TV | Teaching The Outsiders (and more)

The One-Eyed God

September 15, 2010

Survivor returns tonight, so I gotta make this quick. I’m going to direct you to my Confession of a TVaholic post from last fall, bust out my current top ten TV shows, load the dishwasher, and hit the couch for some Jeff Probst and the over 40′s vs the 30 and unders. I haven’t done a top ten list yet on this blog. Back when I was in junior high, we obsessed over top ten lists: TV shows (Six Million Dollah Man was number one for a whole year), movies, Sr. Enda-losing-her-temper moments, baseball players, after-school snacks, you name it, we rated it. It got to be too much work for me (Good Times or Happy Days?), and I pretty much stopped doing it by the time I was in 9th grade, but I had a friend in high school who keeps it up to this day. We call him Holt’s Almanac. So here are my current top ten TV shows. To save time and deliberation, it is in no particular order. I’m not sure why I’m sharing, but anyway… just consider this a junk food post. House - As I have posted before, a few students have seen a little

Confession

September 29, 2009

By mrC

Regular readers of this blog (I think there are a couple of you) know that I did the Catholic school version of junior high; first through eighth grades at one school. I had a nun for a teacher six of those eight years. And I just realized today at lunch — Monday is chicken and mashed potatoes day…mmmmm…taters — that I didn’t have a male teacher until ninth grade. Then, all of a sudden, I have a math teacher who has me “by the short hair” and an English teacher who throws erasers at us if we turn our heads away from him. Dunno what that might mean, but I do know that a lot more of today’s kids need a father-type figure in their lives. Who has them by the short hair, so to speak. Anyway, we were “introduced” to the idea of confession in second grade. I’m sorry if I’m offending anyone, but even then, I was like..Hello? I don’t think I’m going to go tell a stranger all the bad things I did, or even THOUGHT about doing. Not exactly the way the second-grade mind works. Or seventh-grade. Or… Especially if you had brothers like mine. I

Oh Raffle King, Oh Raffle King…

(Sung — way off key, and sort of warbley — to the tune of “Oh Christmas Tree.”) I guess we need to talk about the King. On Wednesdays, after we go over the vocabulary homework, and discuss the words, I give them a vocabulary pretest. If they ace it (100%), they are exempt from the vocabulary portion of the Friday test. I used to have one of them flip a coin to decide whether or not I let them use their “cheat sheet” — the homework page we just went over and corrected — on the pretest. What they don’t believe when I tell them — even though it’s true — is that, on average, their scores on the pretest are lower when they use the cheat sheets, and fewer of them get an exemption. But they like to think it’s a security blanket, so I play along. Then I discovered the King. I would give you the URL of his creator’s web site, but he has some other, shall we say, inappropriate shtuff. (You can do a Google search if you really want to check it out.) So I took the liberty of “cloning” the King. If you click [...]

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mrC commented on State Testing–Tips for Teachers… Interrupted@ Heather - Ouch. 'nuff said.

mrC commented on State Testing…and etc.@ Kelli - Texas. 'nuff said. Sorry, I couldn't resist.

Heather commented on State Testing–Tips for Teachers… InterruptedRequired. Every department does one, usually the released test from the previous year, so by the time the school year is over the students have actually taken 8 standardized tests.

Mrs. M~ commented on State Testing…and etc.Standardized testing is one of the banes of my existence as a teacher. We each give our own subject's state test during our class time, so by the time we are done with all subject areas, the kids have been testing for about three weeks straight. (But we all prefer this method--we have

Kelli commented on State Testing…and etc.In Texas, 5th and 8th graders can be held back if they fail their state tests... this year, however, we have a fancy NEW test, so they've given us a reprieve on that requirement for this year. (Oddly, the new test looked just like the old test, but with a different logo on the

Meg commented on State Testing…and etc.I will say that testing is a great time to get caught up and lesson planning done. AMEN! We do SAT 10 at our school for K-8th and it's a nightmare. Especially since the Social Studies part is about 1/3 US history, and we're an international school in China that doesn't teach US history

mrC commented on State Testing–Tips for Teachers… InterruptedI'll bet if you were at the high school, you'd hear kids joking about that acronym, especially AFTER scores were released. Did you just say that your practice tests are required. Ouch. Good call with the change in plan.

mrC commented on State Testing — Tips for Teachers IICali tests spelling like I do: pick the wrong one or say they're all correct. Your approach is fine. I use spelling lists as a way to talk about roots and origins and use analogies. The actual spelling of the words is sort of secondary, and a small part of the grade.

Heather commented on State Testing — Tips for Teachers IIFor the spelling section of the California tests, do students have to provide the spelling from scratch or choose the best spelling from a list? Our spelling questions are multiple choice and there are usually only a few; I spend a little class time on spelling rules, make sure they know how Spanish letters

Heather commented on State Testing–Tips for Teachers… InterruptedSOL = Standards of Learning. Clearly, the department of education did not think the acronym through. For high schoolers, the "real" meaning of the acronym is appropriate - they have to pass, I believe, 6 of the tests to graduate. Totally with you on this post topic - I worry that the required practice

mrC commented on The Titanic Finally Really Sinks! (Also: Sidekicks.)@Mrs. M- I had forgotten all about those. I just spewtubed them...hahaha. Luv it!

mrC commented on The Titanic Finally Really Sinks! (Also: Sidekicks.)@Anna- Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner!

Mrs. M~ commented on The Titanic Finally Really Sinks! (Also: Sidekicks.)Those "psychic mediums" would be great to research, right?

That reminds me of those great SNL skits about the Sofa King. You know, how the prices are "Sofa King" low, the deals are "Sofa King" great, etc. (You obviously have to say those phrases out loud to get the joke.)

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