Last night I was talking with a professional woman who works in a law office. She makes good money working nine to five. She was lamenting however that she also has to commute over two hours a day to the west side of Los Angeles. Oh, and that one of her bosses is a real sour puss. (Those are not the words she used, I had to change a few words to protect the innocent!) This boss is a real complainer about the clients she has to deal with, the quality and speed of work getting done in the offic...
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I had a little scare in magic class. While teaching an optical illusion I noticed one of my students had a bloody nose. Not a little bloody nose but a gusher. A stream of crimson tide flowing from his nostril. I stayed calm and remarked “you have a bloody nose” as I walked over the sink in the classroom and grabbed some paper towels. By the time I got to him he had plenty of blood on his hands. I had him lay down and hold the paper towels to his nose. He wasn’t the type to panic thank g...
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Do you like chocolate? I like chocolate. Since I learned dark chocolate is good for you all the guilt went away. I eat half a small Trader Joe’s dark chocolate bar every evening. I break it into little chunks. Some I bite and let them turn into a thick goo in my mouth and others I let melt all the way down into a little sliver of deliciousness. Mmmmm… sorry, I drifted off to the land of chocolate for a moment.
What does this have to do with magic? Some people don’t like to work with kids...
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Another Magic Class graduated yesterday. Always mixed emotions for the kids. They are excited to get their wands but sad to see the class end. But we had a ton of fun as I added a game to play and gave them a graduation present that is pretty cool. (Message me if you would like details on how you can make them yourself for less than a nickel each. You can easily make enough for each class while watching your favorite TV show!)
The only odd thing during this graduation was an older student who ...
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Here is why you should pay attention to your students when they are learning a new trick and playing with it. (You are giving them time to play with the trick/props before moving on to the next trick right?)

We did Carnival Day today which is a variation of Circus Day. I ask them what is the difference between a Circus and a Carnival. Some have no idea and some come up with ideas like; more animals at a circus, more rides at a carnival, more acts at a circus more games at a carnival. It is th...
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At my Monday class we had Circus Day. Actually we had two days, part one last week and part two this week. I broke it up into two classes because we did Circus Belts as a project this time. Usually I demonstrate the belts and send home the instructions as "magic homework" but this time we all made the belts in class to take home.

It started off with my showing off the routine but instead of strips of newspaper like I have used in the past I used colored crepe paper. Red, white and blue to mak...
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Wow, this six week session flew by!
I was as sad as the kids were to have graduation come so fast. I guess I am just used to 8 week sessions now.
One boy really was upset at the begining of class and said to the other kids "Stop saying it's graduation day! It makes me sad!" He came up and gave me a big hug. It does feel great to know these kids love learning!

But the kids were excited about getting their wands. One little girl brought a note from home saying she had lost the first day's intro le...
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One of my favorite days is Houdini Day. I plan to do them all week!
So I kicked it off as always by asking if anyone has heard of Houdini. Sometimes one or two really know quite a bit about him. Maybe they read a biography and did a book report on him. None of them did today but they were first and second graders so mine was their first introduction to The Great One. I read the first page of The Houdini Box by Brian Selznick. It is a great build up. And I do try to do it justice with a dramati...
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Whew! A full week of classes! I am teaching at four different schools with seven classes plus my outside teacher who has two of her classes running now. My classes are on three days so I still have two week days off. Not too bad!

I taught the new Make A Snake trick to another couple of classes to iron out the details. I haved one more school to teach it to and will try to get some video of it to post and get the graphics online so it can be used by my other teachers.

I have also been trying ou...
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So one of my schools is new school for magic classes. Many schools let out the older and younger students at different times which is good for After School Enrichment classes since you can run two classes. One for the younger students and 45 minutes or so later run a class for the older kids which might go a little longer since another class won't be coming in.
But this school the time between is only 30 minutes. Not really enough time to run two classes back to back. So you either only have ...
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Here's a reminder! If you would like to add or respond to a post here just e-mail me and I will add it to a blog post!

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Started a new class today. Total of 32 great students. One or two have taken my class before and it was nice to see a familiar face. We had some fun. The spoon gong really seemed to blow their socks off. They love the spiral as well. Ran out of time to do the third trick (Appearing Birthday Candles) for the younger class. Will get to it next week. I do like the kids at this school. They are smart and well mannered.

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Today at my Monday magic class I taught the 11 students Pick One, The Amazing Two String Trick and The Compass That Doesn’t Point North. They had a great time seeing the tricks as usual. =)
One student figured out the workings of Pick One as soon as I talked about the circles each having a secret number. His mind raced ahead to the next steps and it was very impressive! The other kids had fun fooling each other with it.
For the Two String Trick one boy had seen it before in a magic kit but ...
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Welcome Teachers to the Teaching Magic Blog. I will use it to document the classes I teach adding any tips or tribulations I encounter. If you have any questions, comments or class experiences you would like to share then e-mail them to me and I will add them here!
info.DougHoover@gmail.com

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