I am sitting in my lab during my prep time with a teacher that spends every waking moment in the lab. If there is no class scheduled, she’s here with her class. All they do is type. Some day maybe she will realize that every piece of writing does not need to be published. Actually, I’m pretty sure she knows that, it’s just easier to sit in the lab than teach her class. She is conferencing with one student while I help the rest of the class. She has no problem taking a kid and going back to her classroom while I am left alone with the others. At least she could ask. This is the same teacher who tells the technology teacher what she wants him to do with her class every week. She doesn’t seem to care that we have a curriculum to follow and tasks that we need finished by June. Lucky for me I don’t teach her class this year so she doesn’t tell me what she needs done.
The longer I am a ‘specialist,’ the more disrespected I feel!
Monday, April 21, 2008
Thursday, April 10, 2008
Spring Fever
Why does it seem like every class has gone haywire? Today is the first day that it has been sunny and over 70 degrees this year. Has Spring fever hit? There are classes in my school that are difficult every week, unfortunately they have not changed. It's the classes that normally come in, sit quietly, listen to directions and then work quietly that just aren't making me happy. One of the best classes in the school just left my room. This class is full of well behaved, high achieving students. For some reason they were off the wall. They were my third class of the day and the first two were no better. This has been going on for the last few weeks. Each day the students' behavior is worse than the day before. What's the answer? How do I control the constant outbursts? ONLY 44 MORE DAYS OF SCHOOL!!!
Tuesday, April 1, 2008
Crazy Busy
This is the time of year where my life goes nuts! We are starting the home stretch in school, and baseball season has officially started.
Right now it's time to wrap up all of the projects that have been going on as well as start and finish a few 'must do' projects that have been put off. Today I started some surveys with a first grade class. Originally the plan was to have the kids walk around with a survey and ask their friends what their favorite ice cream was(or pizza, vacation spot, etc.). Right before the activity began, I thought, "I'll be smart. I will leave all the kids in their seats and just ask about their favorite things and have the kids raise their hands when they hear their choice." What a mistake! With five different surveys around the room, some kids thought they had to write the # of responses for every survey. Others thought they could only respond if they had that survey in front of them. It ended up taking 30 minutes to complete the surveys. Then I compounded my mistake by trying to have the students graph the results in the last 10 minutes of class. Yes, I did say first grade! The only positive I can take out of all of this is that I teach four first grade classes and now I know what not to do for the other three. It's crazy right now! I think I have three different projects going on with fifth grade and one of the classroom teachers just asked me to start something new next week! Add all this to the four after school meetings over a seven day period and I guess you could say - School is a little overwhelming right now!!!
Baseball season is always the busiest time of the year in my house. We have a sign in our baseball-themed basement that says, "We Interupt this Family for Baseball Season." A statement could never be more true. I am an assistant coach on my two older sons' team and the head coach of my youngest son's team. Because of the level of play, being the assistant is much more time consuming and much more stressful since winning is expected at that level. My younger son's team is still all about learning the game and having fun. I'll take that any time. While coaching these two teams, I am trying to get my middle son's 11 year old travel team organized for our tournament season which begins in June. We need to practice on whatever days off the kids may have from intramurals. I am the head coach of that team as well. My oldest son is also playing in the Suburban Travel Baseball league. This means he will have intramural games one day during the week and one on Saturday while playing travel games on Friday nights and Sundays. Oh, did I mention that he is running track for the school team as well?! Even when I'm not coaching, I feel very guilty if I miss any of my kids' sporting events.
When thinking about teaching and coaching/parenting, I can only say one thing as I wrap up - I wouldn't trade either job for the world!!!
Right now it's time to wrap up all of the projects that have been going on as well as start and finish a few 'must do' projects that have been put off. Today I started some surveys with a first grade class. Originally the plan was to have the kids walk around with a survey and ask their friends what their favorite ice cream was(or pizza, vacation spot, etc.). Right before the activity began, I thought, "I'll be smart. I will leave all the kids in their seats and just ask about their favorite things and have the kids raise their hands when they hear their choice." What a mistake! With five different surveys around the room, some kids thought they had to write the # of responses for every survey. Others thought they could only respond if they had that survey in front of them. It ended up taking 30 minutes to complete the surveys. Then I compounded my mistake by trying to have the students graph the results in the last 10 minutes of class. Yes, I did say first grade! The only positive I can take out of all of this is that I teach four first grade classes and now I know what not to do for the other three. It's crazy right now! I think I have three different projects going on with fifth grade and one of the classroom teachers just asked me to start something new next week! Add all this to the four after school meetings over a seven day period and I guess you could say - School is a little overwhelming right now!!!
