Dinner Time!!! Crock Pot Pulled Pork!

Hey Everyone,

Ive had a few people ask me for my Crock Pot recipe for pulled pork, so I wanted to go ahead and put it on my blog. :)

After a long day at school and work I want something super easy to make. In these cases, I usually turn to my beloved CrockPot. My favorite meal is my CrockPot Pulled Pork. I absolutely love this meal because it is SO simple to make.

Ingredients:

• Salt (1tsp)
• Pepper (1 tsp)
• Lawry's Season Salt (1 tsp)
• 1 can of Root beer.
• Pork Tenderloin I usually get about 2 pounds
• Your favorite BBQ sauce I use Sweet Baby Rays unless Matt makes his homemade BBQ sauce. :)
• Hamburger Buns

Directions:

• Put your Tenderloin and seasonings in a crock pot 
• Pour your Root beer over everything.
• Turn Crock Pot on low for 6 to 8 hours. (mine cooks super fast so I would check it at about 4 hours)
• Once your Pork is completely cooked, you take it out of the Crockpot and put your tenderloin into a medium skillet and turn the heat on to low to medium heat.
• Take two forks and shred the meat. (It will be really easy and pretty much fall apart).
• Then you pour in your BBQ sauce and mix everything together.
• Serve it up!

Mean, Median, Mode, and Range!

Hello Everyone!

Sorry I haven't blogged in a while. I have been super busy with the semester starting, unpacking, and doctors appointments. So far Baby Anderson is doing really well. Growing like a weed. :)

For this post I wanted to share a lesson that I taught. It is set for 5th grade and teaches students the mean, median, mode, and range of a data set.

Here are the standards for Tennessee:

Math State Standard

GLE 0506.5.2 Describe the shape and important features of a set of data using the measures of central tendency.

SPI 0506.5.1 Calculate measures of central tendency to analyze data.

(Check for understanding) 0506.5.5 Evaluate how different measures of central tendency describe data.

Math Common Core Standard

CCSS.Math.Content.5.MD.B.2 Make a line plot to display a data set of measurements

Language Arts Common Core Standard

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.5.7 Draw on information from multiple print or digital sources, demonstrating the ability to locate an answer to a question quickly or to solve a problem efficiently

I introduced the lesson by telling the students that we were learning about mean, median, mode, and range. I also had students say the "I CAN" statement. "I can determine the mean, median, mode, and range of a data set." Having students say the "I CAN" statement lets them know what they are expected to learn from the lesson.

Then I showed the students a video I had made from goanimate.com if you have the one from brainpop.com it is really good too, but I don't have a membership currently so I improvised and made my own.

Here it is...
Mean, Median, Mode, and Range Video :)

Next, I had the students make graphic organizers for the terms and examples. To help the students with the definitions I created a simple PowerPoint for the students to write from, last year when I taught it I used the "elmo" to project the definitions onto the board.
Here are some pictures of them  :)

     

Then you will want to work out examples for the students and have the students work out some problems.

Now... the moment you have all been waiting for... The SUPER FUN ACTIVITY!!!!

I have two different activities that you could do for this lesson. I have taught it both ways and the students love it either way.

Activity Option #1 Throwing a paper ball :)
Materials: Paper, Paper for a paper ball, Pencils, tape measures.

1. The teacher will let students know that they will be going outside in groups to throw a paper ball. There the students will be recording each other’s distance for data. 
2. The students will be broken up into groups of 4 or 5.
3.The teacher will instruct the students to have one person in the group throw while one is recording the data and the other measures with a measuring tape and the students will take turns until each person has been able to throw. 
4.When outside the students will throw their paper balls and they will have to measure the distance in feet how far they are thrown.

5. The students will come back inside after collecting their data.

6. Keep the students in their groups.

7. The teacher will remind the students what the meaning of median, mode, and range is.

8. Next have the students find the mean, median, mode, and range of their group's data.
9. Have each group come up and write their data. You as the teacher can really see where each student is at by questioning individual students how they got their answer.
10. Relate this to a line plot and maybe have the students make

Activity Option #2 Running :)
Materials: Paper, Pencils, watches, or stopwatches.

