In the wake of the fire, Tom and I are still working on finding equilibrium. The size of the apartment, the distance from my gardens, the lack of comfortable space and privacy, the noises of the city — and our neighbors — all conspire against the comfortable routines and patterns we used to have. He […]
Category: teaching
Micro-Literature, revisited
I needed a holding place for the thinking I am doing for an interview tomorrow. Did I mention I have a job interview? Exciting stuff! I chose to go with an old stand-by lesson, the same one in fact that spurred me into action 5 years ago. The one that convinced me middle schoolers were […]
Long, Lazy Day Off
I woke up late, played around with Lucky, got some laundry going and cleaned up around the sewing machine. It isn’t bright enough to work where I have the sewing table, so I set up shop in the kitchen. It took about 5 hours, start to finish — 8 with the breaks I took. It […]
My classroom, and stidkid
Tom helped me set up anther computer for the room today. And I finished rearranging the tables. It is looking better, hopefully there are some good improvements in my technique as well. The last pic is of Mother and Grant with Tom in the background at the Solo and Ensemble day last weekend. He got […]
Past Eleven and STILL Up
Some nights I find it harder to get to sleep than others. Tonight, apparently is one of them.
Techdate: crosspost from LiveJournal
This is a crosspost from the online journal I keep mostly for technology-related posts. However, this is also about teaching, and perhaps explains (along with daily grading of papers, lesson-planning, meetings and tracking down experienced teachers to bounce ideas off…) why I have been posting irregularly and rather poorly the last two months. I owe […]
Three weeks in…
I have just finished planning for the fourth week of my tenure in 7th grade. I had a series of very long, difficult days in the past two weeks. Conferences with parents and students who are at risk of not being able to go on to 8th grade. Learning a little bit more about how […]
What makes a successful student
I am working through how to articulate good learning and study habits for my students. Here is a simple list of DISPOSITIONS that I have come up with so far — do you have any you would add? Risk taking — often more is learned in figuring out what doesn’t work than in getting everything […]
Did I mention teaching full-time?
For the last two weeks, I have been the “in charge” teacher in a classroom, and for at least another week longer. Maybe more. Some days are much easier than others, and I have found it important to change the classroom culture dramatically. The students were accustomed to a fairly open environment, where they could […]
Children and high-tech safety issues
Note to readers: I began this 16 days ago, and then was so busy this month it languished. Hopefully it’s still somewhat relevant.