Next week the 8th graders will be teaching their own lesson on a disease. The only thing I've asked them to turn in is a lesson plan (following Hunter's Model for an effective lesson) and a test (unguided practice). The parts they are struggling with most are how to do a good anticipatory set and the idea that they don't have to turn in a PowerPoint. The only things I want are 2 pieces of paper - 1 with the lesson plan and 1 with the test. The rubric has how I'm going to grade the presentation of the lesson. Yesterday I talked about "old school" before computers and projectors and photcopiers and smart boards. I even forgot that when I started there weren't even whiteboards. I remember when I got my first computer in a classroom (Apple II E). We had to put it on the other side of the room from the chalkboard because the chalk dust was bad for it.
Today the Eighth grade did a chicken leg dissection . (The procedure with pictures and questions was easy to find on the internet.) This was my introduction to the muscular and skeletal systems. The students quickly got the idea that they were involved in the anticipatory set of the lesson . After they idenitifed that meat was muscle, I had them chop off some muscle and throw it in a skillet where I had some garlic and bell pepper starting to sizzle. At the end of the class they could have a piece if they wanted. I then asked how many points would I get for my anticipatory set according to the criteria of the rubric. Ten points (the most you can get) is an oral and visual way related to the system of the human body that gets students involved and interested in the lesson plus something that has all the students actively show they are involved.
I got a unanimous 10 from all the students - even if they didn't eat the chicken.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
The Guarantees of a Wealth of Professional Development & Testing
Yesterday after school we had a faculty meeting for about an hour to hear about all the "wonderful" professional development opportunities and testing we will have this year.
Back in January and February (I imagine) some admin and Board folks got together and started mucking around with their favorite areas in need of educational improvement and now 7 months later we have this tangle of activities guaranteed to spend the approved budget, crush morale, and waste time.
In January someone with a vested interest will try to pull some invalid and unreliable result out of the mangle of initiatives and testing to justify the call for more money in a certain area as time to approve the next budget rolls around.
Back in January and February (I imagine) some admin and Board folks got together and started mucking around with their favorite areas in need of educational improvement and now 7 months later we have this tangle of activities guaranteed to spend the approved budget, crush morale, and waste time.
In January someone with a vested interest will try to pull some invalid and unreliable result out of the mangle of initiatives and testing to justify the call for more money in a certain area as time to approve the next budget rolls around.
Friday, September 24, 2010
Hurricanes & Lesson Plans
I just finished sending off my lesson plans for next week and posted them on Edline (school internet page where parents and students can see). There is a tropcial storm (Matthew) supposed to strengthen a bit and pass over us Saturday at 8 a.m. I'm having a hard time settling now. Although the winds aren't supposed to be too strong when it passes over the local river is already close to flood stage and the river at the town 20 miles away is already flooding.
The 7th grade language arts/social studies teacher and I are doing an integrated project. Fridays we meet for a period to touch base and plan the next week. I was a bit fidgety during our planning and began telling Katrina stories. I told the evacuation story and then how my wife and I found our pre-Katrina agenda from 2005 a year after Katrina. When we read what we had planned for the weeks following Aug. 29th, 2005, we laughed. All the professional development, curriculum, facilities, fund raising, communication, ... plans and efforts were washed away and never thought about again until we found the agenda in the bottom of a box a year later. It doesn't take a hurricane to send your life in another direction, but for me they'll always be a reminder that today's plans can become less that tomorrow's memories.
The 7th grade language arts/social studies teacher and I are doing an integrated project. Fridays we meet for a period to touch base and plan the next week. I was a bit fidgety during our planning and began telling Katrina stories. I told the evacuation story and then how my wife and I found our pre-Katrina agenda from 2005 a year after Katrina. When we read what we had planned for the weeks following Aug. 29th, 2005, we laughed. All the professional development, curriculum, facilities, fund raising, communication, ... plans and efforts were washed away and never thought about again until we found the agenda in the bottom of a box a year later. It doesn't take a hurricane to send your life in another direction, but for me they'll always be a reminder that today's plans can become less that tomorrow's memories.
