Job Hunting

Job hunting is certainly a chore. It seems like there is always another district I should have thought of. It would be easier in a sense if I were a traditional student without a husband and home when looking for a job. That way I wouldn't feel tied down to central Ohio. As it is, I would really like to not have to drive more than 30 minutes from Westerville. Each cover letter needs to be individualized. Each resume altered a little. Each application a ridiculously long process. On top of that, you never know when, let alone if, you will hear from anyone. I am a planner and not knowing what my life will be like in the fall is difficult and stressful for me. If anyone has any knowledge of upcoming openings in central Ohio for 7-12 life science, let me know!

taking on too much

In my Teacher Leadership class, I had to complete the Myers-Briggs personality test. It turns out I'm an Extrovert (big surprise there, haha), iNtuition, Thinker, and a Judger. It is important for me to remember that these are good or bad results, but just results that provide self-awareness. This site gives more info on my personality. One thing that really rang true is that I tend to take on more then I really should.

This is why I ignored my husband's plea that I not take classes this term. I could feel the snowball effect that would happen if I didn't take classes. I would have to push back my graduation date by three terms, pay for the classes out of pocket (I get tuition waivers b/c from Otterbein), and maybe not take the classes at all if life got stressful in other ways and fail to graduate. As a result, I'm trying to push through my three classes, my full-time OC job, subbing 3-5 days/week, and the process of buy/renovating/moving into our first home. This was a lot.

Perhaps my husband was right, and I should have taken the term off. Then again, maybe a year from now I will be teaching full-time, pregnant, and SO glad I have my degree! Can you tell INTJ's are planners??

first in-class arrest today

Today I subbed at a local high school for a music teacher. There was nothing left for my students to do, so they were just sitting around talking. I noticed one period that 3 of my 8 students in the class had disappeared. Five minutes later, a police officer and vice-principal walked in my class and took away one of my remaining students to arrest him. Apparently he showed my three disappearing students his bags of weed and vikadin. They quietly slipped out of class to tell the school administration. Who knew? I think I catch a lot as a teacher, but I guess I miss a lot, too. I had no idea this was going on until it all went down. Turns out the kid has gone through this many times before and has been through rehab, too. What a shame.

If you need a sub

If you need a substitute, here are some do's and don't's from my perspective, the perspective of a sub:
1) Leave a class list and an accurate seating chart. I can't say how many times I don't even know who or how many students to expect. Seating charts are out-dated 9 times out of 10 once the second semester rolls around. What if there's an emergency and I can't tell the administration who was in my/your class?
2) If you expect excellent or lazy behavior from your students, that is fine, just let me know. If you let your students run around all crazy, you've made my job 5 times harder, especially if you don't tell me that's the norm.
3) Leave me lesson plan options. Don't assume that I know everything or nothing about your subject or technology. Leave options, so if I feel comfortable going over your material, I can. If I know nothing about it, leave me something simple like book-work or a movie as a second option.
4) ALWAYS leave me something to do! Over-plan if necessary! Having nothing to do is a painful experience as a sub. Imagine how your students behave for you on their worst day, and now multiply it to see how they treat a sub. Give us something to accomplish or there is mayhem!
5) Leave things where we can find them and leave the teacher's computer logged on for us. Imagine moving into a fully furnished house and being told to find the garlic press. You may have an idea of where to look, but the owner may have thought a different place was logical. Leaving a working computer for us is just courteous. It is like leaving the remote control out so a guest can watch TV during downtime. We need the downtime just as much as you do.
6) Say thank you. You know who subs for you. We leave feedback on papers in your room and online. If you think your job as a teacher is thankless, try being a sub. We work hard at half the pay and no benefits. It would go a long way. It isn't easy walking into someone else's room, dealing with someone else's organization, and trying to make it all work.

Thanks, and thanks to all the teachers who do as much of this as possible!

online book discussions

I visited www.bookdiscussions.com. I love this! There are so many great books about science, but teachers usually make students all read the same book. Maybe with the online book discussion site, the students could read from a list of books. They could discuss them online at the site. They could reply to fellow students or really anyone who's read the book. Similarly, they could get feedback from anyone. I guess the potential negative is also what I like - anyone could view and respond to the postings. Anyhow, I think after years of doing it, the students would have a good resource int he posts of students from earlier years.

One Computer Classroom

The One Computer Classroom website talks about the possibilities of having access to one computer in the classroom. Certainly the teacher can use it for preparation and communication. But the cite talks about using it for presentations and leading the class, too. Although most of the classrooms I sub in have a computer, few of them have projecting capabilities. Also, the site talks about student use. Again, if they prepared their information elsewhere, they can present on the classroom computer if there is a projector. The site talked about giving tests or quizzes as a group using the computer. I've thought about that, but my students always talk me out of it. They don't like the idea of being tested at someone else's pace. They want to go back and reread the questions if they want to, but feel that is not possible if they have to test as a class. But the idea of the entire class depending on that one computer isn't very realistic. I would certainly take one computer versus no computer, but it must be accompanied with a projector. A Smartboard would be nice, too.

Flash play/Animoto frustrations

I wanted to review the Lodge Does the Canopy Animoto video, but cannot. The video requires the download of the latest Adobe Flash Player. I had a similar frustration several months ago at a local high school. I had what I thought was a great lesson plan and webquest for the students, but most of them couldn't get to the pages that were so easy for me to get to from home or my office. Even the teacher's desk computer could go the right pages. All the student laptops and computer labs needed the to download the program. But the schools have the computers so locked down that they are very difficult to use. Anyhow, I write this as a warning. Animoto may be awesome, but if your students can't use it, it is useless. So frustrating.

Picasa

I love the idea of an online photo collage. I can see using that in science class if I give students a chance to go outside and take pictures of our topic, like plants. They could create a one page collage using Picasa. I've given longer final projects using online scrap booking sites. The students are better able to go into a large amount of detail that way, organize it, and present it. But I can see the benefit of Picasa for simpler projects.