My Thoughts
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Ethnography Report for Monday, July 10, 2006
8:30 Sacred Writing:
Good Monday Morning!
Today marks the beginning of our last week of the summer writing adventure.
Our writing prompt for today is: Describe the class you’ve taught that had the least and most discipline problems. Describe the difference.
9:00 Sharing: After writing we shared these thoughts about our teaching experiences with particular classes.
Shelly shared a concern we all face by saying “ Scheduling is always a problem.”
Laura admitted that she didn’t have a lot of discipline problems, but that “any problems usually come at the end of the day.”
Diane, on the other hand, remembered a year when she had some students that “needed individual cages, not the desks provided by the county.”
Jason M. lamented that it is difficult to know how to handle unusual situations you encounter while teaching by saying “How do you reprimand a 50 year old in your 9th grade class?”
And Andrea revisited an afternoon PK class that was divided into “predator or prey.”
Joyce remembered a little boy who kicked and pounded on her metal desk while she tried to read a story to the class.
Peggy realized you can’t always get what you want by admitting that “eventually the good ole boys and I came to an agreement…they would at least try to hide their spit cans.”
Shannon amused us by describing science classes that were given the task of dissecting a pig. The Honors Class had “pig parts flying” and she anticipated “needing tourniquets” for her Special Ed Class but happily discovered she was wrong.
Heather shared a memorable Show -And –Tell moment from a former Kindergarten class. A little girl brought a stuffed monkey to share one day. Much to her surprise, a little boy yelled out “What the hell is that?”
Kristen reminded us that “if you have a bad mix of kids, you’ll have a bad class”.
Beth felt she was “too hot to write.”
Jason D. reflected on two opposing discipline styles by saying “ I have seen teacher that are very calm, and those who are very uptight, and their demeanor means very little to the students.”
Mike reflected on a negative memory from his perspective as a student by saying “If I was driving down the street and saw Ms. ______ I would probably swerve over and take her out.”
Karen M. pondered on her role as a teacher and concluded by saying “a teacher’s job is to create an environment in which change can happen. That’s important-it isn’t my job to make change happen; I only have to make it possible to change.
Karenchia wrote on a different topic. She described her grandmother’s lifelong commitment to preserving their family history. She considers it an honor to accept her new role as official record keeper.
Ethnology Report from Friday, July 7, 2006 was given by Andrea. It was entertaining to hear some of the things we wrote. Nice job Andrea!
10:00-11:30 Short Break./Mike’s Demonstration
Mike presented his demonstration titled Starting Your Day Off Write: Writing to Learn Mathematics. He explained how writing can be used in teaching math to students enrolled in developmental algebra. His lesson demonstrated using writing to introduce a lesson on solving linear equations. He introduced a great math website that allowed us to use virtual manipulatives to balance a linear equation with a balance scale. His demonstration was informative and engaging. I’m sure we’ll all be able to use this in different ways in our classroom. Way to go Mike!
11:30-12:30 Break for Lunch
12:30-1:30 Peer Response Groups
1:30-3:30 Technology Space: Bart Demeter taught us how to create our Table of Contents on our blogs today. He walked us through creating the page, using the bulleting feature, and creating a working hyperlink to the pages included in our Table of Contents. Despite some annoying delays we managed to complete our mission and feel pretty successful! Thanks for a job well done Bart!