Pretty much this activity is exactly the same as the throwing activity except you have the students run a certain distance and record the the data.

The students I did this activity with absolutely LOVED it!

 Relate this to a line plot and maybe have the students make
For the conclusion I gave the students a homework sheet that I found just by googling worksheets for mean, median, mode, and range.  This way you can document the student's learning and see if there is any gaps in their understanding.

As an extensions or next day lesson, a thing to do is to relate this to a line plot and have the students make and label a line plot with their distances/times.

I hope you enjoy this lesson!

References:

Hume, Helen D. The Art Teacher’s Survival Guide for Elementary and Middle Schools. 2nd edition. San Francisco: John Wiley & Son Inc.pp.236-238

Marzano, Robert J. (2013). Students Who Challenge Us. “Art and Science of Teaching/The Many Uses of Exit Slips.” Volume 70. Web. Retrieved  

       on 7 April 2013. From http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/oct12/vol70/num02/The-Many-Uses-of-Exit-Slips.aspx

McLeod, Saul. (2007). Lev Vygotsky. Simply Psychology. Retrieved on 7 April 2013. From 

http://www.simplypsychology.org/vygotsky.html

Gardner, Howard. The Nine Types of Intelligences. Retrieved on 7 April 2013. From

http://skyview.vansd.org/lschmidt/Projects/The%20Nine%20Types%20of%20Intelligence.htm

God's Timing...

Hey Ya'll :)

For those of you who may not have heard, Matt and I are expecting a baby. :)

In twenty minutes, Ill be 8 weeks along. Can you believe it? It seems just like yesterday that I was 4 weeks and boom, now I'm 8. It is already going by so quickly.

It is so amazing how incredible God's Timing is. When Matt and I look back on our house search and our baby we just sit back and think about how amazing God is and how there is no way everything could have worked out like it has by chance. Who finds the house of their dreams the first day they go house shopping? Then finds out once under contract that we are pregnant! We are so blessed and excited about the future. More than anything we love being in God's will, because it's there you find the most peace.

On our first visit to the doctor. We got to hear Baby Anderson's heart beat.

It was the most beautiful sound I have ever heard!

So far my pregnancy is pretty easy going. I love being pregnant and have dreams about the baby just about every night. I already cant wait to hold him or her in my arms, but I am doing my best to be patient and enjoy every minute of pregnancy. It is just moving so quickly. I can't believe I am two months already... Craziness...

I'll do my best to keep you all updated on everything.

Love,
Jess (and Baby Anderson) :)

4th of July/ House Inspection

Hello Everyone,

This week has been super busy for us. We had our home inspection and we are working on finalizing our loan... Can we say this has been a stressful week?!?

On top of having to sign papers and make appointments, I went to Virginia to see my brother come back from his deployment.

Seeing the ship pull up and all the people standing there waiting for their sailors made me cry. I loved every minute of it. What really got the tears going was seeing a mom with a new born baby holding a sign that said, "Meet your mini-me." Yeah... as soon as I saw that, the tears were flowing!

It was so awesome to be a part of the soldiers coming home! It filled me with pride and excitement to be an American.

Unfortunately, Joey had duty that evening and could not come off of the boat immediately. However, he told us that later on he would call us and let us take a tour of his ship!


Going on that tour was SO much fun. I think the USS Eisenhower has 11 floors full of tunnels and hatches (some look more like doggy doors. :)









The rest of the week was spent spending time with the twins. It was so great having my brothers in one place. We got to spend the fourth of July watching fireworks together, which hasn't happened since we were kids :). I had such a great time with my brothers and I am so proud and thankful for their service. I wished my other siblings could have been there too :(



I am so thankful for my family and the amazing country I get to call home. Thank you to all of our servicemen and women out there who make it possible to celebrate our freedom and independence!

I am so grateful that I got to be there when Joey came home and I am thankful that God let me be born in America. "The Land of the Free Because of the Brave." :)


Love
Jess

The Search Continues...

