An Unconventional Solution

I think I may have unkowningly stumbled on a discpline strategy to help my freshmen boys and their noise making problem.

Today, I got the brilliant idea to give some bubble gum to my two biggest noise makers. I also gave one of them a squeezy ball (because he has a tapping problem also).

During the lesson there wasn't one ounce of noise. . . silence. . . glorious silence. I stopped right in the middle of the lesson and said, "shhhh, listen!" The kids said, "what, we don't hear anything." And I said "exactly!"

I explained that this was the kind of environment we needed so that EVERYONE could have a chance to learn. Because I didn't have to stop every 30 seconds and ask someone to stop tapping, or talking, or pushing the chair in front of them, or whatever, we finished the lesson in record time. I think they saw that if they paid attention and were quiet, they got their homework much earlier in the period and many even finished the assignment in class.

I don't know if the gum will continue to work, but one of the boys thanked me and said he really thought it helped him. Tonight, I am going to Target to buy a giant bag of bubble gum!

Sub Woes

I have a question for all of you out there. How would you rate the quality of the substitute teachers in your school? I have been absent 4 times this semester. Three were for district required workshops and once for a personal day. Out of those four days, I have had one competent sub and the rest were terribly incompetent and a couple were just plain weird.

I was off last Friday so I could spend time with my mom, sister and daughter for my mom's 65th birthday. I took great care in designing a test for my algebra I classes. I made form A, B, and C to cut down on any cheating and copied the tests in three different colors. As you can imagine, this took quite a bit of time. I asked the sub to alternate colors among the students so that no one would have the same test who would be sitting by each other. Instead, he gave 1st period the yellow test, 2nd period the blue, 3rd period the salmon colored. I was pretty frustrated when I saw that, but then he left me a note saying he hoped I didn't mind, but some of my students were "stuck" on the test and needed some help so he went around and helped them get started. WTF!!!!!!!

Next, apparently he liked to hear himself talk because several of my classes said he was talking to them during the test about things like polar coordinates and quadratic equations. (These are freshmen who just learned to graph linear equations and find the slope of a line through two points).

Several other classes described the man as "creepy" which I dismissed until the teacher across the hall told me the guy was indeed "creepy" and he heard that this particular sub had been banned from working at our local middle school due to said "creepiness."

The last substittute I had also like to hear himself talk because he kept interrupting my classes to tell them about his life and his former drug problems and how he got himself clean. He also entertained them with card tricks and jokes. I had left a very important test review for them to complete and was quite upset when they came in the next day and said that they weren't prepared for the test. (We took it anyway)

How does a school district find and keep good subs when the pay is so lousy and the work hours so undependable? I know I couldn't work like that.

One Arm Raised

Mrs. H is exhausted from our town's annual Wurstfest (a ten day salute to the sausage). Last night I was honored to become a member of the
One Arm Raided Club. If you want to know what that is, you'll have to follow the link.

Anyway, my husband and I have been hanging out at Wurstfest every chance we get to drink, dance, sing, and generally have a great time. We took polka and swing lessons this summer just so we'd be ready for this event. Last night there were an estimated 30,000 people in attendance and it was one hopping place.

Next year, Wurstfest celebrates 50 years and I'd like to invite all my blogging friends to come to New Braunfels, Texas for the weekend and meet up to share some great times. People come from all over the US and the world to join the fun, so come on down. You won't be disappointed!

21st century BS

The Science Goddess posted an interesting observation today over on her blog. How many of you have heard this quote at professional development sessions in the last 2 or 3 years?

"We're preparing kids for jobs that don't yet exist, where they'll use technology that hasn't been invented to solve problems we don't even know exist."

I don't know why, but this quote has always bugged me. I think SG put her finger on it when she said that this is what education has always done. Think about it for a minute. Think back to when you were in high school. I went through high school in the late 70's. Before graphing calcualtors, before PCs, before email, before internet. My teachers gave me a solid foundation of knowledge that would last a lifetime. They did not train me using 21st century skills because they weren't available at the time. Yet somehow I am successful in the 21st century.

I don't think we as educators need to get all caught up in this 21st century skills mantra. Not that I am knocking technology. I use it all the time in my classroom. It's just sometimes I think I can teach something more effectively and efficiently without the technology. I have noticed that sometime technology just slows me down and kids get lost in the technology and lose the math involved.

A High School education is nothing more than a foundation. A good one, will allow a child to be successful no matter what path they choose in the future. I thank God for my old-fashioned teachers who ruled the classroom like dictators and expected nothing but the best from us. When we got out of line, we were quickly put back on track by a phone call home or a pubic reprimand. At the time, I didn't appreciate some of them, but looking back now, I know they only wanted the best for me and my classmates. They didn't know it at the time, but they truly prepared me to be successful in the 21st century using only chalk, erasers and some square root and logarthim tables in the back of the textbook.

