Around the corner

It’s that time of year at Spring Arbor University… again. It’s not exactly the most wonderful time of the year just yet.  Ah, that’s right, finals. Here, Christmas is about two weeks away, and I unfortunately, still have a week of school left.  And with school always comes…. FINALS.

You’re probably thinking, “Wait, Ang, it’ll be the third week of December starting Monday. Why in the heck does your school get out so late?”

The answer to that question is simple. Our school always starts the fall semester after Labor Day. Since Labor Day was so late in September this year, the school had to add another week at the end of December to accommodate the 14 week semester agenda.

Slotted for next week, finals are the only thing that is keeping me from absolute freedom of homework, and Christmas cookies! Thank goodness I only have to do this for one more semester, otherwise I think I may just go crazy, if I haven’t already.

Wow. That is crazy to just think about. I realized, (sorta) that I have one semester left until I officially become a graduate, before I finally have a bachelor’s degree, before I become an adult. Wow is right. Yet, at this moment, I totally don’t feel like an adult. More like a child who doesn’t want to do her work and is procrastinating by blogging about not doing her work. Straight A student right here!

It’s kind of weird to think that I’ve basically done school all my life. Yep. From kindergarten to my senior year of my collegiate career, I’ve done school. That’s about 16 or so years of my life spent with textbooks, pencils, computers, papers, tests and other academic stuff. Oh, and we can’t forget student loans – the bane of my existence, aside from finals.

But anyways, this semester was actually pretty easy. Most of my classes I took were either online or tutorials. One of those tutorial classes was called Essential Linguistics. I absolutely loved this class. Since I am working towards a teaching certificate for English as a second language, Essential Linguistics was one of the required courses. The class was so fascinating. Linguistics isn’t just about the scientific study of languages, it’s much more than that. It’s real life experiences in communication and brings awareness to the beauty of words and the way they are formed through syntax.  One thing I didn’t exactly like about the class was the final.

Since it was a tutorial, I got to take the final early. My final consisted of three 1-2 page essays and a vocabulary matching assignment. The vocabulary wasn’t bad, but having to write three essays was a bit stressful. I was allowed to have an outline for each topic, but it couldn’t be too extensive. And if you couldn’t tell, I tend to write a lot. I like to include every little detail possible, ’cause you know, it’s the writer in me. Plus, I also had to handwrite it, no computer. It’s much faster to type what you’re thinking that write it.  So for about two hours I wrote my professor three essays about a page and a half long. My hand hurt after. But I finished. It felt wonderful.

The only time I went to a class with other students was for my cross-cultural prep for J-term. This January I will be going to India for about three weeks, learning about the education, economy, government, family life, and religion in India. I’m pretty excited about it. The last time I left the country was when I went to Indonesia in the summer between my freshman and sophomore year of college. In less than I month I will be going to a new place, enter a world with new cultural traditions, new faces, and a whole lot of different. It’s going to be great!  The final for my cross cultural class was also an essay final, but I was able to do it on the computer and that made things a lot easier.

So now, the only thing I have left to do is complete my internship for this first semester. Doing the internship isn’t that bad when I don’t have other classes to worry about. I’m looking forward to finishing this week strong! Christmas break is just around the corner and soon after that INDIA!

Now, where’s my coffee?