It Must Be Spring

We had great weather this week, and two weeks ago, though it snowed last week while I was at a different Nature's Classroom site. I went to Colebrook in NW Connecticut last week while we had a small group because they needed extra staff for a particularly large group. Two hundred and seventy 5th graders. Oh, what a horrible week that was. It wasn't the kids, rather, I had a low-grade fever for half of the week, and I lost my voice on Monday and didn't get it back until Saturday. I drank gallons of peppermint tea to no avail. The worst of it was that I had to be outside for most of the days while feeling terrible, and I had to try and direct the kids with no voice. I woke up on Wednesday (a day we typically have a long hike with the kids from 9:30 to 2:30) and discovered a good inch of snow on the ground. It was miserable, but the kids loved shaking all the hemlocks and making it snow even after the snow stopped. I have mostly recovered, and I'm hoping that terrible cold got my immune system ready to fight all of the rest of the germs I will encounter during the rest of the season.

I didn't get a chance to rest a lot last weekend because I attended a conference for all Nature's Classroom teachers. The purpose was basically to get all of us from the dozen sites together and take classes. There are books with pre-approved class outlines, but it was fun to go observe a few being taught (and get paid a little). I'm even going to replicate some of those classes this coming week.

Last week was a great week, though. I was feeling better and we had temps up to 70. I am finally feeling comfortable with the classes I teach and the program overall, plus I had a really sweet field group. We saw a lot of wildlife this week, perhaps more in this week than the all the previous weeks combined. Spring is here. I even got to run in shorts, a t-shirt, and sun glasses yesterday.

Oh, and Happy Easter to you all.