Teaching Freshmen Boys

Here is something I have noticed about teaching freshmen boys. They make noises! I don't know why, but when I teach freshmen, I always have several boys who habitually make random noises. Everything from bird noises to grunts to growls. This one kid I taught several years ago did this bird whistle thing that drove me crazy. When I would call him on it, he seemed unaware he was doing it. I noticed that he'd even make the noise unconsciously while talking with friends. Then a few years later, I had a kid who would grunt very loudly. The bad thing was is that he'd get others in the class to do it. Everytime I'd turn my back, the grunting would begin like popcorn all over the class. I could not catch the grunters. Finally I said, "the next time I hear that grunt, the entire class stays after the bell for 30 seconds". I know, it is bad to punish an entire class, but I could not catch the culprit. Well you better believe, that class began to police the offenders and they would threaten them with the bodily harm for making the noise. I no longer had to police it.

This year, I have a really good kid who makes the most annoying animal sound. He does it habitually. I have tried everything with him. When he is not making the sound he is tapping his pencil, his ruler, or his hands on his desk. Some days I feel I am going to go bonkers. I find myself getting short with the entire class because my nerves are completely frazzled. He does not seem to be doing it with malice like my grunters were a few years ago. I just cannot seem to stop him.

My entire career I have taught predominantly 9th and 11th grade. I have never had a problem with noise makers in my 11th grade classes. What happens in adolescent male development that causes them to outgrow this noise making between the ages of 14 and 16?

If any of you have insights about this phenomonen, I'd love to hear them.

Ghosts in the Graveyard

Yesterday, I tried a new activity in my MMA class given to me by a colleague. This is by far one of the most successful group activities I have ever done with my at-risk kids. It is called Ghosts in the Graveyard for Halloween, but the activity could be adapted for any holiday. Here is how it works.

1. You will need 8 "Problem Cards" with 3 problems on each card. I made my cards in the shape of Ghosts.

2. You will need 5 black sheets of construction paper to symbolize the graveyard. I put tombstones on mine and hung them on my dry-erase board.

3. You will need about 50 "little ghosts" for each class period.

4. 2 glue sticks to attach the little ghosts to the graveyards.

Procedure:
1. Divide class into groups of 3-4 students
2. Give each group a problem card
3. Every member of the group works the problem and raises their hand when they are done. You go over and check their work and answers. If EVERYONE has done the problem correctly, they get a "little ghost" which they put their group number on and hang in any one of the graveyards.
4. As they finish a "Problem Card", they go get another one. The goal is get as many "little ghosts" as possible to hang in the graveyards.
5. About 10 minutes before the end of the period, I draw for how many points each graveyard will be worth. I use 0, 25, 50, 75, and 100. So if graveyard 2 is worth 50 points and a group had 2 ghosts in that graveyard, they will get 100 points.
6. Tally all the points for the groups and give prizes to 1st and 2nd.
(pencils, pts on a test, candy, etc)

The kids in my MMA class who hate to do work begged to play longer and asked if we could play again at Christmas so I said sure, I could come up with another one. I think it will be something like pin the ornament on a Christmas Tree. I'll make the big "Problem Cards" in the shape of presents.

If you'd like this entire game in word format, I will send it to you by email. It includes the ghost templates so you can use your own questions, and a complete game including the questions I used and answer key.


The game would be appropriate for any level that has covered graphing and writing equations of lines.

Email me at hughey5864@gmail.com and I'll get it right out to you.

Training Day

Today, I spent 7 hours getting trained to use my smartboard. The training was great! I'm so pumped to get started with some of the ideas I learned.

The morning didn't start off too well. Small town girl, Mrs, H, had to drive into the nation's 7th largest city during rush hour traffic to try and find the hotel where the class was going to be held. I left 1.5 hours early for a 30 minute drive. Silly me! It seems as if everyone else in South Texas was also wanting to drive on the same roads as me. It also didn't help that my GPS steered me wrong and I missed the hotel which caused me to enter another highway where a bigger traffic jam than the previous one was in progress. I then looped back around and entered a third traffic jam going the opposite direction. By this time, I am in tears (and about to wet my pants) because our email said that late participants would not be allowed into the class.

Anyway, I finally found the hotel, and rushed in only to find out the training started at 9:00 instead of 8:00. Whew, turns out that I was 30 minutes early. I took a deep breath, went to the little girls room and got something to eat.

The training was so good. The instructor even stayed late and gave me a private lesson on questions I had on how to do different things in a math class. I am going to put some of the things I learned into practice tomorrow in algebra I. We are just getting into graphing, and I have a lot of great ideas of ways to use the interactive board.