haha). You just have to watch out for everything flying through the air!

     I also went to two feasts. I went to one at the house where the throwing party was and then I went to the house of another graduate. They were both great and the food was delicious! I even tried a few new things. I tried some herring eggs and salmon bits soaked in salt and water for a long time (I can't remember the actual name for it). I even got to try some different kinds of akutaq, my favorite was the salmon berry akutaq. It was really cool getting to go to the feasts and it was great to socialize with some of the people that live there.

All and all it was a pretty great day. I had a lot of fun! Enjoy the update!

Winding Down

     Only six and a half more days of school and ten days until I head back to Ohio. These last couple weeks have and will be busy. There will be a lot going on. This is kind of a random post but I hope you enjoy.

     A couple Fridays ago we had field day. For those of you that haven't heard about field day, we try to do this one Friday a month in the school gym. All of the students and teachers are divided into four field day teams. There are the Wolves, Foxes, Lynx, and Wolverines (my team!). Brett comes up with fun activities and races, each team picks six students of varying grades to participate in each activity. We all compete and get points for how we place in each activity. During certain months we have themed activities for Valentine's Day, Christmas, Easter, etc. It is a lot of fun and the kids love it. There are usually a lot of laughs too! The goal is to have the most points by the end of the year, currently the Wolverines are in third place, but we have one more field day to go!

It was hilarious watching the students do this obstacle course relay.

Musical chairs! This month was teacher's pick for the activities. We had some good ones.

The Wolverines! 

This was the last two high schoolers, they were too funny!

     The river broke up a few weeks ago. This tends to be a big deal in the villages. They actually have competitions where you can bet on which day the rivers will break and win money. Like you could actually win a lot of money. It's pretty crazy. This can also be a dangerous time for the villages as well. Lynn told me about a time when all the ice clogged up in a bend of the river and it caused the river to flood an entire village somewhere. Once the ice clears out people can start using their boats again. It is definitely interesting to see and hear. If you sat down by the river you could hear the ice breaking and moving. 

Someone has their boat all ready to go when the ice moves out.

Trying to find a good piece of ice to stand on...

 Ashley and Misty

I found one! Have no fear, I am only about three feet from the shore and in about six inches of water.

I just wanted the illusion of standing out on a piece of ice.

So did you notice how the ice formed all those pointy looking crystals, well they are pointy!

I went to step on a piece and it just kind of crumbled, it was very shallow water but it surprised me a little and I didn't want to get my shoe wet so I fell. The ice scuffed me up a little, nothing too bad though.

A video of the ice moving down the river.

     It was really nice one day and my students wanted to go outside for D.E.A.R. (Drop Everything And Read). Soaking up some vitamin D. We have around 17 hours of daylight now and getting longer by each day. Fun fact: The sun rose in Barrow, Alaska yesterday and won't set again until August. Talk about sunlight!    

     This past Friday we had the Staff vs. Students Basketball Game. It was a blast! Most of the teachers and school staff participated and we even had the basketball coaches on our team. We all had a lot of fun. I actually scored two points, I was pretty excited!

                                           The Staff.....                                   The Students.....

Getting warmed up.

Schooling these kids on AND off the court!

The final score. Teachers (65), Students (45)

     Saturday we had a little yard sale or I guess you could say "gym" sale at the school. It was an opportunity for us teachers to sell some stuff we didn't need or want anymore. I sold some things that I didn't want to take back to Ohio or wouldn't need in Ohio. I sold my sleeping bag, sleeping mat, Muck boots, fan, cooler, some phone cases, towels, surf guns, neck pillow, and a few other things. I made a little bit of money and got rid of some stuff.

     I wanted to share a little about a program our school district does called Migrant Education. Migrant Education is basically a program that provides materials and support to students who move across district boundaries or 20 miles within a district that is more than 15,000 square miles for economic reasons or seasonal/temporary work. Many of the families in the villages pack up and move to fish camp during the summers to go fishing. They go up and down river by boat and some of the students travel far enough to qualify for the Migrant Education program. Yesterday, I passed out books for the students in the program. Scholastic makes these summer reading packs organized by grade level. They are really nice and we had enough to give to all of our students. The students seemed pretty excited about their new books. 

 There was a good variety of books in each pack.

 I had 6th, 7th, and 8th grade packs.

Some of the packs have worksheet and activities the students can do along with the books.

So just thought I would share this video.

This is what some of the students like to do in the spring on their SNOWmobiles. Yes, that is a snowmobile and yes he is skipping it across the water. This is our evening entertainment sometimes. It is even more entertaining when they flood their machines haha. :D

     This Friday we have Prom and Graduation, as well as my birthday. It will be a pretty busy weekend. Next week we will have our last field day on Tuesday and the students last day and clean up day are on Wednesday. We also have a community cookout type meal on Wednesday. Thursday is a teacher workday and I leave Eek on Friday. Busy busy! Hopefully I will be able to post again before I leave. As always, enjoy!