Classroom III

 Martha what is that coming down the roadOriginally uploaded by mnesterpicsWhile reading my RSS feeds on the new and improved, still beta version of Bloglines, I came across this humorous image from mnesterpics on Flickr. I showed it to my wife and we initially thought the animals were seals. However, we laughed when we read the tags and realized they are river otters.The caption: “Martha what is that coming down the road”, got me to thinking. I know, it could be the sugar rush from Sunday morning pancakes, but do we know what is coming down the road?I plan to use this for the first day of classes next week. Using our digital projector, I plan to post this humorous image on the screen. As my students straggle into my classroom for the first day of classes of the second semester, ask them:What is Coming Down the Road?Then hand them a syllabus. BAM!!!!

Teaching is a challenge. Students today are engaged in a plethora of hardcore criminal behaviors. Violent behavior is just beneath the surface of every conversation.  Drugs plague our communities and spill over into the school yard. My point is that teaching is a hazardous endeavor. NEA has an interesting article online at the link below. Now in my last decade of teaching, I look at the number in the NEA article and want to throw up. Teachers are blamed for everything. Poor test scores, drop-outs, poor eating habits of fat kids, and more.Oh well, what do we know, we are just teachers.Check out this interesting article: Be prepared to self-medicate.NEA: Professional Pay - Myths & Facts About Teacher Pay

MYTH: Teachers make just as much as other, comparable professions. 

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This post is inspired by an article I read in a magazine I found while cleaning out my home office today.“Stack the Knickknacks”, well, not sure teachers have these because students do not give teachers anything these days. My desk is covered with curriculum CDs, a US/NC flag, whiteboard markers (most of them are almost dried out), a cup for pencils I find on the floor, and several coffee mugs. I guess coffee mugs would qualify as knickknacks. Pile it up until you can see the desktop“Line up the books and binders to establish a perimeter for your work area.” I would not really recommend this for a classroom. Piled up books end up falling when students try to slip late homework on your desk and then accuse you of not asking for their homework or tell their parents or guardian you lost it on your desk. Do I like do, throw the textbooks in a box and stick them in the back seat of your car. I have used the say textbook for so many years I have the answers memorized. I only use them to write lesson plans. They have the Standard Course of Study numbers our school district requires on lesson plans so they can fire teachers that have poor test scores by saying we are not teaching the curriculum.“Hit the Container Store.” Container Store? Forget that! The only place I can afford to go to is Big Lots. I bought some cheap CD containers. They are full. I need to weed my collection. Bet I have some CDs of Apple software that will not run on Leopard. I also park my truck near the school dumpster at the beginning and end to the school year. When teachers retire or quit, I volunteer to carry their old stuff to the dumpster. If there is something like document trays or pencil holders, I just drop them in the back of my truck and keep on going.“Set Aside A Few Minutes daily to clear your desk.” The Wired Magazine article suggests using your daily planner to schedule time each day to clean off your desk. Use iCal or Google Calendar to make a repeating appointment, each school day, to remind you to clean off your desk.“Create A Folder Hierarchy.” The article changed describing the desk to the computer desktop. Tip: “group files into folders labeled by year, then make subfolders for each set of tasks. Make sure your naming conventions are clear and concise.” This is a problem on my Windows machine. However, I love Leopard’s new feature called Quick Look/Slideshow. This is awesome for unorganized teachers like myself. I never remember what I saved a file as. If I download a curriculum file from our State Department of Ed, they name their files differently and I never remember to rename them.“Color Code Your Files.” Sweet! I am not going to do this. The article recommends using bold colors for “urgent” files.“Move Your Folders.” IMHO, this tip is lame. “…create a desktop shortcut pointing to current assignments.” Have you heard about Box.net? Instead of using a flashdrive, I am trying this. Shortcuts are useless if you are having to work on multiple computers at home and at school.“Choose Attractive Wallpaper.” I like this tip- “if you’ve got a background worth looking at, your’re more likely to keep the desktop free of file and folder clutter.” I am doing to download some photos from Harley-Davidson for their bikes and maybe set up that “retirement date” ticker. That is worth looking at.Allen, David. “Tidy Up Your Desk….” Wired Aug. 2006: 022-023.Cheers!Happy New Year.Powered by ScribeFire.

This is a neat tool for students in the classroom. If a student wants to make a direct quote from a web page, they can use Kwout to create an embedded version of the quote. North Whiteville Academy - Homepage via kwout

Time to change my blog theme. I sort of like this one. It reminds me of Hahlo and the way Twitter looks. http://web.mac.com/blakej78/MiddleSchool/Podcast/Podcast.htmlEnjoy our vlogs/podcasts/claymation projects.

Professional development (PD) in our district is now being offered via a paid online service called PD360. I have not tried it, but our administrators had a need to offer more PD and again technology offered a solution. Is it going to make a difference? IMHO, it will impact many teachers and help them keep their license, but I like to be inspired when I participate in professional development, not just get the credits.Last night, Saturday at 10:30 am EST, it was 10:30 am Sunday in Kuala Lumpur, and Jeff Utecht was presenting to a group of administrators at EARCOS. I was watching TV and had my laptop flickering on the couch as I recovered from a day at the NC Pecan Harvest Festival in Whiteville, NC. I had just reinstalled Twitterific after deleting the crash-prone Twitter app that I had really gotten accustomed to and liked its features– Snitter. Immediately on launching Twitterific, Jeff Utecht tweeted the URL to Ustream.tv where he was preparing to speak at EARCOS. I clicked on the link and within seconds my computer screen and I traveled 2000 miles to a conference room- LIVE FROM KUALA LUMPUR. Now, this old redneck has never been to where ever Kuala Lumpur is and on my teacher’s salary will never be able to afford such an exciting journey. However, through the magic of Twitter and Ustream.TV and the imagination and creative use of technology by Jeff forty or more virtual participants logged in on the Ustream.tv http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/d2UhYkjs8SxZP3G1QOqmDA and watched and chatted. The video I have tried to embed here but could not make the embed work so I have hyperlinked to site. I did not stay up to participate in it because it was getting past my bedtime. I embedded it here so I can remember to view it. I think I can download it to my iPod video by converting the Flash video to .mov using several apps out there on the web. I have a road trip to Raleigh today so I plan to try to download this to view on the drive to Cary, NC.My point here is that PD has to fit my life. The days of sit and get, bored out of my head PD is over. I can participate on my time, in my home, on the couch and replay what is unclear to me. Then if I have a question, I can email, post comments on the Ustream.tv site, or even Skype Jeff (after pre-arranging a phone interview using email: which is considered “proper Skype etiquette”) Note to self- do not just Skype a call to folks anymore. I Skyped the presenter live at the World View Symposium and got some bad looks. I will not do that again. Made me look dumb too. Now, I just need to write up these activities and have them approved at real PD activities so I can earn my credits for renewal of my teacher licenses. I think I can print out the transcript of the chat room as proof of my participation. Maybe we could ask Jeff to email us certificates of participation? Anyone have any ideas on this?