Johnstein!

We were invited to celebrate The Guv's birthday today...granted his actual birthday was in June, but with so many people out of town during the summer, they decided to close off the month of August with a party. It just so happened that this party was scheduled on Rebecca's birthday. Everyone in attendance sang happy birthday to her as well...a fun evening with great friends.  enjoying the pre-dinner spread hyuck enjoying a wonderful candle-lit dinner...

Over the next couple of weeks I am going to post pictures of all my classes "in action"...the first installment is my AP Language and Comp class. This is a class of Seniors who are very motivated to do their best with the many gifts that God has given them. As you can see in the pictures below, my classroom set-up allows for some non-traditional approaches. I have plenty of desks, but sometimes it helps students if they can get comfortable while in class. On this day, the students were working through some key questions that will help them identify common rhetorical appeals made by authors.

Last weekend was our friend Jeff's birthday. To celebrate, Jeff invited everyone on staff to play some kickball...Over 30 people showed up to take part in a match that pitted the over 30 (Geezers) crowd vs. the Under 30 bunch. I was part of the young, spry team...and sadly, we got trounced. Fortunately, no pictures.... That evening, Jeff had a few of us guys over to celebrate by playing a game of poker. Fun was had by all...and I won! Klein preparing the chips for the evening's game...the birthday boy looking confused and disheveled, as always ;) The Guv sitting on his hobbit seat...with Marsak and Felix in the foreground Klein is a mysterious player with his shades and hat...hiding what he is truly thinking. Höger and his own attempt to hide his eyes as he studies his draw I think Höger is trying to cheat here...

On one of the last days before we started back at school, we hosted an impromptu dinner with some current and former students after playing football (soccer) in the cage behind our apartment. Lot of fun sharing a meal with some great guys! In order to increase useable classroom space I removed all the book shelves and storage in the student desk section of my class. Problem is, I am an English teacher...I need places to put books. Fortunately, our maintenance support staff at ICSV had some shelve units that they needed to hang...so they hung them in my classroom. You can see the finished bookshelves on the wall in the last picture of this post. The new shelves give me so much more shelf space that it makes the collection of books seem small! First day of school!!! Required "first day of school in front of the door as you head out" picture Ready for another year... Our school director "the Guv", and my friend and classroom-neighbor "

     The essential belief of the Christian faith is the assertion that Jesus Christ was crucified, died, was buried, and then rose from the dead. In  The Jesus Inquest: The Case For and Against the Resurrection of the Christ, published by Thomas Nelson, author Charles Foster uses his experience and training as a barrister in the U.K and tutor of Medical Law and Ethics at Oxford University to examine the arguments and evidence for and against this crucial tenet of Christianity.      Foster has designed his argument in a format that pits two formidable opponents, represented by " X" (arguing that the Resurrection did not happen as presented in the Gospels) and " Y"  (presenting the evidence that supports the Gospel narrative). Foster draws upon his training as a barrister to take a seemingly unbiased stance for both personas. This being said, he definitely writes from a Christian worldview. Starting with the Biblical narrative as the foundation for both sides of

A lot has happened since our last post...for sanity's sake I have decided to do one post recapping the highlights...so here we go! The Austrian club baseball team that I (Michael) play on made the playoffs! We needed a victory in our final game of the season and also needed the team ahead of us in the standings to lose their final two games...obviously, since I already told you that we are in; both necessities happened. We play a best of three series next week against Team Japan (no, not the real team Japan, just a collection of Expat Japanese that have formed a team). Justin and I put the finishing touches on Kailyn Ann's new crib. Our friends, the Wells, blessed us with this upon their departure and Rebecca stained it earlier in the summer to match some of our other furniture. I joined my friend Gardner in picking up the new staff at the airport. We got there a bit early so we enjoyed a cappuccino in the airport cafe...here's Gardner looking as proper