Yes really.
We used to have rubrics on the reverse side of the instructions for special projects or research papers. One side explained in several paragraphs what you were supposed to do. The other side was a form which showed specifically what you had to do to earn a specific number of points. It broke it all down. These were great while they lasted.
I started last year doing what I called check-backs on instructions, where I underlined or highlighted the specifics buried in the instructions for assignments. This year I've starting just making my own rubric, going one step further.
For example, in AP Psych we were assigned to do either a PSA, book or case study explaining one kind of condition. The explanation was several paragraphs, and since I was working with two other people on a team (and I'd carried one of them before on projects teams like this) I decided to convert the long description to a form that we could use to divide up the work, like translating it into what we had to do.
That last part didn't quite work out, but I did actually have them come over to my house and used the form to make sure we had done everything we needed to do. It kept us on track, and when we were done it turned out that ours was the best one.
Plans are great when they work. But first you need a plan.
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Saturday, February 25, 2012
Announcements and why they matter
At our school, which is very large and crowded (5A now), the announcements every morning can be easily confused with white noise and static on a bad radio. I know they are saying words, in English, but it's just that I can't quite hear them over the sounds of everyone moving around, talking, getting out their books, etc.
I know there are lots and lots of posters taped up on the walls in most of the hallways. The problem is that the halls are so packed with kids trying to get to class in the 5 minutes we've got, pretty much shoulder to shoulder and wall to wall. It's so crowded that last year the principal decided we needed one-way halls for traffic flow - not kidding.
I realize that our advisory teachers are supposed to pass along important information about things like major deadlines.
Except, that's not always how it works, and the reason that matters is that the deadlines are the deadlines. Hard fact, but true.
I just missed something very important: the deadline to apply for National Honor Society, for which I qualified. The announcement the day before was in a newsletter emailed late on the day before the final deadline, and by the time I read my email it was the morning after the deadline. I explained and asked nicely, but the deadline was the deadline.
The only thing that could make this worse was that I realized I missed it last year too. Same thing: I qualified.
Too bad that National Junior Honor Society membership back in middle school doesn't count for anything. Neither does membership in the spring of my senior year, well after college applications are done.
A deadline is a deadline. Not my favorite lesson.
I know there are lots and lots of posters taped up on the walls in most of the hallways. The problem is that the halls are so packed with kids trying to get to class in the 5 minutes we've got, pretty much shoulder to shoulder and wall to wall. It's so crowded that last year the principal decided we needed one-way halls for traffic flow - not kidding.
I realize that our advisory teachers are supposed to pass along important information about things like major deadlines.
Except, that's not always how it works, and the reason that matters is that the deadlines are the deadlines. Hard fact, but true.
I just missed something very important: the deadline to apply for National Honor Society, for which I qualified. The announcement the day before was in a newsletter emailed late on the day before the final deadline, and by the time I read my email it was the morning after the deadline. I explained and asked nicely, but the deadline was the deadline.
The only thing that could make this worse was that I realized I missed it last year too. Same thing: I qualified.
Too bad that National Junior Honor Society membership back in middle school doesn't count for anything. Neither does membership in the spring of my senior year, well after college applications are done.
A deadline is a deadline. Not my favorite lesson.
Monday, February 20, 2012
The gift that keeps on giving
I have this weird connection with moms of kids in middle school and 9th grade, who really really like this blog. I think it's because I'm trying to get through high school doing the best I can, and they want to help their kids get through too. I've been asked about putting all these blog posts into a collection as a book, and I've decided to try to do this sometime in the future. It shouldn't cost much, and I'm hoping to add some posts that fill in some gaps as soon as school is out. I'll post about it when I get it done.
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Decisions you might regret
I am facing a tough choice about next year's classes. I am on track to graduate under Texas' distinguished degree plan, which requires four advanced measures and a third year of the same foreign language.
I am in my second year of French, and I have an amazing teacher. I'd follow her pretty much anywhere, which is just about what I'll have to do next year because French III may only be offered as a Pre-AP class. The problem is that I'm in the regular French classes and since I'm a junior I won't be in high school for French IV, AP or not. French III is supposed to be tough anyway, and PAP French will be that much tougher.
I wish I had started French in my freshman year so that I could take AP French in my senior year. Instead, I pretty much wasted a year in American Sign Language with the kind of teacher that can make you want to run away from a subject (hard to do, but it happens) so here I am, with a great teacher and a language I love but one year short of a goal.
Guess that's one thing college is for.
I am in my second year of French, and I have an amazing teacher. I'd follow her pretty much anywhere, which is just about what I'll have to do next year because French III may only be offered as a Pre-AP class. The problem is that I'm in the regular French classes and since I'm a junior I won't be in high school for French IV, AP or not. French III is supposed to be tough anyway, and PAP French will be that much tougher.
I wish I had started French in my freshman year so that I could take AP French in my senior year. Instead, I pretty much wasted a year in American Sign Language with the kind of teacher that can make you want to run away from a subject (hard to do, but it happens) so here I am, with a great teacher and a language I love but one year short of a goal.
Guess that's one thing college is for.
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
It's just a little circle
This is a small, tiny thing. Just a circle that you draw on the top right corner of a piece of paper that your teacher hands out in class. It can be a circle about the size of a dime, or a nickel, that's all.
What the circle means, when it's empty, is that whatever is on that page will be due sometime, one day soon. It also means that you need to fill in that deadline or due date. So the empty circle sits there as a reminder that you need to write in the due date, and then you need to do the assignment, and after that you need to turn it in.
We get a blizzard of paper every day, all day. Pages and pages. My AP Psych teacher says we get so many in that class because our textbook is so out of date that she has to add all the rest of the information we need by passing out all these papers. She also tries to save paper by putting different stuff on the back side of a lot of the papers, so it's easy to miss that an assignment is on the back that has nothing to do with what's on the front.
The problem is that some of all these papers are just for you to read, and some of them are for you to actually do something with. What makes it even worse is that some of the papers LOOK like they are assignments, but the teacher says they aren't, and some other papers look like things to just read but the teacher assigns something you're supposed to do with what you read.
So your best friend is that circle. And it works best if you can try to make a habit of asking right when you get the paper: is this read only, or when is it due?
Better to be the one who asks all those questions than get a zero.
What the circle means, when it's empty, is that whatever is on that page will be due sometime, one day soon. It also means that you need to fill in that deadline or due date. So the empty circle sits there as a reminder that you need to write in the due date, and then you need to do the assignment, and after that you need to turn it in.
We get a blizzard of paper every day, all day. Pages and pages. My AP Psych teacher says we get so many in that class because our textbook is so out of date that she has to add all the rest of the information we need by passing out all these papers. She also tries to save paper by putting different stuff on the back side of a lot of the papers, so it's easy to miss that an assignment is on the back that has nothing to do with what's on the front.
The problem is that some of all these papers are just for you to read, and some of them are for you to actually do something with. What makes it even worse is that some of the papers LOOK like they are assignments, but the teacher says they aren't, and some other papers look like things to just read but the teacher assigns something you're supposed to do with what you read.
So your best friend is that circle. And it works best if you can try to make a habit of asking right when you get the paper: is this read only, or when is it due?
Better to be the one who asks all those questions than get a zero.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)