Teaching 8 year-olds about Australia

One Monday morning whilst visiting the USA, I was offered the chance to teach a class of third-graders about Australia. My partner’s mother said that her cousin is a school teacher in Erwin Tennessee, about a half hour drive from where we were staying… and that it would truly make her day to enrich these children’s lives if they could learn about cultures and songs from around the world first-hand; especially as they hadn’t yet covered Australia.

With much pride, and my boyfriend in had as a safety blanket, we headed to Tennessee. Taking as many goodies as possible to keep these kids interested – eg, clip on koala toys, postcards of Australian sights and cities, Minties, Fantales, Vegemite and more – we taught the class of eight year olds for just over an hour.

They kept me totally amused with questions like “Can you ride in the pouch of a kangaroo?”, “Can you go hunting in Australia?”, and thinking the capital city, Canberra, is similar to the word Cranberry. In their defence, it was only a few days out from Thanksgiving!

After singing our national anthem “Advance Australia Fair”, and teaching them “Waltzing Matilda”, they sang their US anthem too.

A fun time was had by all. Here’s a photo from the experience.

Time to be Thankful

I’ve just returned from a whirlwind tour of the USA’s east coast, covering 14 states in 12 days. Why you may ask? My partner is American and so this year we decided to spend Thanksgiving with his family, gathering for a few days at his uncle’s place about an hour north of Atlanta – in between zooming around the land to see family and friends in all directions!

Celebrating my first Thanksgiving holiday was definitely a treat! Seeing the turkey so delicately cooked and carved, to experiencing fried ochra, pecan pie, turkey stuffing, and all the other traditions associated with this holiday. In the late afternoon I also drank some moonshine.

As we won’t be back over Xmas time, we also had our big present giving session. My partner’s family always manages to go above and beyond all expectations I ever have of this. Last year, we brought lots of gifts and received suitcases full too. This year, was the same – however, we weren’t caught out with the luggage restrictions, as we had a suitcase dedicated to the presents going home – which we were very thankful for.

I never realised that Thanksgiving is essentially a harvest festival, allowing people from all backgrounds and religions to get involved. “Thanksgiving Day is a harvest festival celebrated primarily in the United States and Canada. Traditionally, it has been a time to give thanks for a bountiful harvest. While there was an underlying religious element in the original celebration, Thanksgiving today is primarily identified as a secular holiday.” (Wikipedia)

We live such busy lives nowadays, when do we ever take time to step back and reflect on what we have, and to be thankful for it?! “Amen” to celebrating the good things in life – and to be surrounded by friends and family once a year to acknowledge it.

Not so keen on the way retail stores then have “Black Friday” – the biggest shopping day of the year for the US – but hey, I enjoy a good bargain too, so why not. Mind you, queuing in traffic and cashier lines for hours isn’t pleasant, especially in the middle of the night :-)

Another thing to appreciate is the talent of my partner. His former life involved him being an artist; and as we travelled around the country, I was lucky enough to view many of his artworks. From Xscape Lounge in Durham, NC, where we had drinks one night, to his friend Ty’s place in Washington DC. Clearly his natural ability in this area is admired by many – and although he hasn’t been able to get into this line of work since graduating from his recent postgraduate studies, which brought him to Australia, it was very special admiring the walls where his paintings now hang!




Cheers to enjoying the good things in life; and taking time to reflect on them.

ps. To view photos from the holiday, visit http://picasaweb.google.com/michelle29jacobs