Busy few weeks

Today, Sunday May 21st, I finally have the chance to sit and think for a few minutes. It has been a busy few weeks. My text for my class has yet to show up, the bathroom fell off (literally), the basement was a swimming pool and it rained most every day. Just another time when living in PA can be interesting. As far as the text goes, there's really nothing more to do other than wait and hope that I can catch up. The bathroom is another story. My family has had a small place on a little lake since 1906. Of course, when it was built, there was no indoor plumbing. Years later, someone put up walls and a roof over a back porch, converting it into a powder room. A few weeks ago this "room" finally gave in to the steady cycle of flooding and freezing. The pylons that used to keep the place up crumbled. This place has been around so long, something had to be done. My father has spent evenings rebuilding what was lost. My part has been as involved as I can be. Today, we finished the roof, despite winds and rain. Of all the times to try and get this done...it's rained just about everyday since the first supports were drilled into the ground! At least now, most of the work will be done under the new roof. Yes we could survive without a restroom, but with the long weekend and the start of summer approaching (at least I think summer will start, it was 37 this morning when I left to work on the facilities), this place has been a gathering place for family and friends.
In the middle of all this, my sump pump gave up the ghost. I didn't realize that until I went to the basement, which is poorly lit, and stepped into the water. That was quite a surprise! That was followed by working in the water to find the pump, remove it and rewire the new one. Ah, there's nothing quite like a little voltage and water to make you think about things. :) Despite all the fun, I still found time to get my Barracuda inspected for the year. That was a bit depressing too. It turns out that I only put 855 miles on it since the last inspection. Not nearly enough driving for the amount of work I have in it. I guess I'll have to make the goal of turning the key more often.

With only 9 days left with my students, my to do list for the summer is growing. At least there isn' t too much time to be bored. I've even been too busy to get my fishing license. Trout season started in mid April and have yet to wet a line. I guess that just means that I have another goal...The never-ending cycle. At least I can still laugh about things and have the humor to see that it's all just normal, even though a few of my friends think I'm a bit to cozy with this Murphy guy and his little law.
I guess the point is that no matter what happens, do what you have to and keep laughing when you can. I'm looking forward to a few days without rain and the end of the school year so I can gear up for the next one. Good luck to all and may the powers that be smile upon you and keep and help you see the humor in things.
mark

Thought for the day

As I work through the tech in ed classes, I'm learning many things. Today, I learned something that came from an unexpected source. My tech guy, who has not always been as supportive or helpful as he could be, gave me some insight while doing some needed work on my computer. Our building is relatively new (at least in my area). It began in 1998 and was completed a while later. The community was in an uproar over the "extravagance” of such a new building. Anyway, my point is that education here isn't always at the top of the financial food chain.
Looking at tech and its return/dollar spent. I'm really questioning some things. One example, which was the tidbit picked up from the tech department, involved switches. These are the unsung heroes of your access to the world. When they go down, your computer is a stand-alone item. The life expectancy is about five years. Those in our middle and high schools are going into their seventh year with few problems. At any moment, all or part of my building could be without access to the grading program (based in another state), attendance program (same), emails (wouldn't that hurt?) and various other things used in the classroom. What it amounts to is about a $70,000 investment. This put me to thinking about what other things could be done with that money. That lead to thinking about how much more we spend on new computers, that age so quickly and all the things needed to keep up to date technologically. Is this the best bang for the buck? I don't really have the answer to that one yet. Maybe we’re just under using it? Ahhh to know it all....
Thanks to these classes I'm thinking differently, but am still a tech person. I like the stuff and use it as much as possible. As long as there are funding streams (the light bulb for my projector costs about $399) and functioning switches, I'll use the stuff, but don't want it to be all that I do just want it to help me do what I do. :)
mark

A full week

This past week was a full week. So many things going on, and not enough time for the full completion of each. From a teaching standpoint, I'm relatively well caught up for this year. From the next year perspective, I'm already feeling behind. I just came though a professional day where I worked with the science teacher from the other team (we have two 8th grade teams of students, designed to help bridge the gap from the elementary system to the high school system). There has been a large push for making both teams congruent in all subject areas. I am looking at a huge change in the coming year. I'm expected to change many things. I'm the newer teacher in this team, so my say is a bit limited. I'm having a difficult time working out some bugs and am really trying to keep up the things that I've done in the past while trying to be as similar as possible. I openly admit that my class has a limited connection to the following years, as far as content goes. Students won't see this stuff again until college! With this in mind, I spend a lot of time teaching the note taking skills, testing skills, reading skills, skimming, context clues etc. I use my content to do so. This practice will become more difficult next year. The grading policy with be different as well...I guess I'm just like a starting teacher next year, with more questions than I had when I started teaching.
All in all, it should be an interesting year. I'm relatively new, and my counterpart has been in the business for 28 years (I asked him on Friday). Combining the new technology (me) and the established worksheets (him) ought to make for an interesting year. I hope that we can both benefit from this attempt at amalgamation and homogenization…only more days of work and discussion will tell.

A Thank you

Thanks to all that helped me get started in the blogs, figure out these new things and those who commented on my unit. Thanks to all of you, this will be a stronger unit next year when I use it and most of the weaknesses should be sorted out. Good luck...I imaginge that I'll be "seeing" some of you in other classes.
mark