Quizes

Been quite the day here.  About 6" of snow in 12 hrs, had a great time taking a break from my studies to play in the new snow and build a snowman with my children.  We ran out of carrots so rather than a carrot nose, cole/rock eyes and mouth we used snowballs to shape up the eyes, nose and mouth.  Then used food coloring to make his eyes and mouth shine through.
After my relaxing morning the the beautiful snow with my adorable children it was back to hitting the books while the kids drank hot cocoa and watched movies. 
Math is a difficut course to take period but it is much more difficult on line.  You do not have the one on one with your teacher in a classroom and if you can not reach your teacher via telephone you have to wait for a reply either via email or instructor post forum in the classroom.  Even though it is rough going and not that easy I so far have been successful enought to keep up my A in the class.  I may only be betting and A- but hey it's still and A right and it only take a point percentage off of my grade.  Thank goodness this week is almost over and I got a 90% on my quiz.  Only 2 more weeks and we are on to two more classes as I will be starting to double up my classes so that I can get done faster.  The goal as of right now is to get my Masters before my youngest child turn 6.  So I have about 4 1/2 years to get that MA.  It usually takes about 5 1/2 to 6 years to get your MA through the GCU.
Luckly I had a few classes that transfered from the community college I attended about 9 years ago so I am getting to my core classes a lot faster.  No to get the TED test over with so I can start practicum classes.

Achievments

As I has just ended my first year as a college student.  Well, I've been attending for 1 year as far as credits go but as far as dates go I still have a few more weeks before we get to that 1 year mark.

Anyway, I am nearing the end of my 7th course I went down to check the mail the other day and had a letter from my school.  I was a bit confused as it was not their normal envelope, I could tell that it was not from the financial aid office and I knew that it was not a stipend check.  So with wonder on my mind I quickly ripped open the envelope as soon as I got home to find what was awaiting me in that nice little white folded paper that we all use to mail off our bills and letters.

Upon unfolding the neatly folded paper I began to read.  "We would like to ............."  and then I zoned out until I hit "Congratulations on making President's List."  I was so super excited I called my dad, my in-laws, texted a bunch of people and plastered it all over my facebook page. 

I view it as a great way to show those around me that it is possible to chase after your educational dreams and achieve a degree no matter how old you are or how many kids you have running around or how many things you think are standing in your way to get to where you want to be.  For me I wanted to wait until my youngest child was in Kindergarten so that I could have more time to take more than one class at a time and get done a lot faster.  However, I'm super glad that I made the choice a year ago to further my education now rather than waiting so that we can make greater strides in our lives and concentrate more on the things that our children will need us for in the future.
Oh, my, gosh, that totally did not come out how it should have.  I just made myself sound like one of those mom's that don't care.  I love my children and they come before anything else, including school work.  Going back to school now and on line gives me the time that I need to spend with the two children that I do have at home still while gaining the knowledge that I will need to continue to teach my children the things they are working on at school and being able to spend the same amount of time with them while teaching.

So, here is to making President's list again and the continues success of not only myself but other mom's that are working hard to gain a higher education and better their future and their families.

too long

It has been entirely too long since I have updated this blog and a lot has happened since the last time.  Since my last update quite a few things have happened that I have had to hurdle.  Life has been in the fast lane most of the winter.  I guess you could say that if life were a circus and I am a juggling clown then I have had a lot of balls up in the air.
After a few challenging classes (not because they were difficult classes, more so because they were tedious generals) I am currently in what I think is going to be the most difficult class to focus on during my whole education process.  Since I'm not really a math person and I have always struggled with math this class is testing me in a million different ways.  Even though I struggle with math and it is difficult to keep up with the demands of being a wife and stay at home mom with 60 intense math question a week I have somehow manage to keep up with all of the demands.
We are fastly approaching the end of the 5th week of this 7 week class and I am dreading week 6 as my instructor continues to remind the class that week 6 is the most intense and crazy week of the whole course.  I can only image what week 6 has to offer since the last 5 weeks have been pretty intense.

Oh how I can not wait for this class to end.  Thank goodness the light at the end of the tunnel is getting bigger and brighter. 

New Courses are Coming

It's been quite a while since I last posted.  Things have been gong super great with school.  I am not making my goal of graduating with a 4.0 however I am still on track to keep my TEACH grant as well as graduating with honors.

Current class up for the next six weeks is Environmental Science.  So far so good.  Not really getting into this class like I have been in the last few classes. 

The one thing I have been gratful for is the support of my family.  My kids have been awesome about "helping" me do my homework.  My husband has been totally supportive of me being school and the hard work that I am putting out to get the grades that I want and deserve.  He's been so supportive that he is now jumping in and starting his first ever college experience ever.  He will be working on his bachelors in Business Leadership.  We were able to find a school that is 100% everything that he needs to move up with the state and become a district supervisor.  I am so excited and proud of him for the journy that he is about to embark on.  I know he will do great he always does.

In adition to my children and husband being super supportive my parents, sister, in-laws are all supportive and give me great feedback on papers that I send to them to review for me as well as encourgement through out each class that I have taken thus far.

After Christmas I will be stepping up the game and taking two classes at a time.  I am thinking I am a bit crazy but I will be able to drop back down to one at a time when ever I want.  I have a goal to graduate with my master the same time that Jonathon graduates with his Bachelors so that we can make it one great big party for the both of us to celebrate our acheivements together.