Hey ya'll,

SO today was a BIG day for us... I'll start with yesterday.

We started looking at houses again yesterday and we viewed about 10 additional houses. We narrowed it down to our two favorites, then we invited our families to join us and give us their opinions. I valued and really wanted their opinions. Matt and I prayed about it, we slept on it, and then we decided which one we wanted. We were filled with excitement and anticipation of what the following days would bring.

Today we met up with our realtor at our favorite house and we took another walk through just to make sure that this was THE HOUSE.

We love this house. Our little dream house! :)

So we sat down with our realtor and made an offer.

Later on this evening they countered, and tomorrow we have to either except or counter again. If we get everything negotiated out then our closing date will be the end of July!

We are so excited about this! I am already thinking about how I want to decorate! If you follow me on Pinterest, you will see a ton of house decor on your newsfeed, so I apologize in advance. :)

On an even more serious note, we want the Lord's will in this... We want His plan for our life. So if you could, please pray for God's will in this situation.
Thank you so much

Love
Jess :)

The Start of Our Search For Our Happy Home

Hey everyone,

Matt and I have been really thinking about buying a house lately. Some of our really good friends were going through the house buying process and it got us thinking about getting a house of our own.  The thing that really got us started was looking at our rent payment and thinking it could be going towards a mortgage... but instead we are seemingly throwing our money away into renting an apartment.

We started off my looking at the usual sites: zillow, trulia, etc. We decided to talk to a realtor to see if we even could get a house, since I am in school full-time it cuts out the possibility of me having a regular full-time job-- in all reality we really were thinking that we wouldn't be able to get one until after I graduated.

Our first step was to find a realtor we wanted to use. We went with some of our friends. From then, our realtor told us to get in touch with a lender before looking at houses. We called up the lender she suggested and made an appointment.


Before we went into the appointment we prayed for God's will and that if He wanted us to get a house for Him to make a way for us to be approved, and if not we would wait. Me being negative like I am, I went in thinking there is no way we will get approved.

What do you know... WE WERE PRE-APPROVED! We were ecstatic with the news! We immediately started driving around town looking for houses.

So today we spent part of the day going around looking at houses with our realtor. I am so excited about what God is doing in the Anderson house. Tomorrow we are going to look at more houses and I can't wait. :)

God showed me a lesson over the week. The lesson was that above all I need to trust in Him and Him alone. Once I started thinking about things like a down payment and all the money it takes to get a house, I started to take my eyes off of Him and started focusing on everything else. This reminded me of the story in the Bible about Jesus and Peter on the water. Jesus told him to focus on him. However when Peter took his eyes off of Jesus he started to sink.I started to look at all the stressful things that go on in buying a house and I started to sink in stress. However, if I had just kept my eyes on Jesus I could have easily avoided unnecessary stress.

Anywho... That is my rant for the day :)

Love
Jess

A Little About Happy Me.

Hi! I'm Jessica Anderson. I am married to the man of my dreams, Matt Anderson. We were married in August of last year, so we are still newlyweds and getting used to the whole being married thing. The year has been filled with great times getting to really know each other. So far it has been fun and frustrating, and the best 10 months of my life!

I am currently a babysitter/unemployed, full-time student at Tennessee Technological University. It has always been my dream to be a teacher. Ill be graduating next May and it could not come faster.
Matt is the college-age youth pastor, also known as Standing In the Gap at the best church on the planet, Fellowship Baptist Church.


We love Jesus and put HIM in the center of our relationship. I love the Lord and He is the BEST thing that has ever happened to me. I don't know what God has planned for our future but I do know that we want His will for our lives. 

Why blog? I have been wanting to start a blog for about a year now. However, for whatever reason (lack of motivation and laziness) I had not started one. Plus I could never think of a catchy name. So today I was determined to start one. I wanted to write about the joy of growing up, marriage, teaching, and ministry. Its weird to think that just a few years ago I was in high school and now I am a married woman about to have a career and working at the church that I have always loved! I am living my dream. :)

-Love

Jess