Almost halfway there..

Well, it's almost mid-October (which means Thanksgiving is near and so are the Christmas holidays, which means the year is almost halfway done..) and so far, I've survived the first couple of months of school. I've started up a Zumba Fitness for Faculty for a couple of schools near to my high school. We're having the classes at one of the elementary schools since they won't charge rent. :) We're having a blast!! Class is every Thursday right after school.


One thing though is that I am so busy. There really isn't a night or weekend where I don't have some sort of commitment. It's beginning to get tiresome. Granted, it's great exercise but at some point, I'm going to have to sit tight and not commit to stuff right away. I swear that Zumba is keeping me more busy than my real teaching job--haha! At the same time, if I don't have these classes or have to skip one for some reason, I feel bloated and I don't feel good. These classes are like a drug. I have withdrawals, like the bloating and icky feelings, when I don't get to partake in the classes for some reason. I'm hoping that at least in November, I'll be able to take a little breather. I've got 2 parties I'm going to be participating in for Zumba purposes: Zombie Zumbathon and a "Wicked" Zumba party...sheesh! Lots of fun but after I get done with those, I'm going to collapse! :) I'm not having my Saturday Zumba class on the 29th so that Kyle and I can escape town for that weekend and have some peace and quiet. No Zumba. No nothing. It'll be nice. We can be refreshed and then come back that Sunday afternoon ready to start it all over again--full force!


The kids in my classes are all pretty good kids. Only minor problems such as the normal stuff like, too much talking and not staying on task. However, I've remedied that for the a little bit (especially for my 6th period). It's called new seating charts and a heart-to-heart talk with them saying I know they can do better. So far, it's worked. *cross fingers*


Kyle is still working on his Master's. He hasn't started writing yet. He's hoping to start that soon. I'm hoping he'll start that soon too because that means this madness will be done. :)


Well, I better get going. Gotta go practice with a fellow Zumba Instructor for the Zombie Zumbathon later this month. :)

1st couple of weeks down, several to go!

School has gotten off to a great start! My kids are great and (mostly) behaved. :) Sure, they're talkative and can be a bit rambunctious but they're good kids, all in all. I've been majorly saved by my fellow German teacher, Jamie Gilderhus, with all of her lesson plans she so graciously gave to me this summer. I've been trying to beef them up where I can to make them my own. I've been trying to figure out my own pace as well and doing lots of trial and error attempts...although since school has but barely started, I haven't had that many "errors"...yet.. I should get a picture of my classroom up on here pretty soon.


I've also volunteered to be the Wellness Champion for my school in order to get more involved with the teacher community at Timberline HS. All a Wellness Champion does is be the contact for the lady at the district office to send posters and flyers and whatnot to me and I can hang them around the school for faculty. I also get to help decide what health initiatives we'd like to implement for the district based on needs and desires of the district. With that said, I've decided that I want to start up a Zumba Fitness for Faculty class on Thursday afternoons. I've already had about 8 teachers at my school say they were totally interested in participating and so we'll see once I get an actual location how many more I'll gain. I would do it at my school but there's been a snag, (don't want to go into details) so I'm working with the district lady to get someplace else worked out. :)


Basically, I've been going nonstop lately. I'm tired. Whoever said half-time employment was actually half-time? Yeah, it's called half-time because I'm only paid for HALF of my time spent. ;) No worries, I love my job so far and don't have very many complaints about getting to school at 10am... that part is awesome, I won't lie.


I've also started up a German Club and have a few student participants already. We're having a "Club Rush" this week to promote all of the school clubs and hopefully grow ours. I also have a Back to School Nite event tomorrow where I get to meet some of the parents of my students. I'm also going to try and snag some and try and convince them to come to my Germany trip parent meeting the following night so they can have their kids take part in a wonderful travel opportunity. I think the parents are the ones who I can grab and actually get their attention about this amazing opportunity. Who wouldn't want to go to Germany in 2013 with a couple of AWESOME German teachers?

Well, that's what has been happening with me so far since school started. Kyle has still been plugging away at his Master's. Not a lot of spare time lately except for last weekend when we drove up to Donnelly, ID to stay a night at one of his coworker friend's cabin. They were up there and so we had a nice visit with them. The fresh mountain air was just what we needed. It allowed us to have a nice sleep that night and we woke refreshed the next day. It was a great weekend.

Jennifer Campbell rocks Zumba at the Canyon County Music Festival

Here's a video of me teaching a Zumba routine (Bollywood music) at a local music festival. :)

And it's begun!

