So much to do, so little time

So, believe it or not, I have been student teaching while I've been here. Even though the majority of my blog is filled with pictures of my travels, more of my time spent here has been in the classroom. Along with this comes a LOT of work. We stay until about 5 every day to plan out our lessons and what we are going to do with the kids. A lot of nights I even take some work home to finish AFTER 5. On top of this, I have been working on completing my edTPA. This is the "teacher performance assessment." Basically, this is a 3-part assessment that I have to complete during my time here, and it is actually due at the end of the month!

Here is a quick outline of what this includes:

Task 1: Background information of my school/students, 4 lesson plans, 10 page commentary on what I will be doing in these lesson plans, copies of the materials I will use, and the assessments I will have the students complete.

Task 2: 15 minute video of me teaching, 7 page commentary of what I did while I was teaching

Task 3: Examples of student work, feedback on student work, student reflections, 10 page commentary on why I chose the assessments

So, as you can see, there is a LOT to the TPA, and it's not something that I can just do the night before it's due :) Which is why I have been slacking on my blog posts. I'm taking a "quick" break to share some pictures from my trip to Berlin (2 weeks ago haha)

We stayed at our usual hostel, St. Christopher. We've been lucky that this hostel has been in all of the places we have stayed so far, we have had a lot of luck and enjoyed staying there. One of their perks is a free walking tour, which we took full advantage of once again! The tour started off at the Bradenburg Gate. We thought this would be an appropriate place to wave the Cougar flag :)

The tour continued on to the Holocaust Memorial. This was such an amazing site. And what is so interesting about it is that nobody knows the meaning behind it. The man who created this left only a small plaque labeling the name of the memorial, but even that is difficult to see because it is hidden behind some bushes. Even in interviews he reveals very little information about what the symbolism behind this memorial is... 

Walking through the memorial was very cool. At the outside it starts off low, then the memorial begins to swallow you, then it's height decreases again. From some points it seems symmetrical, at others you can tell that it is in fact not.

Another place we visited (not pictured) was in the middle of an apartment complex parking lot. There was no sign or indicator of what had happened in this area, but our tour guide told us that we were standing in the exact spot that Adolf Hitler had committed suicide. This was so powerful because it is something that is not publicly recognized, however, lo and behold we were standing right on history itself. 

Another spot we went to was Check Point Charlie. Simply just a spot where Berlin was separated between the Germans and Americans. There was a funny reenactment of what it might have been like if someone tried to illegally cross the border.

One side has an American Soldier, the other side has a German Soldier.

The joke was that this was the "Berlin Space Needle." I can't quite remember what the actual name for it was but it definitely was not that! We asked our tour guide about this and he said that really all it was is a radio tour. Looks cooler than it's purpose I guess :P

Berlin has some beautiful architecture, and because of how beautiful it was, especially in this square, we were amazed that our walking tour group seemed to be the only people around. Apparently Berlin has 200,000 open apartments, for why we are not sure. But if anyone is interested in moving to Berlin, seems like there is plenty of space for you!

This was probably my favorite site in Berlin, the Berlin Dom. It was just GORGEOUS both on the outside and inside. I think the snow gave it a nice extra touch as well :)

We have seen many churches now, but they all seem to be so different and have their own unique style. We were able to climb up into the Dome at the top and look out at the city. Unfortunately due to the weather we could not walk around on the outside part, so I didn't get any good pictures of the view :(

No trip is complete without a picture of our yummy drinks, right? 3 out of the 4 of us decided to trade the beers in for a fruity drink this time, just for a change :)

We only had 1 full day in Berlin, and then part of the second day to see the town. The second day we spent almost the entire time searching for the Berlin Wall. We finally found it! There was TONS of artwork all over the wall. 

The day before, on the walking tour, we had walked by part of the wall but did not get a chance to get very good pictures of it :( This part was not painted. I am not sure why some parts are and some parts aren't.

Since the Berlin wall had been "knocked down" I felt it appropriate to take a picture doing just that..of course it was convenient to have a spot to place my foot!

Something that I really liked that the tour guide left us with was a quote he had read in a book. "Paris will always be Paris, but Berlin is always becoming Berlin." This was so powerful to me because whenever I think about history, I think about the events that happened many many years ago. The events in Berlin just happened in the past 100 years and Berlin is still up and coming. It was incredible to get to see a city that has so much fresh and new history all around!