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Bring the Answers to the Test & Get 80% - not as easy as it sounds
I let the students bring in one page of notes handwritten (front and back) to each test. If they bring the notes the most they can get is 80%. Usually about 3 or 4 students bring the notes. The notes they write from a study guide that is exactly like the test except I will change the order of the questions, so they can't just memorize a list of answers with no relation to the question. They can copy down every question with every right answer and bring it to the test, though.
I just finished grading 2 tests where the students took the time to make a page, front and back, of notes and brought it in to the test. The 7th grader was taking a multiple choice test. The study guide was multiple choice, but I changed the order of the questions from the study guide. The student missed 7 out of 16. The 6 grade test had 20 fill in the blank questions. The 6th grader, with a page of notes front and back with all the answers, missed 16 out of 20.
It is a little mind boggling how that happens.
I just finished grading 2 tests where the students took the time to make a page, front and back, of notes and brought it in to the test. The 7th grader was taking a multiple choice test. The study guide was multiple choice, but I changed the order of the questions from the study guide. The student missed 7 out of 16. The 6 grade test had 20 fill in the blank questions. The 6th grader, with a page of notes front and back with all the answers, missed 16 out of 20.
It is a little mind boggling how that happens.
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
45 Minutes to Write 2 Sentences
Yesterday the 6th graders were writing the conclusions to the experiment: Does the amount of soil affect the growth of a plant?
I use a 5 part (at least one sentence in each part) conclusion format. This evolved from a much abbreviated form of the parts to a chapter in my dissertation. The parts are: 1. answer the experimental question, 2. state if the data did or did not support the hypothesis, 3. write about the data that supports your answer, 4. write about any confounding variables or ways you could have made the experiment better, and 5. give a new related experimental question.
I have the 6th graders right after lunch, so the 45 minute period is down to 40 minutes by the time they are seated and lab notebooks passed out. I award team points for the first teams seated, so they are getting better and hurrying along the slower members of their teams.
The first thing they had to do is figure out how much each plant grew. They had to subtract the final height from the starting height. This skill created a bit of a math challenge for a few - especially since they had not had negative numbers and some of their data indicated the plants had shrunk. Once all teams had worked out all the plant heights they struggled to make sense of the data. No team had data that supported the hypothesis that more soil would cause the plants to grow taller. The hypotheses were not that 'sophisticated', though. Most of the hypotheses were 'the amount of soil will affect plant growth'. They eventually worked out that the amount of soil did affect plant growth as an answer to their experimental question. Then they had to pick which sentence fit their hypothesis: 1. The data did support the hypothesis; or, the data did not support the hypothesis. I imagine a few will have written both sentences in their lab notebook.
As they put their final periods on the second sentence the bell rang. Forty-five minutes were up, and only 2 sentences. "The amount of soil does affect the growth of a plant. The data did support the hypothesis."
But - 1 skill (calculating differences in measurements on a data table) and 2 concepts (analyzing data to write an appropraite answer to an experimental question and comparing data with a hypothesis). During a graduate course somewhere in my past I learned that on average a skill takes 45 minutes to teach and a concept 30 minutes.
I think I rushed the 6th graders yesterday, but it was just an introduction. We will have plenty of conclusions to write before the year is out.
I use a 5 part (at least one sentence in each part) conclusion format. This evolved from a much abbreviated form of the parts to a chapter in my dissertation. The parts are: 1. answer the experimental question, 2. state if the data did or did not support the hypothesis, 3. write about the data that supports your answer, 4. write about any confounding variables or ways you could have made the experiment better, and 5. give a new related experimental question.
I have the 6th graders right after lunch, so the 45 minute period is down to 40 minutes by the time they are seated and lab notebooks passed out. I award team points for the first teams seated, so they are getting better and hurrying along the slower members of their teams.
The first thing they had to do is figure out how much each plant grew. They had to subtract the final height from the starting height. This skill created a bit of a math challenge for a few - especially since they had not had negative numbers and some of their data indicated the plants had shrunk. Once all teams had worked out all the plant heights they struggled to make sense of the data. No team had data that supported the hypothesis that more soil would cause the plants to grow taller. The hypotheses were not that 'sophisticated', though. Most of the hypotheses were 'the amount of soil will affect plant growth'. They eventually worked out that the amount of soil did affect plant growth as an answer to their experimental question. Then they had to pick which sentence fit their hypothesis: 1. The data did support the hypothesis; or, the data did not support the hypothesis. I imagine a few will have written both sentences in their lab notebook.
