Skip to main content

Best Day Ever

Today was probably the best day so far of the school year!

It started out pretty normally. First period was uneventful. Second we had meetings. Then in the first five minutes of third period, I was walking backwards between a row of desks while talking to the students, and I tripped on a backpack and totally wiped out! As one student said later, "I followed the path of a downward opening parabola." I flew up into the air and landed flat on my butt. I did the only thing I could do. I burst out laughing. Some kids actually said they were really nervous because it looked like I was going to hit my head on the white board tray. Dodged that one I guess! So the kids were really nice about it, and we moved on.

About 10 or 15 minutes later I see a man walking down the hall way, and it's Jay, and he has flowers for me! It's not a special day or anything, he was just out and about and wanted to surprise me!!!! I introduced him to the class, and he stayed for a minute or two. It was hard to go from that to adding and subtracting matrices...

Even my 7th period that is just a bundle of energy and basically incapable of closing their mouths did a good job through notes today. Almost all of them were doing what I asked when we did some practice problems on the desks.

A student 8th period had been a huge distraction for the last 2 days, but after emailing his parents, he totally turned it around today and apologized after class.

Then I had a student from last year who went North come to visit to get some Algebra 2 help after school.

Tomorrow I get to go to our first round of meetings for Curriculum Review. It is nice to still be working and doing something that I think is so important and can make a difference but have a break from students for one day as well.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

God and Classroom Management

Ezekiel 20:11-13 "I gave them my decrees and made known to them my laws," (God gave clear and consistent expectations. I would bet he made sure they were available in multiple formats so people could both read and hear them.) "for the man who obeys them will live by them." (I have way more wisdom and knowledge, not to mentioned a fully developed frontal lobe. I know the results of those bad choices already, so seriously, listen to me for your own good...) "Also I gave them my Sabbaths as a sign between us, so they would know that I the Lord made them holy." (Here I imagine God feels like I do when I spend hours planning a hands-on lesson that would make me curious and excited as a student. I bet he looked forward to the Sabbath because he imagined how excited he would be as a human to have this day to rest and appreciate what a great and loving God they have. He wants us to know he loves us and wants what's best for us, just like I want my ...

School vs. Real Life

I read a post on facebook today about things in the real world that students don't learn in school. It got me thinking about how we spiral everything in Geometry and Algebra 2. Here's how it works... We teach a brand new unit for about 2 weeks. During that time, we review something from a particular previous unit each day so that by the end of those two weeks, they have learned all the new material a little bit each day and reviewed all the "spiral" material a little bit each day. Then we give two tests, one over the new material and one over the "spiral" material. By doing this, they will experience all material once as new and a second time as spiral. This will allow them to take two tests over every unit. Their first test score affects their grade, but if they score higher on the second test, they get to keep just the higher score. If they score lower on the second test, we average the two test scores. Most students score higher on the second test becau...

"I feel like a bully when I expect the same achievement out of all students at the same time."

I have been teaching exponents to freshman and sophomores for the last week and a half. I had a carefully planned graphic organizer. I planned on spending 1 or 2 days per exponent property and moving on with the year without too much difficulty... Little did I know what I was up against. Apparently, exponents are not as simple as I had always thought they were. I don't think I really cared in high school why the properties worked. I was great at memorizing things that I needed to know, and so I never had a problem or a need to know, "Why." I was a grade-chaser all the way. Well after teaching every exponent property in the unit and giving a 5-question lesson quiz, I learned that perhaps some of my students had learned nothing over the last week and a half... That's not really true. They had partially learned the properties in isolation, but putting everything together was just too overwhelming. I agree, the students need more practice, but if I had sent them home ...