Teaching in the Twenty-First Century

It has been a long time–since October 20th to be precise. I have been out reading blogs but have had no energy to write on my own. Now, however, I feel I must get back into the practice, as I have let several opportunities slip away. I use my blog as a diary of what I have done and where I have been–I come back to it each year and read where I was a year ago and consider if I am where I want to be now.

What I have been doing since October 20th…

1. Teaching 2 periods of AP History (periods are 90 min each)
2. Teaching and removing one period of Academic Decathlon
3. Replacing that period with Regular US History
4. Attending the National Council for Social Studies Conference in San Diego–awesome!
5. Deciding where I will be next year
6. Suffering through the insistent and voluntary professional development
7. Being mom, student, daughter (when not thinking of work!)

Let’s start with AP US History–so far this class is going better than I had expected. First day of school being pulled into the APs office for being too scary to the kids was kind of a letdown–as I thought I had full admin support. It turns out I did–I started with 51 kids and ended 1st semester with 49–not too shabby. I have several who are wishing they had at least tried to get out of my class, but they are stuck until the very end. Of course, to finish the material in time for the test I had to almost double their nightly homework, so the complaints are valid, but they are getting back into the swing of things.

Now, Academic Decathlon did not go so swimmingly. In order to get it as a class–I had to have the numbers. I convinced my Odyssey of the Mind kids to sign up for it. However, full disclosure was–you will get to work on OM stuff when I schedule it and when we are not working on that you will do the work for AD, you just won’t be required to compete. Well, of course, my disclosure was not clear enough, or they thought they would outwit me, so at quarter time most of my OM kids dropped. I was down to 13 and a team for AcaDeca is 12 and they must meet GPA requirements, so I didn’t have a team. Instead of keeping the class, the kids decided to spend the rest of the semester creating an action plan for next year. They created a recruitment plan and a course outline so that next year we will be more prepared. Not bad for a first try.

So, since AcaDeca was cancelled I had to teach another class. Regular US History–Now I have never taught US History on the semester schedule. I have always had my kids in a combo class of US History and American Literature–so I could spend the entire year teaching it. Add to that the fact that I now, once again have kids from level 0–I speak/read/write no English–to level above grade level and I am in the same type of mess everyone else in education is in. Why must we deem level tracking bad–when it was more than likely the curriculum or the teacher that was bad, not the idea? Do the people who profess inclusion is the best policy really know how to teach the highest to the lowest all in one class without boring those at the top or completely mystify those at the bottom? I don’t. Everyday I teach I know someone is left behind in some manner. Advice I received from admin–teach to the lower end–the high kids will move along fine. And they said this to me–the GIFTED facilitator at our campus. I could not believe it. So, I will be learning as much as (actually, probably more than) my regular class students.

The NCSS conference was awesome. 5 days in San Diego. I traveled with three gentlemen from my school and we had a great time. Daytime was spent learning–picked up some great ideas for primary source doc use in AP course–and nighttime was spent going out. The final day we listened to Sandra Day O’Connor and it was fantastic.

Over Christmas break I was surfing the next for online teaching opportunities–and I mean online teaching NOT tutoring where the lessons are already created and you simply read to the students–to pick up a bit of extra income. I want higher ed jobs–not necessarily high school. In my search I found a few positions for onsite faculty at campuses in Missouri, Kentucky, and Tennessee. I began applying–so my future at the moment is up in the air. Is this what I truly want? That’s a future post!

BTW–for any AP teachers out there–I have been accepted as a reader–so I will be in Lexington, KY with you this summer!

You would think professional development chosen by yourself would be a good thing. Yeah, right. I signed up to have additional training on our so called protocol for teacher improvement and on instructional coaching. The instructional coaching PD has been going well, if a bit redundant because I had an entire course on this very subject as a doctoral student. The protocol training however–let me tell you–ugh–I get so aggravated every time I think of it…I will post on this next week.

So, for the time being I am back…I hope to keep it updated at least weekly for those who read, or used to read, or who are new to reading…