finding awesomeness

My colleague  who teaches choir was relating his day.  Instead of hitting the snooze he unplugged his clock.  He awoke at about 10 minutes before the first bell.  He charged into his middle school class and one of his 6th grade students was at the podium putting the class through warm ups.

I am so looking forward to teaching this child.

triage

I have proof insanity runs in our family.

My daughter is teaching under the same non traditonal program I went through.

Though she is teaching english.  In fact she is the English department at a small rural school.

"so are you trying to save them all or is it Triage?"

"its Triage mom, there are students who will learn, even without me; there are those that mess up; then there are those that are borderline.  Those are the ones I focus on."

We spend a lot of time and effort on those that will not succeed at the loss of those who with just a little nudge will excel. Not that I will give up on any student.  I have one coming around the bend, though his buddy moved and I have no idea where he went.

for the first time

I am doing something I have never done in ten years as a teacher.

I am joining the union.

Our state insurance board has mismanaged the money, nothing criminal just inept; and we are facing a fifty percent increase in our insurance premiums.

I live in a right to work state.  Then I talked to many people and found out how many things I take from granted are because of the union.

So much for my tea party membership.

Lab ventriliquism

To teach teamwork use in a lab, I have students do different jobs.  I randomly assign the groups and the students decide their jobs.  So the instructions for the first lab on the board read
"Go to your lab stations"
"Decide jobs"

"perform lab"

etc

The jobs are coordinator
                    Quartermaster responsible for getting supplies
                    Operator actually does lab
                    Recorder 

"Mrs. W. we have a question."
"okay, Who's your coordinator?"
student who called pointed to other student
Me:  "okay, Chad what is your question?"
They realize I will only talk to the Coordinator.
First student to Chad, "ask her if this is the graduated cylinder we use?"
Chad, "is this the Graduated cylinder we use?"
Me: "have you asked your lab partners?"



*gotta love being obtuse but this is to train them how to be a team and not keep asking me for help*

One go round with a group had a student who was talking "You mean I was right?"