Baseball season is always the busiest time of the year in my house. We have a sign in our baseball-themed basement that says, "We Interupt this Family for Baseball Season." A statement could never be more true. I am an assistant coach on my two older sons' team and the head coach of my youngest son's team. Because of the level of play, being the assistant is much more time consuming and much more stressful since winning is expected at that level. My younger son's team is still all about learning the game and having fun. I'll take that any time. While coaching these two teams, I am trying to get my middle son's 11 year old travel team organized for our tournament season which begins in June. We need to practice on whatever days off the kids may have from intramurals. I am the head coach of that team as well. My oldest son is also playing in the Suburban Travel Baseball league. This means he will have intramural games one day during the week and one on Saturday while playing travel games on Friday nights and Sundays. Oh, did I mention that he is running track for the school team as well?! Even when I'm not coaching, I feel very guilty if I miss any of my kids' sporting events.
When thinking about teaching and coaching/parenting, I can only say one thing as I wrap up - I wouldn't trade either job for the world!!!
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Random Thoughts
Progress reports are really annoying, especially writing comments. I end up putting the same comment on 200 progress reports. When you have to do 500 progress reports every trimester, it's difficult to personalize.
What do you do when all the kids want to do is play games? Even when you let them play games they want to play a different game. Today one 2nd grader told me that next time we have technology, she is just going to sit and draw a picture. I asked her if she does that during math class in her regular classroom and she looked at me as if to say, "what are you crazy? My teacher would kill me!" Some day Technology might be a 'real' subject!
March Madness is upon us. Have you joined your pool and filled out your bracket? Don't pick North Carolina, because everybody else is! It is so awesome to have off of school on Thursday so I can watch the first round games!!!
I'm going to the beach for Easter weekend. Is it Wednesday night yet? My whole family goes every year and we make a big Easter dinner with ham and lots of side dishes. This year we're getting a hoagie tray. Everyone is so happy we don't have to cook or clean. It really doesn't matter to me, I just occupy the kids while everyone else cooks and cleans. I'll take six kids for a couple hours to avoid that work! I guess asking for 80 and sunny this weekend is a little too much. It's supposed to be 50 and sunny most of the weekend. No bad for March.
What's up with the Phillies? They might go from first to worst if their pitching continues like this. I see a lot of 10-9 games in the near future.
Like a Ryan Howard popup at Citizen's Bank Park - I'm outta here!!!
What do you do when all the kids want to do is play games? Even when you let them play games they want to play a different game. Today one 2nd grader told me that next time we have technology, she is just going to sit and draw a picture. I asked her if she does that during math class in her regular classroom and she looked at me as if to say, "what are you crazy? My teacher would kill me!" Some day Technology might be a 'real' subject!
March Madness is upon us. Have you joined your pool and filled out your bracket? Don't pick North Carolina, because everybody else is! It is so awesome to have off of school on Thursday so I can watch the first round games!!!
I'm going to the beach for Easter weekend. Is it Wednesday night yet? My whole family goes every year and we make a big Easter dinner with ham and lots of side dishes. This year we're getting a hoagie tray. Everyone is so happy we don't have to cook or clean. It really doesn't matter to me, I just occupy the kids while everyone else cooks and cleans. I'll take six kids for a couple hours to avoid that work! I guess asking for 80 and sunny this weekend is a little too much. It's supposed to be 50 and sunny most of the weekend. No bad for March.
What's up with the Phillies? They might go from first to worst if their pitching continues like this. I see a lot of 10-9 games in the near future.
Like a Ryan Howard popup at Citizen's Bank Park - I'm outta here!!!
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Pressure to Post
Even Mr. Web 0.005, Darren Smith, has a blog, how can I not have one. I guess as a technology teacher it's a good idea to start and set the example for my students. Of course some of my students can't even spell their names yet. Teaching computers in elementary school is both exciting and challenging. It is true that the kindergarteners can't do everything on the computer, but it is also amazing what they are capable of doing and how quickly they learn. It's amazing to think that these kids who can't do much now will be doing research and creating PowerPoint presentations in just a couple years.
Outside of school, I live for my family, but so often seem to only have time for my three sons. My wife understands and for at least a few more years wouldn't have it any other way. My boys are 12, 10 and 8 and all are very actively involved in sports. I find myself at more sporting events than I do meals at my kitchen table. I coach almost every sport my kids play and coach many teams at the same time. In an average year I coach at least three baseball teams including one travel team, two basketball teams (only one this year, it felt like I was on vacation this winter) and one football team. Life is always busy.
That wraps up post #1. I'll be back!
Outside of school, I live for my family, but so often seem to only have time for my three sons. My wife understands and for at least a few more years wouldn't have it any other way. My boys are 12, 10 and 8 and all are very actively involved in sports. I find myself at more sporting events than I do meals at my kitchen table. I coach almost every sport my kids play and coach many teams at the same time. In an average year I coach at least three baseball teams including one travel team, two basketball teams (only one this year, it felt like I was on vacation this winter) and one football team. Life is always busy.
That wraps up post #1. I'll be back!
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