Get SEATed

I found an activity today that I’m planning for next week.  We’re beginning our study of elements and the periodic table.  So I turned to the ever trusty Google and typed in “periodic table activities.”  This simple search brought up several great results and one in particular caught my eye.  The element windsock is going to be a fun way to find out some basic information on common elements.  We’ll be using the same basic idea given on that website, but we’ll also be adding an everyday object that hangs from the center of the windsock. 

For example, the windsock for aluminum may have a piece of foil hanging down surrounded by tails with information on them such as atomic mass, number of protons/neutrons/electrons, etc.  We’ll be hanging them from the ceiling to liven up the room with some student produced work.  There’s already plenty of that on the walls, but I’ve yet to venture to the ceiling for displaying work.  I mentioned this activity to the students today before class ended and they were already planning where they wanted to hang their windsock. 

It’s little things like this that I get excited about and make me look forward to the start of a new week.  I’ll get some pictures of our creations and post a follow up to this once they’re all completed.

I’m becoming increasingly frustrated with my yearbook students as the days go on.  We are in the process of putting together a fundraiser, but it requires that they actually take some of their time and go to area businesses that might support our efforts.  The problem is that, outside of a few hard workers, nobody is taking the time to go.  They were told about this fundraiser 5 weeks ago and they are still dragging their feet. 

My yearbook students are told early on (specifically, the very first day) that they are expected to put forth a great amount of effort.  If they don’t feel that they can give that effort, they need to get out of the class and change their schedule at that time.  Of course, they all said “oh yeah, no problem.”  That was 5 weeks ago and progress has been slow going.  Every day, I ask, “Did you go to the business that I assigned to you?”  The answer comes back as something along the lines of, “No, I didn’t get a chance to.”  Really, 5 weeks should be more than enough time. 

My hard workers have been doing well and I am very thankful for their efforts.  The slackers know that this is for a grade, but it doesn’t seem to be of much concern.  I’m not sure how else to get them to do what needs to be done.  Hopefully we can get our fundraiser up and running in the next few days so that I can end my frustrations, at least with this phase of the yearbook work.

This is my 11th year in the classroom.  I’m almost finished with 1/6th of the school  year and I’m feeling better than ever about how my classes are going.

My students are producing a lot of great work and I’ve got it displayed on the walls throughout the room.  I don’t know…maybe it’s the room change, maybe it’s having a good mix of classes, maybe it’s just me getting older.  The days are flying by, rather than dragging on.  I have remained on top of everything, not putting things off until the last minute.  I look forward to the next day and what interesting things will happen.

Now, this is not to say that the previous years have been terrible (although there have been some not so hot ones…different story though).  It’s just that there’s something different about this year.  I’m planning great lessons, incorporating technology often, and having productive classes.  I’m applying for grants in an effort to pull in some great equipment (weather station, telescope…just to name a couple). 

Who else is with me on being energized with the new school year?

I have a grant proposal to write with a maximum value of $750.  I have a few ideas on what I’d like to get, but there’s nothing that I desperately need for my classroom. 

If you were given $750, what would you want to get?  It is a science related grant, so it has to apply to either a physical science or environmental science class.  I like incorporating technology, but it doesn’t have to be tech stuff. 

Share your ideas and let’s get a big list of things going here.

You know how you mean to keep doing something, but you end up just putting it off, over and over again?  Yeah, thought so.  It’s been a while since I’ve posted, but I’ve been meaning to get back a whole lot sooner. 

I’m almost done with the 5th week of our new school year.  I can’t believe it’s gone by so fast.  Of course, it’s almost like the last school year never ended for me.  Right after the school year ended, I started teaching summer school.  After that was done, I worked at school every day getting all of the computers ready for the new year.  School started and it’s been full speed ahead ever since. 

I’ve got a physical science, an environmental science, a yearbook class, and a computer repair class.  I’m enjoying all of them very much and I believe the kids are as well.  We’ve been working on so many different things so far this year and it really keeps things moving quickly. 

I did recently get my very first proposal submitted on DonorsChoose.org.  I’m very excited about that site because I feel that the students can learn two lessons as a result of it.  First, they’ll learn the science topic that the funded project is intended for.  Second, they’ll learn that making donations when you are in a position to do so is important.  I want to teach them saying thank you for something like this is important.  The DonorsChoose process is very good because that thank you part is built in.  Have you tried submitting a proposal on that site?  If not, I suggest giving it a try. 

* Shameless plug – if you want to check out my proposal and send a couple of bucks, it would certainly be appreciated by me and my students http://www.donorschoose.org/donors/proposal.html?id=312188 *

I was watching a baseball game a little while on TV.  The announcers started talking about batting average and how this player or that player is off to a good start because he has 2 hits in 7 at bats.  The guy is hitting the ball in play 29% of time. 