The school year is nigh and I'm gearing up for it this week, which means meetings, meetings and more meetings! I'm getting at a taste of how exhausted I'm about to become. Although I will say, these days I've been going all day. With this part-time gig, I probably won't be as tired. But the anxiety and good stress of starting something new will probably weigh on me for a little bit. Nonetheless, I'm completely excited!!! I've got new ideas for the classroom (stuff for getting the kids to participate, etc...). I've met one of my students already--he's a German exchange student. Already forgot his name. LOL! Anyway, he's gonna be my teaching assistant for my German 3 class,where I only have 9 kids and he'll be my resource for culture questions and any doubts I have about my language skills. I'm sure he'll be willing to help me out. :)


I'm sharing a classroom with another teacher who's there in the morning and the great thing is: I DON'T HAVE TO MOVE ROOMS FOR EACH CLASS!!! I get to stay in that room in the afternoon!!! YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW HAPPY THAT MAKES ME! I get to plant myself right there and stay. I have my desk all set up for the most part, aside from odds and ends that will be added I'm sure as the year goes on. I plan on making a filing system (I'm not organized--not quite sure I'm gonna do this but it's gonna happen). I've got ideas for small projects. I'm excited for them. I think the kids and I will get along just peachy (here's hoping).


I'm sure I will have updates for ya'll soon. I'll let you know how the first few days/weeks went.

Wow, that was random/weird/nice...

I just had the nicest thing sent to me. A girl on Facebook befriend me after I sent a friend request because we had gone to middle school together. She was part of the people who may or may not have had a hand in making my life a little harder than it needed to be at that point in time. But I don't remember her being one of the MAIN ones. So anyway, she sent me a message apologizing for the way she treated me and that she hoped she didn't cause me too much grief. She said she wasn't really that way and that she's thought about me over the past several years and wanted to basically make amends.


That is an awesome thing for her to do. I mean, yeah, it came in 16 years later but hey, better late than never I suppose? I replied back to her thanking her for the nice message and that I turned out okay (debatable?--haha) and that I was very fortunate to have 2 very loving and caring parents to help me get through all of those tough times. Not every child has 2 parents nowadays that will take time to listen and comfort their children in times like those. I'm extremely lucky. And I told her that I really don't remember her being one of the main ones that gave me issues anyway. Or at least not that I can easily recollect. I do remember 2 girls to this day but it's all in the past and I have such a good life now that who cares what those 2 girls are doing? If I held that anger and sadness in for 16 years, they would've won. This girl that wrote to me actually seemed like a pretty approachable person when she was by herself and not around those other girls. I told her that pretty much. I said that, "Deep down, I think I knew you weren't like the other girls and it sorta confused me at the time. You seemed like you were a very pleasant person." Ahh, the power of peer pressure. I believe it's the strongest when you're in middle school. You're caught in between being a kid and an adolescent/teen. You're not quite sure who you're going to be at that time so you let other people decide for you, unfortunately or fortunately (depending on who you choose to be around)..


But it shows her maturity in writing this message and I only can appreciate her for this act of kindness.

The room is booked!!

A fellow Zumba Instructor and I have officially made it a goal for both of us (and other Treasure Valley Zumba Instructors) to attend the 2012 Zumba Instructor Convention in Orlando, Florida!! Apparently this year's Convention was a huge hit because not only did 7,000+ Zumba Instructors from around the world attended but ALSO the hip-hop artist, PITBULL made a special appearance for the Friday night Fitness-Concert! Wyclef-Jean also was in attendance as well!!

What happens during a Zumba Convention you ask? Well, think of it as a Comic Book Convention...BUT WAY, WAY, WAY COOLER!!! People also tend to lose a few pounds while there too due to massive amounts of exercise! This convention is only open to Zumba Instructors who are a part of the Zumba Instructor Network (ZIN) and are in good standing. There, they can get extra specialty certifications such as Aqua Zumba, Zumba Toning, Zumbatomic (Zumba for kids, ages 12 and below), Zumba Gold (Zumba for the active, older adult or the de-conditioned individual), etc. There's a new specialty that they've showcased during the convention and that's called Sentao, which is a Zumba workout on a chair--very low to no impact on the joints! The convention also offers specialty "boosts" which are little flavor sessions people can go to if they already teach a certain specialty and just need new ideas and whatnot. Now, the convention isn't all work and no play, they DO have LOADS of fun there too, such as the Glimmer and Glow Party and as I mentioned earlier, the Fitness-concert where special guest appearances may happen!

As you can see, this is a beyond-awesome event and I must be in attendance next year with thousands of my closest friends in the Zumba Fitness world!! And that's why I've gone ahead and booked a room at the most coveted event in a Zumba Instructor's fitness career...

This is what I'm talking about!!

This is my sweaty, hug picture with Camilo Jimenez. He's the guy that taught the Zumba Master Class I wrote about in the previous post. I had an AWESOME day.