Winding Down (or gearing up?)

I cannot remember school going by this quickly when I was a student. It seems that each day just flies by as does each week and each month. Part of it has to do with 2nd period being my prep period; the rest of the day is a sprint to the finish.

The kids put a great deal of effort into their state tests. Just by walking around I could see pages being filled on the open-response essays. Kids were asking for extra sheets (of course we couldn't give them any). You could tell that they were putting forth tons of effort--even with the last sections of each day. I'll be surprised if we don't meet our school's goal.

We are on an exciting weather unit right now that the kids find fun. Most of the resources are from DSM kit that I received from our science resource coordinator. We collect daily weather data, put it in a chart, and make predictions on the weather. It's a concrete and relevant way of understanding the scientific method. Of course, it also allows the students to get a little bit of time outside, which is very helpful with testing over and warm weather.

I've found many grants to get resources for the classroom. I just applied for a minigrant that almost every teacher who applies gets it. I have another in the work for a laptop, projector, and interactive remote system. That last thing is where students have remote controls (essentially) and they are asked a set of questions. The students use their remote controls to send their answer to the computer. As a result, the teacher is able to see the exact response from each student. The results are not displayed directly on the screen for all students, but you can have survey results displayed (eg polling the audience in "who wants to be a millionaire). It seems as though the questions are stored on the computer but can be given in paper form. As a result, giving tests where a section is multiple choice would allow those sections to be instantly graded.

What's great about these systems is that you can get daily feedback on where each student is and the effectiveness of your lesson. It makes differentiation and frequent assessment feasible. It's a task for any teacher to give daily assessments that are then tracked by individual standards and students (on top of lesson planning and grading). The system will work well as a behavior management system as students will be a bit more engaged with using technology instead of simply writing out answers. Of course, the remotes can be taken away if students act poorly (they would do their work on paper). I'm excited and I hope the grant goes through.

I'm also excited about the materials I've found for next year. I wish I had known the amount of stuff I would've needed to do good labs during this past year. I've been able to find a hands-on resource for almost every standard I teach in the large science catalogs that I've looked through. Now it's a matter of writing the grants, but I hope to have a completely inquiry-based science classroom next year (and for any teacher who comes after me). Pedagogically it makes sense as students need to have a concrete experience before going to higher abstract levels of knowledge. I have many students who prefer activity in the classroom and need something to manipulate or see.

With more of my time free, I hope to keep you all updated on my ongoing projects.