As they put their final periods on the second sentence the bell rang. Forty-five minutes were up, and only 2 sentences. "The amount of soil does affect the growth of a plant. The data did support the hypothesis."
But - 1 skill (calculating differences in measurements on a data table) and 2 concepts (analyzing data to write an appropraite answer to an experimental question and comparing data with a hypothesis). During a graduate course somewhere in my past I learned that on average a skill takes 45 minutes to teach and a concept 30 minutes.
I think I rushed the 6th graders yesterday, but it was just an introduction. We will have plenty of conclusions to write before the year is out.
Monday, September 20, 2010
Fireflies, Memories, & Contributions
Today I'm back to work with kids after an extra long weekend for Honduran Independence & Honduran Teacher's Day. WooHoo for independence and teachers. I went to the island of Utila for the holiday. Certainly one of the great advantages of working overseas has been the ease to get to nice places on vacations.
Yesterday (Sunday) I went into school to work on bimester exams. As I worked out Erickson questions for the 8th grade I began to wrestle with my own stage of conflict (generativity vs stagnation). I’m looking at 35 years in this business and I’m writing these questions to fill up a 2 hour test. I’ll spend half a week in review. Another week will be spent in giving the different tests. The kids will soon forget the stuff (if they take the time to study in the first place) and off we go again in the cycle for another 9 weeks. Beyond filling a government reqirement there doesn’t seem to be any point. How much of my life has been spent like this? Has there been a real difference in the life of any student or have I been a well paid baby-sitter for 35 years?
I feel the kids should see the questions in some form before the exam, and I think there should be 120 questions – 1 per minute. I’m not sure why I have made these assumptions. They just seem right to me. I’m about 35 questions short in each grade level. I don’t want to throw 35 bits of info at them in the next 2 weeks on top of what I already have planned. Maybe I’ll pick 4 relevant BrainPop movies on topics we have covered this term and let the students know the BrainPop quizzes will be on the test and let them watch them on their own. Anyway, I have 2 weeks to work out the missing 35 questions and the rest of the school year to work out the generativity vs stagnation conflict.
I live on a golf course and as I was walking home tonight from the pitch and putt game I play a few times a week it had turned dark and the fireflies had come out. Their twinkling green lights brought back memories of other firefly moments in the past 35 years. Once on a trip into the Amazon headwaters in Ecuador, the kids in the village where I was staying smeared their faces with firefly fluid and danced around the campfire as I played the harmonica. Another magical twinkling moment was when my wife and I took a trip to Benin our room completely filled with fireflies.
It has been a career that has brought me a lot of great memories. Hopefully it has made a contribution.
Yesterday (Sunday) I went into school to work on bimester exams. As I worked out Erickson questions for the 8th grade I began to wrestle with my own stage of conflict (generativity vs stagnation). I’m looking at 35 years in this business and I’m writing these questions to fill up a 2 hour test. I’ll spend half a week in review. Another week will be spent in giving the different tests. The kids will soon forget the stuff (if they take the time to study in the first place) and off we go again in the cycle for another 9 weeks. Beyond filling a government reqirement there doesn’t seem to be any point. How much of my life has been spent like this? Has there been a real difference in the life of any student or have I been a well paid baby-sitter for 35 years?
I feel the kids should see the questions in some form before the exam, and I think there should be 120 questions – 1 per minute. I’m not sure why I have made these assumptions. They just seem right to me. I’m about 35 questions short in each grade level. I don’t want to throw 35 bits of info at them in the next 2 weeks on top of what I already have planned. Maybe I’ll pick 4 relevant BrainPop movies on topics we have covered this term and let the students know the BrainPop quizzes will be on the test and let them watch them on their own. Anyway, I have 2 weeks to work out the missing 35 questions and the rest of the school year to work out the generativity vs stagnation conflict.
I live on a golf course and as I was walking home tonight from the pitch and putt game I play a few times a week it had turned dark and the fireflies had come out. Their twinkling green lights brought back memories of other firefly moments in the past 35 years. Once on a trip into the Amazon headwaters in Ecuador, the kids in the village where I was staying smeared their faces with firefly fluid and danced around the campfire as I played the harmonica. Another magical twinkling moment was when my wife and I took a trip to Benin our room completely filled with fireflies.
