Being a Teacher

I have come to the frightening conclusion that I am the decisive element in the classroom.

It's my personal approach that creates the climate.

It's my daily mood that makes the weather.

As a teacher, I possess a tremendous power to make a student's life miserable or joyous.

I can be a tool of torture or an instrument of inspiration.

I can humiliate or humor, hurt or heal.

In all situations, it is my response that decides whether a crisis will be escalated or de-escalated,

And a student humanized or dehumanized.

Haim Ginott, Author and Teacher

Happy Australia Day

Happy Australia Day to all! Let's all not forget the new citizens (Congrats Fab) and the flood victims. Get your BBQ fired up and beer ready, go to the beach, swim and stay safe! :)

Preparation

As I'm sitting here waiting for Baby A to finish cooking and watching the Australian Open, I just realised I have not updated my blog for more than a week. A lot of crazy things has happened, got into a car accident, hoping for my application for Masters of Teaching to be successful (and it starts on the 24th!), preparation for Gen418 and our Uni/Youth service Infuse and a lot of disappointment and discouragement, but what makes a person a fighter and warrior is that they choose to pick themselves up when they are down and fight through the tough times, giving the sacrifice of praise even though there's pain in the offering.

I've been reading a lot of books on leadership in preparation for what is to come. God spoke to me clearly that 'He has called me to be a leader' in prayer meeting 2.5 years ago and I have been watching, learning and trying my best to live it out.

As I step into more of that role I realized there's a lot of costs. Investing in people's lives, and people who might criticise you can drain you emotionally. The attack can somehow makes you wonder if you're even worthy to be in that position. Another thing I found out was that the devil hates you a lot. As Ed Young said... A whole notha level, a whole notha devil.

I realised the intensity of the attacks on me has been so great and much for the past few months. Lies, temptations, questions have all got me, for the first time ever I felt as if poison darts has injected in my heart whenever I get these attacks. I can literally feel 'the fierty darts' from the enemy.

I realised there are personal things that are not wrong but have to give up in order to live a life of significance. God has speaking to me about pruning things off in my life that will hold me back or that will hinder God's involvement in my life.

There'll probably me more things that I will learn as I go on but at the end of the day I don't want to give up and throw the towel......

'Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up' Gal 6:9

what is life?

First post of 1/1/11 + Miracle!!!

I wasn't planning on blogging or writing my first post of 2011 in the first day of the year but something funny happened at work that I had to share.

Some of you might know I managed to get Sunday off work which is a good thing because it means I can focus my energy on the church and not get tired but I never knew the reason why my manager gave me Sunday off, I just thought it was because I had church so she gave me the Sunday off. Turns out I found the real reason today.... and the reason was 'I was practicing to be a priest' so apparently I managed to get Sunday off. I thought I find that funny and cute. I am a royal priest :)

However! The coolest part for today was at work. The hotel was fully booked and we can't move any guests to any room because it was 100% occupancy. There were two problems with two rooms which me and my supervisor tried to fix.

1.) remote had dead batteries, screw was on the remote control, needed a screwdriver. Problem was maintenance had gone home and there were no screwdriver and new batteries available. Poor Guest can't watch TV or Play their Wii.

2.) Air corn in another room was dead, the panel used to control the air corn was dead and we couldn't fix it. again... maintenance was gone... poor guest had to sleep tonight with no A/C

My supervisor then found an odd looking screwdriver and asked me to give it a go on the remote to see if I could get the batteries out. I went to the room, it didn't fit in the screw and the sudden thought just hit me. 'Why not just command the batteries to have power again?' and so I laid hands on the remote control and released power to the remote control. Tried it and the remote started working again!!! Then I got excited and went to the room where the A/C wasn't working and turn off the power, commanded it to work and turn on the power and it WORKED!! as if nothing has gone wrong. is that a way to start the new year or what? I told my supervisor the good news that I prayed and it worked and asked if she would like to come and see the A/C working... and she said 'no need I believe you'

Sure the Remote Control and the Aircorn didn't accept Jesus but it was still a miracle, seeing how God can even cause 'dead' things to work again. oh and yes... pretty much word spread quickly that I was 'practicing' to be a priest. Let's hope my workplace can be changed for the glory of God! :)