One semester completed

It is finally there, I officially ended a full Fall semester within the PhD program. I have many thoughts, both positive and negative and now that I look back I am kind of amazed by how much I did during those 4 months. It really feels like I have been here a year. I am not sure if that is a good thing but let's sum up my experiences.
a) teaching: taught 6 PEAC courses: jogging, bowling (2), Fitness Concepts (3). Overall, I enjoyed teaching as well, I always do. I talked to another GA today and we both agreed on the lack of guidance we do receive from the administration. Mainly, you get a textbook (if you are (un)lucky) and that's it. They keep old syllabi on file but we can do what ever we want. In one way it may be nice but I do not believe it is good teaching. For example, there are about 10 slots of fitness concepts each 8 weeks and the instructors who teach those courses all have a different approach to what the course should look like. Yes, they get the textbook but that is not the same as a curriculum. Personally, I look at the students and find that in some of my courses i have students ages 18 to 60. Coming from the constructivist viewpoint I refuse to teach lecture based in a direct teaching approach. All these students have different experiences and needs and I don't want them to only learn the fitness theory principles but it is more important to me that they can try things out and have the confidence to implement a fitness plan. The text book comes with pre-made ppts, quizzes, etc. The first semester I changed the ppts added an active lab almost 1 x per week and attempted to make it as interactive as possible. Next semester know I can do better. But are we, GA's teaching FC, teaching according to best practice? Does anyone care? I think students care, most of them anyway. When I asked, they enjoyed the practical exercises as well as the wiki projects, so I modify and move on. Something ought to be done though. I think that perhaps a wiki, that compiles the course + NING network can help in bringing the GA's together. Maybe for my research I should overhaul the PEAC teaching practices? A thought.
2) Classes all went well. I think I got A's on all of them, stats will come back tomorrow but I am confident. Funny enough, of the courses (Research in PE, Adapted PE and Educational Statistics), I preferred the stats course. I really enjoyed the teacher, he explained things so I could understand it. I also really liked his way of assessment. Here it is: 8 worksheets worth 3 points each, you can keep doing them until you earn your 3 points. 4 assignments worth 10 points each, you were able to work together with a partner on 3 of them, which helped!, 4 quizzes out of 10 points and a final exam out of 40 points. I think that the assessment he used was fair and included a consistent distribution between the tasks, test, assignments. Also, his grading scale indicates an A at 85% and not 90%, which I like as well. In my classes I seem to have a lot of students getting 86 or 87 and I think they deserve an A. In Canada you have A+ which is good because than those who get 85 or higher get A's and those 90 % or higher can get A+'s. The other courses were handy in some way but fairly easy and repetitive. I prefer more of a challenge to the brain. Next semester will do just that I think. I have 4 courses: stats, effective teaching, assessment of motor dev., supervision in PE.
3) Research: I may have just jumped the gun a bit but I already got a research project completed in my first semester. I think that is fine, I already got another one started in Jan, a pilot of which I talked about before. I would really like to do a small research project in my Team Handball class that deals with TGfU. Perhaps I will ask the pro's, that's an idea!
Now I have 4 weeks off, really, I am not sure what I will do as I won't teach skiing for the first time in 7 years. That scares me. I miss the snow and the activity but I have no money, if I did, I probably would have gone to Belgium as I miss my family but that in fact I can't afford either. The good thing is that today I have found a roommate! We got along great right away and I think it will be fun and it will help me with the bills. I may, may I say, be able to afford a bike by the spring. That is my goal.
My running goals have slowed down due to my IT band issue. This sucks big time and it drives me crazy so I hike, run a bike and bike but I really want to run! GRRR. I need to be able to to run a 25K in Feb and a 50K in April. If anything, I need that. Running trails is my outlet in this process. I need it.