It has been a career that has brought me a lot of great memories. Hopefully it has made a contribution.
Monday, September 13, 2010
Adolescent Insolence
I spent 7th grade today going through the rubrics for 2 upcoming assignments. It was a bit tedious (as I expected) and I'm not sure why I didn't stop. I suppose I trudged my way through for the half dozen kids who want to do well on the assignments, because it was in my plans, and beause we have a long break coming up and I didn't feel there was much point in starting anything new. I have 2 classes of 7th graders. Last year both classes had some students who made the classes a rather difficult mix of immaturity, lack of motivation, and unbridled peer group concerns. This year one class is delightful and the other - well, they are in some cases just a year older.
During the "just a year older" group I called on one student who seemed to not be paying attention to repeat what I said. He is clever and repeated close to word for word what I said. I then said something else and he decided to repeat that also to the delight of some of his classmates. I stood silent for a couple of seconds as the class looked expectantly at me to see what would happen next. I then went on with the lesson as if nothing had happened.
Before writing this I searched for some clue to the causes of adolescent insolence. I didn't spend a whole lot of time in the search, but what was popping-up were entertainment sites which praised actors' abilities to play "adolescent insolence". I thought to myself, 'Yeah, this is a common type in teen movies', but what came first - adolescent insolence or "Rebel Without a Cause"? Of course the insolence came first, but did the movies make it the chosen behavior of a teenage hero? Or is it just a natural response from a certain type of individual trying to save face? I need more research - unless someone has the answers.
During the "just a year older" group I called on one student who seemed to not be paying attention to repeat what I said. He is clever and repeated close to word for word what I said. I then said something else and he decided to repeat that also to the delight of some of his classmates. I stood silent for a couple of seconds as the class looked expectantly at me to see what would happen next. I then went on with the lesson as if nothing had happened.
Before writing this I searched for some clue to the causes of adolescent insolence. I didn't spend a whole lot of time in the search, but what was popping-up were entertainment sites which praised actors' abilities to play "adolescent insolence". I thought to myself, 'Yeah, this is a common type in teen movies', but what came first - adolescent insolence or "Rebel Without a Cause"? Of course the insolence came first, but did the movies make it the chosen behavior of a teenage hero? Or is it just a natural response from a certain type of individual trying to save face? I need more research - unless someone has the answers.
Saturday, September 11, 2010
Sometimes You Want to Cry
If you read my previous post you're aware that on Wednesday I had a lab where 6th graders looked at protists and yeast cells. On Friday we were checking a study guide with questions about cells. One of the questions was, "About 350 years ago Anton van Leeuwenhoek was the first person to do what?"
We check the questions through a game I call "CHALLENGE !!" A team calls on a member of another team to give their answer to a specific question. If the person gets it right their team gets 2 points. If they miss it the team that called on them can CHALLENGE !! (A proper challenge involves the entire team on the count of 3 firmly and decisively in unison pulling down their right fist and saying CHALLENGE!! ) If a team challenges a wrong answer and gives the right answer they get 2 points for the challenge and 2 for the right answer. Teams that agree with a right answer get 1 point. (Challenging a right answer will lose your team 2 points.)
Anyway, the person called on gave the right answer to the van Leeuwenhoek question - "He was the first peron to see a single celled organism."
I then asked the class how many of them had ever seen a single celled organism. I know we didn't have science on Thursday and from Wednesday to Friday is a long time. And granted on Wednesday 3 of the 5 teams had a hard time finding any protists, but they all saw plenty of yeast cells.
Out of a class of 19 how many hands would you guess went up? .... 2.....
Sometimes it makes you just want to cry.
We check the questions through a game I call "CHALLENGE !!" A team calls on a member of another team to give their answer to a specific question. If the person gets it right their team gets 2 points. If they miss it the team that called on them can CHALLENGE !! (A proper challenge involves the entire team on the count of 3 firmly and decisively in unison pulling down their right fist and saying CHALLENGE!! ) If a team challenges a wrong answer and gives the right answer they get 2 points for the challenge and 2 for the right answer. Teams that agree with a right answer get 1 point. (Challenging a right answer will lose your team 2 points.)
