Hedgetoad Teaching

We're all in a state of flux... I think it's the nature of an educational professional to constantly evalutate, adjust and change. Sure, lots of ideas get recycled; tweeked and presented as new, but it is in our nature. Problems arise when things change for reasons that are not thought out or focused so tightly that the change causes more problems in keeping that focus. This summer our district chose to change it's online presence. The reason for this was because the old system could not be searched for on a search engine. Yes, this change had to be made because no one could "go*gle" us. Sadly, no one in our tech department (that one guy) made the connection in how google ranks it's links... and why "googling" kept bring up numerous links to G*&eatSchools. Two years ago, the old system was installed because it was very compatible with our electronic gradebooks, making it easy to put grades online. Guess what the new system does not do? And so, si...

Our school district, like many others, is short of money. We're all tightening our belts and trying to make do with what we have. It's meant many sacrifices. For example, if anything breaks down… forget about it being fixed. If a chair breaks in my room , a pretty common occurrence, the student will have use an absent student's chair for the rest of the year. It's not that big of deal, until you also realize that due to overcrowding, I have students doubled up on designated seats. So far "Bob" has not actually been here when "Joe" chooses to show up. Luckily for me… not so lucky for either Bob or Joe. Our technology is fairly gone as well. Forget about using the internet for research for the most part because most sites are blocked by our super strict blocking company (we are the only school they serve that allows student to access the internet) and there is not one available to unblock. Computer problems go unresolved and although our superintendent...

Things have been going fairly well with my classes. I'm starting to get worried/suspicious... itchy butt was actually on task all period on Friday, thanked me for moving his assigned seat and returned promptly from a trip to the library with a book to read . It's a bit freaky. I'm thinking the flu epidemic is having an impact on this long streak of calmness. Only any given day, at least three kids are gone from every class. Even itchy butt has been out a few times, and you know that kids like that are never gone. Not that anyone has had swine flu, they're all just staying home at the slightest sign of sickness. Today I had my first pro-cert culminating seminar. Five hours people... five hours! During the pre-assessment pro-cert we had long discussions about the use of the refresh button , how important it was use the ,jpeg format for photos and other technological conundrums. Today we had a 30 minute discussion on how a document appendix works. Labeling each document ...