blah blah blog

I really enjoyed doing a blog.  I consider it a digital journal.  I have kept a journal since 5th grade so it is something I am used to doing.  The biggest difference I see is that other people will view this so I had to be careful with what I wrote.  I am used to letting loose in my personal journal so I had to read and re-read, checking it over as if I were soemone else viewing it.  Another difference would be how I had to monitor what I wrote to keep out family references.  I am used to writing anything and everything as it crosses my mind.  I have been so busy with teaching, clooege work and life in general that I have let the blog replace my regular journal to some extent.  I will probably do this again with my students.  I think it would be something they would enjoy and a way for me to receive feedback from them about class and school.

My side of the Mountain

This is the book I did the original book talk for.   It's by Jean Craighead George.  She has written over 100 books for youth.  She was awarded the Newberry Medal for another of her books, Julie of the Wolves.  She grew up in a family of naturalists and she wrote this book putting that knowledge to good use.  When she was little she dreamed of running away from home and living out in the woods.  This book is a fulfilllment of her long ago dream and  for others who may have had a similar dream.
The book is about a teenage boy named Sam Gribley who ranaway from New York City and his time out in the woods of New York State over a several months time span.  It describes how he caught food, trapped animals, used natural resources around him to make clothes, utensils, housing, and more.  It is a great book for middle school aged students.  I read it to my son in 4th grade and he enjoyed it as well.  He is a real life Sam who likes to go out to streams to catch crawdaddies and bugs, and so on.
You can apply it to science of course for the naturalist aspect, but also to literacy for the writing style, colloquialisms, for social studies to discuss the differences from New York City where he ranaway from and compare it to the woods where he lived for almost a year.

How Time Flies

The semester is quickly coming to a close for my classes in Greenland and the graduate classes.  It has been such a learning time for me.  I am a mother of four of my own, but then I have 120 other kids.  These are my science kids.  I wish I coud get to know them all equally well.  There are definitely some I have a good rapport with.  Others not so much, but I still want them to succeed.  I get so frustrated when they just give up and seem so apathetic.  My superintendent wants us to pick one student to pay particular attention to and take under our wing.  There are too many for me to choose just one.  I hope and pray that I can continue to improve my own learning and that it benefits those of my science kids too.

pipe cleaner babies

My biology kids have an engaging lab today where we did a genetics lab.  They got to play the role of parents and had four pipe cleaner babies.  I think it really got the idea across of genetics for independent assortment, alleles, chromosomes, and more.  I had several comments from kids saying they liked it because they were so involved and hands on.  It was such a simple lab with simple materials, but they were asking questions, talking about it, doing calculations from it, collablorating, etc.  They were funny to listen to as they talked about their "kids."  I hope they dont get their parents upset when they tell them about what they did in school : )  I will deifinitely use this lab again.

FINALLY!

I have been struggling with my 8th grade classes all year because I have to run over there from the High school.  I am always several minutes late.  They have had no supervision, so some have been out in the halls, etc when I walk down the hall.  They are up and not doing what I have left on the board for them to do.  Progress reports came out yesterday and I have had two conferences with parents about why their students are doing so badly in my classes.  Well, if I have spend a third of my class trying to get them calmed back down and on track, I cant cover as much material.  They must have complained to the principal because he told me today he would get someone to watch my classes until I got there.  YES!!  I had asked and the teacher across the hall from me had asked for someone to do that and we were told there was no one to watch them.  I guess someone is available now.  Those moms seemed no nonsense to me and can help keep their darlings in line so that I hope the class will go smoother since they know how their students are doing.  It has been a good day!

"Mark of the Lion"

One of my favorite reading genres is historical fiction.  I have read a powerful trilogy of books called The Mark of the Lion.  It's set in first century AD in Rome dealing with the persecution of Christians.  It follows one slave girl in the first book and then other lives that she touched in the rest of the series.  It is full of suspense and tension.  The author, Francine Rivers, does not shy away from sensitive topics.  She has written other good books such as Atonement Child dealing with abortion and The Scarlet Thread dealing with prostitution.

a tale of two classes

I have had two observations done so far.  One was by my mentor in my high school science class.  He said I was doing a really good job teaching a new topic to the kids, establishing a good rapport with them, etc.  I was on cloud nine.  Today I had another observation by the middle school principal in my 8th grade class....it was a total opposite.  The kids were on their worst behavior.  He told me based on that observation he should recommend me for classroom management training.  I was upset but then I looked at it from a different perspective.  I know I'm not the only teacher who has a tough class to deal with.  I have several special needs kids in this class--behavior and learning problems.  I will have to come down a little tougher on these kids and do more to keep them engaged.  He may come observe my other 8th grade class which is better behaved.