Anyway, the person called on gave the right answer to the van Leeuwenhoek question - "He was the first peron to see a single celled organism."
I then asked the class how many of them had ever seen a single celled organism. I know we didn't have science on Thursday and from Wednesday to Friday is a long time. And granted on Wednesday 3 of the 5 teams had a hard time finding any protists, but they all saw plenty of yeast cells.
Out of a class of 19 how many hands would you guess went up? .... 2.....
Sometimes it makes you just want to cry.
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
Best Laid Plans of Humans, Protists, and Viruses
I had a lab today where the 6th graders were looking for protists in this soup of decaying leaves, dirt, and water that had been "brewing" since Sunday. Each day I added a little flour and pulled out a dropper of the liquid and observed a slide full of swirling little single celled monsters. This morning at 7 I set up a slide and at least 30 unicellular bumper cars careened in front of the lens. I decided to put the beaker outside and let it heat up a bit. At 10:30 I brought the beaker inside and separated the "protists soup" into four beakers for each student team. By 11 a.m. the 6th graders were dropping their own drops of the "soup" onto a slide and NOTHING!! Where had the little monters gone? We struggled to find a few paramecium stragglers and each kid at least said they saw one. I'm not sure anyone believed me when I swore that just 4 hours earlier one drop of the liquid would have had 20-40 protists dashing and darting all over the slide.
Great question today from an 8th grader after I explained why viruses were not considered alive by many scientists. She asked, "So what's their purpose?" I countered, "What's our purpose?" The whole class started thinking. It was close to the end of the class. I started telling them about how some scientists theorize that the evolution of our cell types evolved from an archae cell that was invaded by a virus. The hope or belief of some cosmic purpose to each organism for some reason thrills me.
Great question today from an 8th grader after I explained why viruses were not considered alive by many scientists. She asked, "So what's their purpose?" I countered, "What's our purpose?" The whole class started thinking. It was close to the end of the class. I started telling them about how some scientists theorize that the evolution of our cell types evolved from an archae cell that was invaded by a virus. The hope or belief of some cosmic purpose to each organism for some reason thrills me.
Monday, September 6, 2010
Facebook Fracas
Today a group of 8th grader girls came to me for a "very secret" conversation. They told me that an 8th grade boy had written on Facebook that he wanted to die. We had been over Erickson's stages last week and discussed the teenage conflict of "Identity vs Role Diffusion". I had talked about how role diffusion in extreme situations had led to teenage suicides. We talked about ways to develop healthy identity and what to do if you were depressed and began to develop suicidal thoughts. The class is very upbeat and there is not really anyone who I would describe as morbid or seemingly suicidal.
I told the concerned girls that I would talk to the boy. After a chat with the guidance counselor about what I would say and what she wanted me to ask, I spoke with the 8th grader.
He was surprised and said he never put anything like that on Facebook and that he hadn't been on FB for several days. I asked if he had had such thoughts. He (with no hesitation) said no.
Now what? I checked with one of the girls and she said she had defintiely seen it.
I told the concerned girls that I would talk to the boy. After a chat with the guidance counselor about what I would say and what she wanted me to ask, I spoke with the 8th grader.
He was surprised and said he never put anything like that on Facebook and that he hadn't been on FB for several days. I asked if he had had such thoughts. He (with no hesitation) said no.
Now what? I checked with one of the girls and she said she had defintiely seen it.
Friday, September 3, 2010
Nothing New under the Sun
I had a professor in my Masters program who used to like to take every "new buzz word" and trace the origin of the concept behind the "buzz word" back to the ancient Greeks. Recently my son (who is in a graduate program in engineering) sent me an email about some tests he took which required dimensional analysis. He suggested I look into it for some science problems.
I have a good bit more research to do, but it seemed to be the basic strategy was to identify the "unit of measurement" that is relevant for the answer and then use various appropriate thinking skills strategies to get a valid answer in the relevant unit of measurement.
I Googled "Pythagoras and dimensional analysis" and got 54,400 results.
Our school has bought into a literacy program. Over lunch I was discussing with my wife her introduction to the program. (Fortunately as the science teacher I am exempt from the literacy prorgram). She explained a little about it and her concerns about the strategy being developed by a psychologist who doesn't understand whole group classroom dynamics. The program has buzz words like "visualizing" in the strategies.
