Well, it's the weekend! Today I was doing my Scottish lesson for the 1st through 5th grade classes at Heritage Elementary School today.

I hope the kids learnt some new things about Scotland, and I think I dispelled some myths too.

I had my kilt on, only the 2nd time I have worn it (the other time being my wedding), to try and give them a little taste of Scotland and to see how many children asked "Why are you wearing a skirt?" :D

I had quite a lot of things I wanted to tell the kids, from why we have the Scottish Saltire as our national flag and the origins of it's beginning, to how old the Forth Rail Bridge is, to the history of Linlithgow Palace/Edinburgh Castle/Stirling Caslte/Wallace Monument. I also shared the ingredients of the haggis, and of course no one found it appetising - but who would think it sounds appetising. I assured both students and staff that it does taste nice.

I had given the children the opportunity to ask me some questions, and without a doubt the best question I got was - "Do you have TV's and computers in Scotland?" - my answer was "Yes, and laptops and electricity and lights and running water". My sarcasm came bursting out at that point.

We spoke about kilts and tartans and I have asked the kids to design their own tartan for me. I have given them a design template to use and I am looking forward to seeing some of the final designs. I also gave the children a web site to find out if they had their very own tartan already and they were very keen to try and find out to see if they had a tartan.

Tonight I am going to watch the Texas Brahams play Amarillo Gorillas. Both teams play in the CHL (Central Hockey League), I am really looking forward to it.

Saturday is going to be a busy day, but I will post that later. I better go just now as I have probably written too much and if your reading this, will be thinking when is it going to end. :D

So my 2nd full day at Heritage Elementary School is done. I spent the day with Mrs Bolles 5th grade class. The students were keen to ask questions, just to listen to me talk, it was so funny. It was like when I was at uni and asking Laura (the Geordie to speak) stuff just to listen to her.

The class had their specialist time 1st thing, and whilst they were doing that I was getting ready for my lesson I am doing with all the classes.

Once they came back they were doing Maths, Writing, Science. The 4th and 5th grade classes are taking part in a scheme called the Snowball. It is when they write a letter to children who have lost a parent to the war in Iraq. Their are 2000 children visiting Texas and each of those children will get a letter from a student in Texas for every night they stay over in Texas. They go to lots of different places in Texas whilst they are over here in December for 5 days. It is a really great idea and the kids really enjoy it.

Right, it's just a short one today folks so bye for now.

Hey Y'all! Greetings from Texas. I landed 3pm Texas time (8pm UK time) and was greeted at the airport by Mrs Voigt - Principal Teacher of Heritage Elementary School. She then took me back to her school where I met my host, Mary Anne Stevens, and I then went back to her place and was introduced to her son Jared.

Tuesday night was Family night - a tradition that happens about 3 times a year where staff and their families, along with pupils and their families come together at a restaurant to socialise. When we arrived I met Bert, Mary Anne's husband and some of the other staff from H.E.S. The restaurant we went to was a Tex Mex - I can't remember the name, I will blame the jet lag on that one. Once we were done we came home and I headed to bed, as I was still pretty much on UK time and it would have been 2:30am and I had been up from 4:30am the previous day.

Today in school was Veteran's Day (Remembrance Day) and some of the students had brought a guest to introduce themselves to the school - their guests were anyone they knew who had or is serving in the Armed Forces.

Oh before that though I made my first appearance on American TV - KHES - the school's morning news programme.

I spent the morning visiting the classes throughout the school meeting all the children and staff. All the time I was doing this the sky was bright blue without a cloud in the sky (and I have photographic evidence just to make everyone back in Scotland jealous).

At the end of the day I joined the staff at their faculty (staff) meeting in the library, and I was the only male their from about a group of 30 - and I thought it was tough a Linlithgow, lol.

Anyway had a great 1st full day in Texas and I will try and get time to post more throughout the rest of the time I am here.

Bye y'all!