https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib "Introducting me." -Nick Jonas, Camp Rock 2 en-us 2023-01-14 18:34:37 UTC 2025-04-23 02:54:07 UTC hello@padlet.com https://padlet-uploads.storage.googleapis.com/1935199479/de4af82b8b641b833b8a71af6026ac47/Mrs__Mayes.jpg lisamayes17 https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444441242 Motherhood is a piece of my identity that I am still learning about. The contradiction between feeling so immediately so sure and complete in being a mother to Hazel and learning how to actually be a mother has been fascinating and rewarding. Talking about theory has never had quite so personal an application before as I read and research different parenting methods all claiming to be the best. Parenthood has also prompted several conversations about what my husband and I assume to be "natural fact" and how our experiences are shaping, for better or for worse, the parents we are becoming (Nealon and Giroux 6). I think motherhood is also an area where I live what Nealon and Giroux explain as the immediate action to be analyzed and taken in response to the theoretical. Even in my teaching, I've never relied so much on specific theory to inform my choices. ]]> 2023-01-14 18:40:43 UTC https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444441242 lisamayes17 https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444450160 I have been a high school English teacher for 6 years now in a suburb of Minneapolis. I adore teaching high schoolers (I have 9th and 10th graders), but my teacher persona is a completely different person from my everyday self. I find I can have infinite patience for my students and their everyday nonsense. This is not true in my everyday life outside of those kids! Teaching is hard, and COVID has been particularly hard on who I considered myself to be as a teacher and learner. The forced pause and reevaluation of what I thought teaching looked like made me reexamine some of those actions and practices. I've allowed myself and the students far more grace in the following years as I've seen students craving stories but often they lack the academic stamina to pursue those meaningful stories. ]]> 2023-01-14 19:05:32 UTC https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444450160 lisamayes17 https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444450846 I have two cats, but Bruce is my favorite. We fostered him when he was a kitten and just fell in love with his personality. He now is a jerk to most everyone that enters our house, truly attempts to bully everyone that enters, but he patiently accepts our daughter's clumsy pets, and for that, he remains my favorite pet I've ever had. ]]> 2023-01-14 19:07:34 UTC https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444450846 lisamayes17 https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444454704 Learning is a somewhat humbling experience I'm finding, and the older I get, the less I seem to know. I have new empathy for my students as I enter the a classroom as a student again. I remember one of the first classes I took at Mankato sitting on Zoom listening to everyone reflect on our reading and thinking in my head: oh I might be the dumb one here...What a terrifying moment! A moment I know students have felt in my classroom. So while I am here for the content and to become a more informed teacher of English literature, I am finding the most applicable learning I am doing is my learning to empathize in new ways with the students in my classroom. My time as a student now, with more pressing responsibilities has caused a reexamination of my teaching practices, like late work and homework for students. The reevaluation of actions in my room made me realize that the belief behind those actions was that I wanted students to become stronger readers and writers in the contexts that made sense for their lives. I realized that I could still hold that truth even if I changed the action in the classroom. ]]> 2023-01-14 19:20:31 UTC https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444454704 lisamayes17 https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444457063 Blake and I met in college, North Central University, in downtown Minneapolis. Blake is from Minneapolis and loves the city. I am from a small town in Iowa and hated the city. I always intended to move back to Iowa after college. However, 8 years later, we live just outside of Minneapolis... and it's great. We've been married 6 years now and have one daughter together. ]]> 2023-01-14 19:28:07 UTC https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444457063 lisamayes17 https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444459918 Kings Kaleidoscope instrumentals are the only way I have been able to focus and get homework done. Also, my students adore the instrumental tracks too. We all are a little more productive when there's just a little something going on in the background. The highest compliment I've ever been paid was when as student said "Mrs. Mayes, you always have the best playlists". And I'll take that one compliment with me for forever now. Music is a language all on its own in our house. Our daughter asks for ACDC's "Thunderstruck" at least once a day: "ahhhhhh thunder?" I was a musician in high school and college, and I'm looking forward to sharing that language with my daughter. ]]> 2023-01-14 19:36:43 UTC https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444459918 lisamayes17 https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444462067 Some people don't like personality tests, and I am just not one of those people. I find I appreciate the language to talk about things I may have assumed were "normal" but are actually just my understanding of the world. I especially like the Enneagram as it focuses on understanding the motivations behind the viewable actions. After identifying as one of the 9 numbers, the goal then is to understand which actions are healthy, neutral, or unhealthy given a motivation. It's all about growth and trying to be emotionally healthy. I follow an Instagram account called "Rudeassenneagrams", and I love her explanation of each type through memes. I have found having vocabulary about how my brain thinks is really helpful in letting others know what I need. It has influenced how I work on learning teams and how I approach conflict with my partner. Thinking about Nealon and Giroux's chapter, the Enneagram is another example of applying a theory to understand an action. ]]> 2023-01-14 19:44:20 UTC https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444462067 lisamayes17 https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444465801 A common ice-breaker question is "ocean or mountains", and I think my answer would be anywhere near water. My husband and I love to travel as long as that destination ends up near to water: ocean, river, or lake. We aren't incredibly picky. There's something about water that is just so relaxing. Our house actually is pretty close to the Mississippi. When we were both home during COVID, I would leave my house to walk by the river. I ended up there again when I was 9 months pregnant and desperate to walk our baby out of me. ]]> 2023-01-14 19:55:32 UTC https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444465801 lisamayes17 https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444470476 One of my favorite lines from this week's reading is "if we avoid encountering the reflexive or critical questions of 'theory'...then we risk a situation in which...[e]verything seems self-evident" (4). I have long considered theory to be somewhat of a waste of time as it feels like theory is often learned apart from a practical application. I'm busy! I don't necessarily have the time and brain space to learn theories and never do anything with them. What I love about Nealon and Giroux's text is the connection between actions and theory, their reciprocal nature. When laid out on this Padlet, I understand how multifaceted my own identity is. I am finding that my learning as a parent is dramatically influencing my theories of  teaching. I have a new perspective and it has given me the opportunity to examine my professional truths. There are things I've considered as "natural fact" about my personhood, and I appreciate that Nealon and Giroux challenge the assumptions and prompt us all to ask why (6). Understanding why an action is performed is a practical use of theory that I had not considered before.

Nealon, Jeffrey, and Giroux, Susan Searls. The Theory Toolbox : Critical Concepts for the Humanities, Arts, &
 Social Sciences. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2011. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/mnsu/detail.action?do  

]]> 2023-01-14 20:10:14 UTC https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444470476 lisamayes17 https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444471904 We speak English in the house, but we also use American Sign Language. My husband is a CODA, a child of deaf adults. His first language is ASL. His parents actually take care of Hazel during the week while we are at work, so Hazel's first language is also ASL. I have enough skill to get by with about a preschool vocabulary, but the day is very, very close when Hazel and Blake will communicate, and I will have no idea what is going on. It's really interesting to be near Deaf culture without really being a part of it while my daughter and husband both are a part of it. Blake and I will often have conversations about how Deaf culture presents in our marriage and in his parenting. He is famous for the observation compliments: you have a blue shirt on. Believe it or not, that is a compliment, and it's taken a little bit for me to hear what he's actually saying: I like your shirt. Deaf culture is blunt, sometimes painfully so. It isn't meant to offend; it is meant to comment on a state of being, not a judgment of a person. So our household is a little more on the blunt side. ]]> 2023-01-14 20:13:39 UTC https://padlet.com/lisamayes17/wd3wz2zrhto8vfib/wish/2444471904