Dialing for Dollars

From: indiatalkies.com

I stumbled across an article about Idaho's plan to tie teacher bonus pay into parent contact.  On one hand, I'm all for experimenting with compensation ideas for teachers (although I think the plans tied to test scores are a bad idea).  On the other hand, given that some schools (like mine) include many students who have parents that constantly move, up to four times in a school year, it could be quite hard for some teachers to talk to their students' parents on a regular basis.

The article mentions that many town in Idaho are so small that teachers and parents will run into each other at the grocery store.  If only I could be so lucky!  One of the benefits of living 25 minutes from school is not seeing my students and their parents when I go shopping!

Bastards

From: discoveryeducation.com




There are a lot of people that complain about what our legislators at the state and federal level do in regards to education, but for the most part, I haven't been one of them...until now.

It's one thing for our state legislators to extend our school year by five days. I understand that if you look at our students' test scores, they ain't all that. So, one could make the argument that five more days in school could increase our students' scores. Fine--add a week to the beginning of the school year, or two at the beginning and three at the end.

But, no. We take away vacations and teacher workdays within the established calendar so we can add our five days without adding five days of pay to our teachers' paychecks. I'm not upset about losing out on any money. What makes me mad are the options presented to us: take away Memorial Day, three days of spring break or other such nonsense.

Why do we need those days? As I tell my students, the longest stretch of the school year is from Labor Day to the end of first quarter. We go five straight weeks, five days a week. Students get on teachers' nerves and teachers get on students' nerves. Our students here had been relatively well-behaved until the last couple of weeks; now kids are starting to snap. We need those workdays to keep sanity for both our teachers and our students. Without them, where will the break come from?

Next Question

I'm showing this video in class tomorrow about NFL super agent Drew Rosenhaus.  Many of my students through the years have expressed an interest in being a sports agent.  We'll see if they change their tune after watching this...

Dan Wheldon

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I showed the video above to my class today.  It's hard to talk to a class full of teens about death, and I'm sure I didn't do a good job.

I wanted to make sure they knew about the risks of driving 230 mph, and why Dan Wheldon's death in particular was news.  Didn't hear until after I showed the video that NASCAR driver Jimmie Johnson recommended that IndyCar not drive in ovals--the speeds are too fast.

Most of my students aren't racing enthusiasts, so I wonder how much of this video sunk in.  Was it something that they were interested in because it was such a spectacular crash, or are they truly interested in the underlying reasons behind a race car crash?

Keeping Track of Things With Evernote

From: galaxytab-samsung.net

I don't remember who turned me on to Evernote, but I thought it was important to note that I didn't stumble across it myself.  I'm sure it was someone in our instructional technology department.

Evernote is a web site (and an app) that you can download to different machines.  As you make a note on one machine, Evernote syncs that note with the Evernote app on each of your machines.  I downloaded it first on my school-issued Samsung Galaxy Tab.  Evernote works really well on the Galaxy, because you can attach pictures, videos and voice memos to the notes.

Evernote also works well with computers.  You can attach files from your laptop or desktop and open them up somewhere.  I even have it on my personal iPod Touch; I'm just not sure how much I would want to use Evernote on that.

As crazy as it's been to be a technology facilitator at my school, Evernote has helped me get (somewhat) organized with all of the things people are asking me to do for them.