The First Days: Anna

Often times I pass my coworkers in the halls and think to myself, “that is one sweet outfit!”.  Much of my traffic also comes from fellow teachers who are just starting out in the field, or are just curious to see how other like minded teachers are clothing themselves.  In the past, I’ve featured a couple of my Brooklyn friends on this blog such as Millie and Rachel.  This year, I’m starting off fast – with first day outfits.

This is Anna.  She teaches French.  Anna is all kinds of awesome.  She said she doesn’t normally wear this shirt because her hair gets caught in it.  But first days are special, and it looks great on her!  Anna is not one to shop normally, and she couldn’t really remember where every item came from.  Shopping really isn’t the point though, is it?

anna day one2

anna day one1

anna day one

top: topshop – shoes: blowfish – bracelets: aldo

A Giant

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scarf: topshop – cardigan and jeans: uniqlo – shirt: giants – belt: banana republic – boots: madewell

A few FAQ from students:

“Miss, are you going to have kids?” — No.

“Miss, what are you?” — I am a human being with feelings.

“Miss, did that hurt?” — (about my nape piercing) Of course.

“Miss, why are you so damn tall?” — Because I come from a city of giants.  Duh!

Q1 in the bag

Today is the last day of the first grading quarter at school.  One in the bag, three more to go.  The end of the quarter also means it’s “final product” time for the kids – the one major “assessment for learning” project to demonstrate their “mastery” of the unit’s “learning targets”.  A bit of teacher speak for big assignments in every class.  For me, final product time means I’m spend a lot of time “scaffolding” the project I’ve assigned and giving lunchtime and after school help with writing lab reports, graphing, and making sense of experimental data.  This year, I’ve decided to get two birds with one stone and assigned the kids a state mandated lab report as their final product.  It’s been a 2 week process so far, with a lot of hand holding along the way.  It’s looking good though and I’m optimistic about the quality of work I’ll be getting come Monday.  I can’t even count how many brain cells I’ve devoted to making this learning process as painless and accessible as possible.  I’m feeling a lot of coulda-shoulda-wouldas for last year’s curriculum.

In the meantime, if you come here to check out outfits, you’ve probably been disappointed this past month.  I’ve been MIA, mainly because I’ve been sticking to this teacher uniform, and I’ve been on a shopping ban.  Also, it’s been pretty crisply cold here in Brooklyn – winter is here.  This morning, I figured I’d splash out some bit of color and warmth with an old summer skirt.  I swear it looked better in my head this morning while I spent 5 precious minutes staring blankly into my closet.  In real life, I’m actually not a big fan – an experiment gone bad.  You win some, you lose some, right?

Q1
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glasses: warby parker – scarf: topman – t-shirt: everlane – belt: gap – skirt: anthropologie – tights & cardigan: uniqlo – boots: steve madden

Stay-cation

Sadly, my spring break is coming to an end.  It’s been a sweet week and a half.  I took a trip to visit Jojo, my good friend Aimee came out to visit, and B and I enjoyed a day-long stay-cation.  He took off work today and we went exploring in Manhattan.  We started at the very southern tip and wound our way north to Central Park, then headed back down south stopping at my favorite basics shop Uniqlo on the way.  I got B to buy some new pants in a snazzy preppy stripe.  He’ll probably never wear them unless I force him to – which will be often!  Today was all about warmth and comfort.  Spring has sprung, but it was still super windy and cold today.  Perfect for my new favorite sweatshirt from the men’s section of H&M- I’m all about men’s clothing lately.

I particularly loved all the memorials down in the south end, especially the Merchant Marines Memorial.  I also found a Schenck on the WWII memorial, an electrician from Kansas.
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staycation5

staycation

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sunnies: ray-ban – scarf: topshop – sweatshirt: h&m – jeans: f21 – socks: uo – sneaks: converse – bag: frietag

winterizing

I love how some dresses can be winter-ized by just adding a few things.  This dress, I’ve taken from the balmy crisp SF weather, through to hot muggy Brooklyn summer, straight into the dry freeze-your-ears-off Brooklyn winter.  All it takes is the addition of a scarf, wooly tights, cardigan and suede booties.  Of course, there was a coat involved, but I left it off while inside.  Dress, during summer last seen here.  Next time, I’ll have to remind myself to use a few more squirts of Static Guard

scarf: topshop – cardigan and belt: j.crew – dress: f21 – tights: h&m – booties: steve madden

old faithfuls

Winter break is coming up in 2 more days.  Just in time too – I’m due for a serious break and I know my students need one also.  I pulled out an old faithful today, a striped sweater dress.  I bought this dress a couple years ago from H&M after I saw Anna from See Jane wear this version so beautifully.  It was inexpensive, has held up to many washings and can easily be a year round dress with a few additions.  And so, it’s become an old faithful with a bit nostalgia.  I wore this dress the first time B and I visited Brooklyn/New York City together after only dating for a month.  OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

circle scarf: topshop – dress and boots: h&m – leggings: target

Blooms

It’s friday night – post teacher happy hour – so I don’t feel much like writing a whole post.  So I have this to marinate upon-

I’d like to frame this blog post with an authentic experience around high order thinking and annotation to encourage rigorous pair-sharing.  Meet Mr. Giraffafant, Ms. Cruz’s sweet old buddy.  Using what you know about genetics and natural selection, compare and contrast key characteristics of Mr. Giraffafant’s outfit with Ms. Schenck’s outfit of the day (keeping in mind one of her many high school nicknames, giraffe).  Be sure to support your argument with evidence and cite your sources.  blooms5   blooms2

blooms3

blooms4

blooms

scarf: topshop – jacket: uniqlo – cardigan: j.crew – shirt (old) but also seen here on this blog & boots:  anthropologie – coated pants last seen here: bdg urban outfitters

bright sunshiny day

Two days later and things are going much better.  Then again, I see ‘that class’ again tomorrow (first time since monday), so ask me again how things are later.  I think I have a game plan though, and it’s called “space”.  I’m giving those boys space and in return, they’re going to give me space.  At least, that’s how it’s working out for me in my head.  In the mean time, I’m up for some brightness in my life.  So I color blocked my day with a neutral and a hot red pepper color. That’s me – neutral for the most part, but sometimes I turn into a hot pepper and get angry.  bright

brighter5

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glasses: salt (old) – circle scarf: topshop – cardigan: j.crew – belt: gap (old) – dress: some cheapo no name from tobi.com – tights: uniqlo heattech (so warm!) – booties: steven by steve madden (on sale!)