Stevens Point. The End.

Well, I've made it to the end! Tomorrow is my last day of classes and the close of my two-week stay in Stevens Point Wisconsin. I will have completed 148 hours of pedagogy lecture and 79 hours of teacher observation. It will be strange trading in my gypsy life of travel for a grounded life with only a bicycle in the small town of Bolivar, Missouri. I think I will be pretty antsy to travel again.

I am currently seated in a table at Emy J's as I write this blog. If I walk here and back to my campus dorm, I have found that I burn the same amount of calories that I consume in a kid's size cup of their ice cream (which is made from real Wisconsin cows). Needless to say, I have not had a lot of success in resisting this $2.25 splurge.

Look! I'm with Shannon again, reunited from the Book 1 Memphis Institute in June :)

Shannon and I were able to room together during the first week as she continued her training at Stevens Point. She made sure that I tried the famous Wisconsin cheese curds, which were disgustingly tasty. It was a good time, and she was very missed during the second week. 

Carol Dallinger was my instructor for Book 8. She was from Evansville, Indiana (my home state!) and I really appreciated all of her experienced insight during our class lectures and discussions. She also had loads of books and material that she brought for us to look through--my book wishlist has definitely grown. Carol used flash drives to give us our material for the week. I loved this because we were able to have so much more and I now to have to transfer over so much information to my computer. Coming into this class, I didn't know what to expect because I wasn't a big fan of Book 8. After the first day, we defined its purpose as material that is used to solidify technique and in a sense "buy more time" before beginning the Mozart Concertos. Kind of like how Book 3 is an extension from Book 2 with the same function before the first concertos introduced in the student's repertoire.

On the weekend, I was able to spend some time with April, one of my best friends from college. We went cliff jumping, antiquing, skinny-dipping, and played music together.

This week I am in Books 9-10 with Mark Bjork (Shannon's violin professor from her undergraduate degree). The lectures are much different than all of my previous weeks. After discussing our observations from earlier that day, we take turns performing different excerpts of Mozart Concertos No. 4 & 5 while another classmate teaches. Initially I felt very intimidated because (1) I have not completely studied either of these concertos (2) I do not have a music degree, and am performing in room full of music majors from prestigious schools and (3) I have not taught anyone past Book 4 in private, let alone someone pretending to be a Book 10 student in front of the whole class. However, I am getting over it and have been learning loads more than I ever would have in a regular lecture. It has also given me practice for calming my nerves.

Tangent: I have recently been meditating and doing yoga on a regular basis and am amazed and its musical benefits. Immediately after the first day of meditation my tone improved 120% and the yoga has really helped my breathing, coordination, and muscle relaxation. Maybe during some of my teaching lessons I should just have a yoga/meditation segment..



I do not regret one second of this trip. I thoroughly enjoyed everything I learned and met a lot of great people. I would not recommend everyone to take a similar trip because it can get lonely & exhausting, but it worked really well for me. Here are a few highlights from the trip this summer:

Graceland with Shannon!

Road trip to Ithaca, NY with my Dad :)

Cooking coconut shrimp with Aunt Trish in Georgia!

Beautiful Hiking in Ithaca, NY

Meeting JJ

Hunting for Mr. Cornell's Tomb with JJ.

ER visit to check lumps on my 

legs for blood clots after all my travel and 
class-sitting. Results are negative.

Last, but not least...all of my classes, observations, 
new resources/book wishlist, and new friend Natalie!

Lots of Sushi!

                                               

So now what?
After all of this training, I plan to go back to school in Missouri to finish my business associate's degree and will be auditioning for music schools to attend in Fall 2013. I also will be taking the first steps toward opening a Suzuki School in the South Dakota Badlands on the Lakota Indian Reservation.

 

Hershey Park

I tried to stay strong and not cave into eating anything sweet while I was in Hershey, PA, but was unsuccessful. There seems to be a chocolate aroma wafting through the air of the entire city.

After a five hour lecture on my first day of class, I headed over to the Hershey Chocolate World for a tour of the company's history. Parking was free for under 3 hours, and entrance was free. The tour was also free. So I ended up walking in and out of the Hershey Chocolate World without spending a single dollar.

What most impressed me was the founding of the Milton Hershey School, which gives orphaned kids the opportunity of a great education. The tour itself was a ride with dancing cows and a model of what the factory looks like. It ended with free mini Hershey chocolate bars and a huge gift shop/food court with every kind of dessert you could imagine. There was even a big Hershey Kiss vending area and a place you could get your picture on the wrapper of your chocolate bar. Kind of crazy! Very different from my previous week in Ithaca, NY!

I really enjoyed the families I stayed with. The first three nights was with a family with 3 college students around my age. The oldest son and I had theological discussions. They also had a piano and we played music together on the last night. It was quite a nice visit!

The last three nights I stayed with my grandparents' friends. They were super nice and we ate breakfast together every morning. She even made baked apple raisin oatmeal (my favorite)! One night they had about 10 friends over for a desserts and a mini-concert. I was able to explain the Suzuki method in depth with them and they all were genuinely interested and engaged in the discussion. Because I myself was a Suzuki kid, they were very interested in knowing how I think about music as I play and how the Suzuki method teaching molded me into that kind of player. It was a nice evening.

I had Book 3 training this week at the Hershey Milton School. I am really excited about this scale book that Sharon Miller recommended for us to buy for our students. It's preparatory for the Flesch scale book with all the same fingerings in two octaves. I will be buying it in the near future.

Well, I'm really tired and need to get some sleep. A posting about the Stevens Point Institute (first established Suzuki institute in the Americas) is coming up in the near future!