1st Semester

Well, first semester is over and we are still going strong.  As my first semester back to school came to an end I was feeling pretty good about myself and about my grades even though I got an A- causing my GPA to drop from a 4.0 to a 3.9 but hey I am being optimistic and looking at it as I have gotten A's in all of my classes. 
Class #4 is going great even though it is not really a class that I really wanted to take but I have to take it so Critical Thinking and Problem solving it is my friends.  I was a little intimidated by the name of the course, however; I have been able to surprise myself with how well I am doing. 
We are having to write a persuasive essay which causes us to have to do a peer review.  I guess because I have been doing so well my teacher thought that I would be a great person to complete two peer reviews.  So here I have sat for the last two nights after my children have gone to bed looking at essay's from two different classmates giving my opinion on what they could do better and what they did well.

I did not have a problem doing two essay's I found it rather easy and breezed through them thinking, "Is this supposed to be hard?  Am I missing something?  Do I need to be taking more time with this?"  Only to realize that I was thinking way to much into it and just needed to get through it and get it done the best I could.  And that is EXACTLY what I did.
Really the only thing that scares me about the peer review has nothing to do with what if the other person thinks I was too critical of them but what my peer reviewer is going to say about my essay.  Knowing my luck I am going to get someone that is completely against the ownership or use of any kind of gun period.  I am going to get the only tree hugging, ignorant, self-centered person that is in my class to do my review.

I guess we just look at the bright side and keep on pushing through and getting on to the next class.

keeping the grade

As I have said a number of times before, it is not easy being a stay at home mom, going to school full time, and keeping up with the demands of having four children running around the house especially in the summer time, but some how I am able to manage to keep up the grade and continue to get the grades I want out of the classes that I really do not care that much about that I have to take because they are required.  Even if they have nothing to do with my major.

I somehow let myself slip in the last class that I took and did not get the grade that I wanted, however, it was still an A even if it was an A- and A is and A right.  I have stepped my game back up and have double checked and triple checked everything that I do in this current class and I am managing somehow to get 100% on every assignment that I have been assigned thus far.

I do not know if the class is just that easy or if I am just trying that much harder.  Or it could just be the fact that I am much more laied back in this class and enjoying my children more often and worrying less and less about the demands that my class has on me.  Which ever that may be I am glad that I am doing so well and I am hoping that this will help me get my GPA back up to where i would like it to be or at least closer to where I want it to be as, let's face it one A- will keep anyone from a 4.0 GPA.

although as well as I have been doing I am thinking about going straight into my master's program as soon as I am done with my double Bachelor and if I should do that I will want to go to AZ and walk with my class to get that diploma that I have worked so hard for.  I am on the fence as to if that is something that I want to do right now.  I guess it will all depend on how well I continue to do and if I am where I want to be or in a place that I am able to get away to do so.  I think it would make a fun family vacation to go down to Arizona and see some sights and let my children watch me receive that piece of paper that says their mommy earned a double bachelor degree with kids still in the home and all of them being very young.

We will see where we are at 3 1/2 years from now.

Why me????

Communication and Information Literacy, I totally get why this is important as a teacher and the class is going really well so far.  We are just getting ready to wrap up week two, so far the work has been pretty easy, I do not mean like, "hey, I can just whip this out in five minutes and I am done and it looks great and will get a great grade."  I am talking about it is easy to get the work done, it is easy to find what I need, and the work is pretty easy.  It is taking me a little longer to get the worksheets done so good thing they are few and far between.  There is a lot of reading about 2 chapters equalling about 70-80 pages a week.  Thankfully, the information is easy to read and most of it I already know.

So, this week we are talking about the difference between primary and secondary sources which is really easy to figure out and talk about.  We are also talking about why it is important to cite information and quotes that you may use in your essays or work.  There are so many plagiarism laws that it is not even funny.  With I am glad they are there and that the law sees fit to protect people against "word" thieves.

I am sitting on the couch the other night, kind of watching "Deadliest Catch" on Discovery with Jonathon as I am reading through one of the question posts.  I open a new thread to read someones response to one of the questions for this week and notice that I feel like I have read this before.  As I get looking I go back and look at a few other things and realize that it is my post.  I thought that I had clicked someone else's thread so that I could read and comment and wonder why all of what I wrote is not there.So I get to looking and find that it is my post, minus a few sentences at the end.  I guess my response was so great that someone thought they could use it as their own and hope they didn't get caught doing so.

Little did this person know that I check the threads every day a few times a day and I generally read every ones posts and decided which ones I want to comment on.  Lucky for them I kept my cool and did not say a word to him but emailed my teacher instead.  People that know me really well know that every fiber, cell, molecule, and ounce of my being wanted to getting catty and respond to this persons post and call them out in front of the entire class and ask them why they thought it would be okay to use my response as their own?

I get a phone call from my teacher yesterday, he explains he got my email and that he is looking into it and will be conducting and investigation  on this person.  Good thing it is only the second week of class because now he has to go back through all of this persons posts and double check his work with everyone else's work in the class, which makes a lot of work for my teacher.  I am glad that he is looking farther into it and that he is doing what needs to be done to make sure that this person takes responsibility for what they have done and that they will not be doing it again.
This could be as little as a 0% for the week on discussion and participation or as much as being kicked out of the school.  As my teacher said, "plagiarism of any kind, even using someone else's post as your own, in the academic world is no different than committing a murder on the street."  I for sure would not like to be on the receiving end of any of this.

I feel bad that I may be getting this person kicked out of school or even causing them to fail and assignment but in the end it really is not my problem and I should not feel badly about it because they are the one that chose to copy/paste/and delete the last few sentences of my post and try to pull it off as their own.

I really think that this person was thinking they could get away with it.  This is the second time that this has happened to me.  I really do not understand it.  There are people in this class that have way better answers than what I am posting.  And to top it all off this person had the guts to comment on my post.

Well, I know that academic justice will be served and that is all I care about.