Just prior to heading into the summer vacation, the secondary staff gathered together to have their final meeting of the year. At the tail end of the meeting, one of the staff members, Gary Verbeek—in typical Gary fashion—took over the meeting and announced that the staff needed to listen to a praise song by a [...]
You can’t make a very good birdhouse with a set of tweezers. Eventually, you might squeeze a few nails into the right places, and I suppose if you got a splinter, at least the tweezers would be more helpful than a hammer. When you want to do a job well, it’s important to choose the [...]
I have been part of Grandparents Day at ACES (including when it was Clayburn Hills) for 20 years. I will never forget my first year as Vice-Principal when I was in charge of gym bookings. I neglected (I just didn’t think about it) to make sure the gym was free the evening before for set up. [...]
I teach Beowulf in Literature 12. It's a story about a hero and a monster. I did some research and learned that heroes represent cultural ideals—our best selves. Monsters challenge these ideals—they represent our doubts about who we are. Zombies are everywhere these days. If literary monsters reveal a cultural identity crisis, I wondered what [...]
Music. It can move you in ways nothing else can. It can bring back memories long forgotten. It can move you to tears at the most inexplicable times. It can make you drum your fingers and bop your head or completely let loose and dance like no one's watching. But when the music is coming [...]
Over spring break I had the opportunity to travel to Los Angeles in order to check out several Christian colleges and universities my daughter is considering attending in the fall. (She will not be too excited about me making this public, but I am willing to run that risk because this is worth sharing.) We [...]
The Rainbow Loom® craze started late for us—it came as a Christmas present for my daughter. But since then, not a day goes by that I haven’t seen or heard about these colourful elastic creations—at home and at school. The stores love them because revenue is high. The kids love them because it is the [...]
My wife and I met tree-planting in Northern B.C. That was the best thing that came out of that experience, but there were a few things I learned about life from that job as well. I think everyone should have a tree-planting-type job at some point during their life time. You can learn a lot [...]
I have always been fascinated with castles. It probably goes back to the Fisher Price Castle that we played with at my Grandma’s house—although it was strangely inhabited by Sesame Street characters. My Grandma had that castle for something like 35 years—my daughters were even playing with it as we cleaned out her apartment last [...]
Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens might have been good for Maria von Trapp, but there’s a few things I like too... Fresh sheets, especially if they were line-dried Peanut butter on fresh bread Being in charge of the TV remote My husband’s blue eyes Cuddles on the couch from kids who are far [...]
