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from Minneapolis to the Delta
I love the show Top Gear. It’s pretty inexplicable because, well, it’s a car show, and I don’t really know or care that much about cars. However, it’s not so much a car show as a show about irreverent guys doing really silly things with cars, and I really enjoy irreverent people doing really silly things. So, when I was doing my typical “how can I make this interesting” musing around d=rt, and realized that improbable races are a silly Top Gear thing, I was pretty excited. I mean, a Ferrari versus an airplane? A Jag against the sun? How could it go wrong?
What actually happened is something that happens to me fairly often. It wasn’t awful by any means, but the output/input ratio was not in my favor–I mean that the amount of time I put into planning the lesson, collecting video clips and statistics and creating note sheets,…
I first read Ender’s Game when I was the same age my students are now. I picked it up yesterday looking for a light read. I happen to have been thinking a lot lately about leadership, since I am rapidly approaching the end of my two-year commitment to Teach For America. As a result, the…
read more »http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/01/ff_lottery/all/1 There’s at least one great lesson to be gleaned from this article. I’m just not sure if the time I’d put into chipping it out would be worth the payout. So I’m throwing it up here in case someone smarter and more motivated than me wants to have a go. Might be a good…
read more »“We just get one piece?” “Why does first period get pizza and we don’t?” “This is boring.” Overheard in my classroom. With many tally marks beside them to mark how many times I’ve heard them. One of the things I am thankful for (besides the week off of school) this Thanksgiving is that not only…
read more »No, not by my students. Who knows what they got out of this week. Well, I do, actually (hint: not as much as I’d like), but these are the objectives life had in store for me: -Life is so much better when the principal’s around. -Tie your shoelaces. Tie ‘em well. When you forget and…
read more »I should be calendaring objectives right now. Instead, I have spent the past hour brainstorming applications for slope. My new approach to planning: throw every sweet application into the pot at the beginning. Planning has never been so much fun. I owe a lot of love to this guy: http://blog.mrmeyer.com/. Also, mathalicious. Next unit, we’re…
read more »This school year so far has been a bit frustrating for me. I remember last year, seeing second-year (and more veteran!) teachers, and thinking, wow, they are rock stars, they have it all together. Can’t wait until that’s me. Well, it’s my second year, and that’s not me. I still feel like a screw-up most…
read more »T-2 days before students. It’s amazing how incredibly calm I am; last year at this time I remember being nervous, and of course excited. Now, I’m just excited. Everything that has happened at professional development this week has led me to believe it’s going to be an awesome year: I love my new principal, I…
read more »Obviously I did a miserable job of blogging this year; that’s what next year’s goals are for! There is no way I can adequately summarize the past few months, but my kids made awesome progress, and I was so proud to see all of my senior “babies” graduate. And I’m already incredibly excited for next…
read more »I’m doing some experimenting with my management system, since it’s not as efficient as it could be. I’ve become more lenient than I should have. However, tightening up again has so far resulted in mostly misery, which I’m taking as a sign that the approach I’ve been trying isn’t natural to me or my students,…
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