Saturday, May 29, 2010

Pride

Well, they say pride goeth before a fall so I hope that this is not the case for what I am about to say. I am so proud of our students and their presentations! They did a wonderful job of presenting, especially considering that we had some problems to overcome that day. If you view their presentation videos you will see and hear some of those problems.
First of all, we are just beginning the renovation of Greenbrier West and the day of the presentation was when they decided to excavate right outside of my classroom windows. And I mean RIGHT OUTSIDE OF MY WINDOWS! In fact, I think they actually hit the wall a few times with the excavator bucket. The telephone with a built in speaker was not available, that went on the fritz the day before our presentations and there was not another room available with a landline and a Smart Board to present with so we had to use a cell phone which left the sound quality not the best. We also had the electrician come through at least 6 times to get to the utility room which is accessed through my storage room and he cut the power one time. I was trying to recover from a very hoarse voice, at least 6 announcements were made over the intercom during the presentations and we have lost our air conditioning so it was very hot in the room.
Two of our students were also supposed to be going with the sophomores to a Career day event so they had to arrange for alternative transportation to the event.
With all of that going on and the students being very nervous about the day, I thought they all did a tremendous job with their presentations. We all want to work on their games more extensively and that tells me that they are fully engaged and wanting to learn. That is what this is all about, isn't it? Having students go through a process that makes them want to learn. I am very proud of that.

Friday, May 14, 2010

education

What is education to you? Is it just your time in school or are there other aspects of 'education'? What are your thoughts about education? I hear students say "I can't wait until graduation; I can't wait to get out of here." Why? What is it that leads sutdents to say that? Are they just tired of the process? Do they think everything will magically come to them without as much knowledge or 'education' as they can accumulate? Tell me your thoughts...