So this Sunday is the Super Bowl, and my beloved Steelers are in the big game. (Again.) This will actually be the third Pittsburgh championship contest since I've been overseas: in 2009, the Steelers won Super Bowl XLIII and the Penguins pulled out a dramatic game-7 win in the Stanley Cup Finals.
Given the time difference, I was working during both of those games. The Penguins game was on an in-service day at the end of the year, so I did get to watch most of it. The Steelers game, though, was just a regular Monday morning, and let me tell you, trying to teach during that game was no fun at all. I caught a brief glimpse of the fourth quarter before lunch, then had to dash off to a meeting right at the beginning of what would become the Steelers' last-minute, game-winning drive.
Thankfully, I will not have to suffer so ignobly during Super Bowl XLV. Instead, we're throwing a middle-school Super Bowl party. Students have been asked to choose a side and come in team colors (a co-worker has offered to take the unenviable position of rooting against the Steelers). During the game, they'll have a series of English, math, social studies, science, and art activities, plus snacks.
Thanks to some cheer-leading by the faculty, the students are starting to get excited, and I'm certainly looking forward to sharing the experience with my classes. It'll be a pretty unique way to watch a game, that's for sure--and in the process, maybe I can start a little colony of Steelers Nation here in Japan!
