We are halfway through the first nine weeks of school now, which means 25% through the AP Government class...when I think of it that way, it is a bit stressful. We are on track with last year though, so I feel o.k. about our pace. We are acclimated to each other now and into the groove. I'm enjoying all of the students, and especially enjoying reading their blogs. A few of them have expressed to me that they are also enjoying this assignment...I'll take that as a win since many of them were really reluctant at first. I'm getting some good ideas from them as well...maybe my own writing style will improve and my "voice" will get more engaging.
For now, a recap of my week:
It's homecoming week, and it's been fun seeing the kids dress up. The only day that appealed to me was Monday which was pajama day. As luck would have it, though, I was leaving campus for a professional meeting so I didn't get to dress in my comfy PJ's that day. Sad face!
The professional meeting was an opportunity to go and hear Jon Bergman, one of the authors of a flip classroom book and host of some flipped class websites/communities on the web. He was speaking at the University of Montevallo to education majors and the head of the department let our administrators know about it. I was lucky to be able to attend. He inspired me to push harder toward a mastery classroom in my regular classroom. I'm going to do some flipped elements with them, but plan to introduce a layered curriculum model with them. My goal is to have elements of that model prepared for every unit by next fall.
I have been to physical therapy twice so far this week, with another session planned for tomorrow afternoon. As I grow a bit stronger, they are adding more exercises each time. This means I'm there longer and I'm tireder each time, but I'm so pleased to be improving that I have no complaints. A bag of frozen popcorn as an ice pack before bed, and a pain pill at the end of a long day allow me to sleep and refresh for the next day.
Tuesday was Constitution Day and we had a birthday party for the Constitution in every class. I offered a few bonus points if they could connect their edible contribution to the Constitution or the government. I look forward to reading those this weekend as well. My favorite of the day had to be these from the first class period of the day.
We watched episodes of "Constitution USA with Peter Sagal" in my classes and then discussed it. Thank you PBS for streaming the series. It's got so many great current examples. The kids appreciated that too!
Today was a long day. Amelia wanted to go to dance, and Olivia had mock trial team practice. Since the family is still driving me everywhere and Will was working, I just stayed at school for 13 hours. Yes, as I type this, I just took a pain pill and have that popcorn at my back! It was a productive day. I knocked out a good rough draft of a layered curriculum unit for my regular classes on the next unit. I look forward to reviewing it with a colleague tomorrow. After work, we ran to Joann's to buy Amelia some fabric for her toga tomorrow...senior tradition. I got a good laugh when she described a project assignment she has due tomorrow. I applaud my colleague's attempt at creativity, but it it is hard to do a fake social media profile on an object rather than a person....I had a good belly laugh coming up with slightly ridiculous examples of status updates she could include! We were both crying...that's some good laughter!
Eleanor is coming home tomorrow for a long weekend...she's staying until Monday this time since she has a dentist appointment on Monday morning. I look forward to visiting with her. I'm hoping she hasn't been scheduled to work on Saturday. Amelia has the homecoming dance on Saturday night and Olivia wants to spend the night at a friend's house. That would let us have a little mother-daughter time. We haven't had that in awhile.
My goals for this weekend include laundry and catching up all my grading...I'm terribly behind on assessing blogs and still need to grade the last test for AP... Grocery shopping would probably be good too, and it's time to pay bills this month. Oy vey! It just never stops!
P.S. Awesome feedback from former AP students this week...had tweets from two. One liked the candy bar above and wanted one...I managed to snag him one. Another said he used our supplemental reader for a public forum at his private college for Constitution Day--score one for me and Lanahan. Then, I got a news story tweeted to me telling me that perhaps I could use the story in AP...thanks, I think I will! On a more humorous note, Amelia's boyfriend met one of my former regular students in a class. He moaned about how hard I was and asked how Conner knew me...she's my girlfriend's mother was probably a bit of a shocker for him! :)
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