Through the course of 162 games, roughly the same amount of days a class meets in a year, a batter is considered to be amazing if he has a 40% batting average.  Let’s say a student comes into the classroom each day and does his/her assignment on 40% of those days.  Is that student considered amazing?  Far from it. 

Not only do these ball players gain all-star status for a 40% perfomance, but they get paid millions of dollars to do so.  If a student gets 40% in a class for the year, he/she has to repeat the class the following year.

Yes, I understand that baseball games and classrooms are two entirely different things and that this post is a bit on the exaggerated and dramatic side, but it gives a good example of perspective.  From the perspective of a coach or ball player, 40% is awesome.  From the perspective of a teacher, it’s not so hot. 

I am an online tutor.  I’ve been doing this for about four and a half years now.  In that time, I’ve helped literally thousands of students to complete questions ranging from drawing an atomic model to geologic time scales and everything in between. 

Today’s students are natural multitaskers.  They have grown up in the computer age and are so used to using chat programs and surfing the web that they don’t have to give it a second thought.  It all comes very easy to them.  Why not take advantage of their interest in the online environment to provide a method of completing homework? 

For me, there are so many advantages to this type of work.  I can work from home, any day of the week.  I don’t have to use gas to get to a student’s house (neither do their parents).  I get to help students who really want to learn and are interested in trying.  The extra income is wonderful (and sometimes vital in these economic times).  So many times, I get into a session with a student who doesn’t understand a topic, but through questioning, we reach a “light bulb” moment when you can tell things start to click.  That is an excellent feeling.

Of course, there are some disadvantages, although they are far outweighed by the advantages.  It’s hard to get tone across a written chat, so you have to pick your wording carefully at times.  Also, you aren’t able to carry out hands on experiments as you would in a classroom, but most of the time, that is not really a problem since the students have the data already and just need to answer questions about it.

I plan on doing this for the foreseeable future.  Even after a long day at work, I enjoy coming home and helping out students online.  In an odd way, it actually helps me to relax because I know I’m helping out students from around the country to get their work done. 

Anybody else out there do online tutoring?  Share your thoughts and experiences please.

Talk about a departure from my usual topics.  Perhaps this will generate some discussion though. 

Star Trek: The Original Series
Star Trek: The Next Generation
Star Trek: Deep Space 9
Star Trek: Voyager
Star Trek: Enterprise

I’ve always enjoyed scifi and my favorite out of this bunch would have to be The Next Generation.  I grew up with this series (and the movies).  Of course, I greatly enjoy the other series as well, but TNG is my fave.  Who out there hasn’t at one time or another wished they could have a transporter to beam back and forth between work and home?  I probably could use the stun setting on a phaser on a daily basis in my classroom, so there’s definite application to learning in that area. 

I’ve even heard of teachers who have discussions specifically on the science of Star Trek, so if it’s something that the students would be interested in, I’d give it a try.  I might even use that as an end of the year “mini-project.”  Hmm, I think I like that idea.

The state superintendent of education recently suggested that school board members have limits to the number of times that they can serve.  He also wants to get rid of their monthly salary.  I’m in favor of both proposals. 

Around here, the politics run thick and some board members have been in place for many years.  How can we have change when it’s the same ol’ thing time after time?  Sure, the people keep voting them in, but it’s because they’re so firmly entrenched, anyone running against them doesn’t stand much of a chance. 

I don’t know exactly what the salary for board members is, but anything is too much.  All of these people have their “day jobs” so why not give up that paycheck for the time spent working to “better” the schools?

Another thing that I’ve never understood is why it isn’t a requirement that school board members have some experience in the field of education.  On our local school board, there are two or three (out of nine) who have been in the classroom.  The rest have no idea what it’s like.  How can they properly run a school system if they have no experience with what goes on within the system? 

Is this the same situation around the country?  What are your thoughts or experiences with your local school board?

State testing is over for my groups of students.  No more worries and it’s all downhill from here, right?

Nope.  The challenge now becomes what to do with the last few weeks of school.  The last few weeks have consisted of reviews and prep work to take the tests.  The kids are tired, so I have to make sure that the material we cover prepares them for next year and is engaging enough to keep their attention. 

The attention part is hard enough as it is, but with each passing day, the students are focusing more and more on “The Countdown.”  How many out there have already started marking off days on the calendar?  I imagine quite a few calendars have fallen prey to the big red numbers that dwindle down to 0. 

In my physical science class, we’ll be doing some group projects, various experiments, etc.  I might even get them to work on one more big project to summarize what they learned throughout the year.  We’ll even have our egg drop contest to see which group can build the best container.  We did that last year and the students enjoyed that quite a bit. 

What will you be doing to battle the end of the year blues?