Weekly Wrap-up for January 9, 2010: Book Acquisitions and First Week of School.

I feel like this past week has been one of the longest of my life. On one hand, it is great to be back in the classroom. But, it has been hard getting back into the swing of things. My body doesn't like it and actually rebelled on Thursday with a pounding migraine that hit right before lunch time. But I survived and things are still going well.

I am teaching satire to my senior English students. It went well this first week, with discussing techniques and characteristics, to watching clips from Family Guy, SNL, and The Daily Show. We even watched Shrek, which they analyzed in an in-class essay for me on Friday (I have them sitting on the coffee table right by me, waiting for me to read and grade them).

My World Religions class finished a unit on Sikhism and I found an awesome video on Hulu (A Dream in Doubt) about hate crimes against Sikhs in America after 9/11. It was an incredibly emotional video and the kids had strong reactions to it.

In U.S. History we are talking about the Great Depression and the New Deal. They seem to be interested in it and are asking a lot of questions.

Most of all, I am learning. My previous experience teaching in a high school was completely different than this. It was a rougher area and took a little more to engage the students. So I keep having to challenge myself to come up with new and exciting things to engage them. I'm doing okay so far!

We have two more weeks until finals week, and then a new semester with new kids. I already have things prepped for that, so I am anxious for that to begin!

Anyway, on to book thoughts! I recently acquired a new little stack of books, most of which are seen here:

The top two are Parts 2 and 3 to Dante's The Divine Comedy. They were given to me by a friend who knew I was looking for them! The third, and beautifully white book, is The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoevsky, the last novel by him on my list. It is translated by Pevear and Volohonsky, so I can't want to dive in during that future readalong. That one I purchased.

The next two Penguin titles are The Canterbury Tales by Chaucer and The Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyon. Again, these are two titles off my list that I have been itching to read. And having them on my shelf will make this much easier. And, I bought both of those too.

Below that is my shame. Yes, it says The Real Housewives Get Personal. I have a slight addiction to The Real Housewives on Bravo and a good friend saw this on the bargain shelf at Borders, so she bought it for me. And I already read it. *hangs head in shame* I can't help it. I like the shows! I'm addicted to mindless TV!

And the very bottom is the newest issue of Real Simple Magazine. Matt and I are continuing to work on organizing and purging, and this magazine always has great ideas!

Not pictured are two books I picked up last night. The first is Ceremony by Leslie Marmom Silko, a book that I am reader for Roof Beam Reader's TBR Challenge. And, since I've saw Eva's post on it, I have been anxious to read it. The other book I picked up is The Death of Ivan Ilyich and Other Stories by Leo Tolstoy and translated, yet again, by the dynamic duo of Pevear and Volohonsky.

Beyond my new books, I have been focusing on reading for the readalong posts, which will be appearing this coming weekend. I flew through Rebecca on the first and second of this month, got the first half of The Woman in White done this past week, and I am trudging slowly through War and Peace.

I hope you all had a great reading week, and for those of you participating in the readalongs, I'm looking forward to seeing what you have to say about them this weekend!

Happy Reading!