I just Googled "literacy and ancient Greece". The first thing that popped up was about the high level of literacy in ancient Greece based on "writing". There is a buzz word for you. Have the kids write!!
Of course that is hard tedious work to check the writing, correct it, have them rewrite fixing the corrections, and then you need to check it again. Much more fun to read a story and hold up neatly laminated cards that encourage "visualizing".
Thank goodness I am the science teacher and don't have to deal with literacy. I do have a sink full of test tubes to wash and a mountain of lab notebooks to grade, though.
Happy Friday! Three weeks down and 33 to go!!
I have a good bit more research to do, but it seemed to be the basic strategy was to identify the "unit of measurement" that is relevant for the answer and then use various appropriate thinking skills strategies to get a valid answer in the relevant unit of measurement.
I Googled "Pythagoras and dimensional analysis" and got 54,400 results.
Our school has bought into a literacy program. Over lunch I was discussing with my wife her introduction to the program. (Fortunately as the science teacher I am exempt from the literacy prorgram). She explained a little about it and her concerns about the strategy being developed by a psychologist who doesn't understand whole group classroom dynamics. The program has buzz words like "visualizing" in the strategies.
I just Googled "literacy and ancient Greece". The first thing that popped up was about the high level of literacy in ancient Greece based on "writing". There is a buzz word for you. Have the kids write!!
Of course that is hard tedious work to check the writing, correct it, have them rewrite fixing the corrections, and then you need to check it again. Much more fun to read a story and hold up neatly laminated cards that encourage "visualizing".
Thank goodness I am the science teacher and don't have to deal with literacy. I do have a sink full of test tubes to wash and a mountain of lab notebooks to grade, though.
Happy Friday! Three weeks down and 33 to go!!
Thursday, September 2, 2010
Back to School Night - Tonight
We get a good turn-out for this event; although, the 5 pm kick-off time is a bit of a joke.
I have 20 minutes scheduled for each of my 3 grade levels. By the time the parents get in the room and stop chatting with each other I have about 10 minutes. I have an agenda on a PowerPoint: Course of Study, Communication, Rules & Procedures, Grading, Philosophy of Course, & Other. I then let the parents decide how they want to spend the 10 minutes. Last year they mostly wanted "Other" - Where do I come from, and why do the kids call me "Dr. C"?
Today the 8th graders used microscopes to look at 7 mosquitoes that bit me yesterday (and didn't live to lay their eggs) to see if they were the dengue virus carrying species. I've left the microscopes out with the mosquito slides on them. That should cut my presentation down to 5 minutes.
I have 20 minutes scheduled for each of my 3 grade levels. By the time the parents get in the room and stop chatting with each other I have about 10 minutes. I have an agenda on a PowerPoint: Course of Study, Communication, Rules & Procedures, Grading, Philosophy of Course, & Other. I then let the parents decide how they want to spend the 10 minutes. Last year they mostly wanted "Other" - Where do I come from, and why do the kids call me "Dr. C"?
Today the 8th graders used microscopes to look at 7 mosquitoes that bit me yesterday (and didn't live to lay their eggs) to see if they were the dengue virus carrying species. I've left the microscopes out with the mosquito slides on them. That should cut my presentation down to 5 minutes.
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
You´d Think I Would Know By Now
Today the 6th graders were going to do a plant experiment - How does the amount of soil affect the growth of a plant?
I had 2 periods for the lab and I started out with them weighing the empty plant pots.
I soon found out none of them had ever used a triple beam balance before. Two periods and a part of their lunch period later the last team finished weighing the mass of the pots with soil.
Not only were they struggling with the mechanics of the balance, but many had trouble adding the amounts from the 3 balancing beams (100 + 40 + 7.5 = ??)
Is it too late for me to get good at skill analysis?
I had 2 periods for the lab and I started out with them weighing the empty plant pots.
I soon found out none of them had ever used a triple beam balance before. Two periods and a part of their lunch period later the last team finished weighing the mass of the pots with soil.
Not only were they struggling with the mechanics of the balance, but many had trouble adding the amounts from the 3 balancing beams (100 + 40 + 7.5 = ??)
Is it too late for me to get good at skill analysis?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)