Posts Tagged ‘ Stories of Seventh Grade ’

“There’s already something on the back of mine.” (Also: Racial Harmony.)

May 21, 2009
By

It was our first day back in the classroom after 8 days in the library. We were all glad to be back. “Oh, my clicker…how I’ve missed you.” One of them actually said that. OMG. What a day. Full of action, and laugh after laugh. First there was the video. YouTube is blocked in our district. Our head of IST keeps bleating about CIPA and how YouTube doesn’t filter, and…anyway, we can’t use YouTube. But finally, they created a workaround for us. We have to do things from home rather than from school, but it works OK. We find the YouTube video we want to use, and copy the URL. Then we go to the district’s “safe video portal” and paste it in. Then we can approve our own video, and use the safe portal to show it at school. It’s a bit clunky, but it works fine. Yesterday I added a video. I hadn’t even showed it yet, when I got an e-mail from my principal. I have only added a couple of videos before, but both of them were of the nutty variety, rather than the “educational” sort.  One of them is near the top of the most

Read more »

What’s a Rerun of a Flashback Called?

March 31, 2009
By

I was trying to wait until I reached 100 posts before I did this. You know, like in television, your series used to have to reached 100 episodes before you could go into syndication ands reruns. But I figure with my bad paw, I have a bit of an excuse. (It’s getting much better, but I go see the hand surgeon guy tomorrow to get the official word.) And the kids were bugging me about the cage today. I’ll be back to posting regularly soon; we’re reading another Ray Bradbury classic, “The Earth Men,” and it’s been fun. So here we go, and to paraphrase words of an old NBC promo, if you haven’t read it, it’s new to you. From September 26, 2008, The Tom Sawyer Syndrome (Flashback) “If he had been a great and wise philosopher, like the writer of this book, he would now have comprehended that Work consists of whatever a body is obliged to do, and that Play consists of whatever a body is not obliged to do.” That’s Mark Twain’s famous observation after Tom Sawyer has scammed the town kids into whitewashing his fence for him, and paying him for the pleasure. We won’t

Read more »

What if they…? (The Gas Effect.)

March 27, 2009
By
What if they…? (The Gas Effect.)

The hand is better. I’m not The Craw any more. (I hope the vintage Get Smart reference doesn’t date me too much.) It’s not all the way better, I still don’t have use of my most important finger for bicycling in traffic, and I still can’t actually pick up much of anything with it, but I can sort of type again. Thursday, the Doc in the Box guy pulled an inch-long palm frond spike out of the back of my hand. It went in from (my) palm side. On Sunday. Now I have to go back every day for him to root around in the hole he dug, cleaning it up. Anyway, I think I have enough feeling back that I can tell you about this one. We finished Charlotte, and we’re on to my second favorite (obviously this blog’s namesake is #1) part of the year, the Ray Bradbury section. I love blowing their minds. I always start with the classic, “A Sound of Thunder.” As I  tell the kids, this is probably the most ripped-off time travel story of all time. You know, that’s where that silly movie, The Butterfly Effect,  got its name? They made a straight

Read more »

Oblivious

March 6, 2009
By

They call it a teachable moment. One of the arts of teaching is recognizing and taking advantage of opportunities that happen spontaneously. Opportunities where a combination of what you said, how you said it, which class you’re in, and how they reacted to what you said, combines for that golden moment where you can get them to get it. When it happens it’s a beautiful thing. Even if the kid that provided that moment for the rest of the class doesn’t realize it. One of the warm up questions today was: discreet : rash :: oblivious : _________ a) subordinate  b) breach  c) sardonic  d) rash  e) vigilant I couldn’t remember whether oblivious was ever an official vocabulary word, so I said, “Now everyone’s clear on what oblivious means, right? Discreet was a vocab. word, and we worked it. This one is different from discrete, which means separate. And rash is on this week’s list; I’m not helping.  So, we all know what oblivious means – out to lunch, not aware of what’s going on around you; sort of like this class is a lot of the time…” General laughter all ’round at the usual gag. They all go back

Read more »

Insert the G.

March 3, 2009
By
Insert the G.

We finally finished Tom Sawyer. Some of them just gave up on me. Some of them realized it got easier as they went along. Some of them actually enjoyed it. But ALL of them had fun during one of our last discussions of the book; it’s chapter 33, where Tom and Huck go back to the cave for the money. Throughout the novel we talk about how Tom, when he plays, always has to “go by the book.” Or to use one of this week’s academic words, Tom always follows protocol. He climbs the fence, instead of running through the gate, after pelting Sid with dirt clods for ratting him out about the thread. He won’t “die” when Joe runs him through in their sword fight, because Tom’s playing Robin Hood, and he can’t die. He goes over the cliff with the ham, instead of using the trail, when they run away to the island, because that’s what a pirate would do. And he does it again in chapter 33. The bonus question on the quiz that day was… “*Bonus: There is an example of Tom “going by the book” in chapter 33 which he would probably be very embarrassed

Read more »

Random Featured Post

“There’s already something on the back of mine.” (Also: Racial Harmony.)

It was our first day back in the classroom after 8 days in the library. We were all glad to be back. “Oh, my clicker…how I’ve missed you.” One of them actually said that. OMG. What a day. Full of action, and laugh after laugh. First there was the video. YouTube is blocked in our district. Our head of IST keeps bleating about CIPA and how YouTube doesn’t filter, and…anyway, we can’t use YouTube. But finally, they created a workaround for us. We have to do things from home rather than from school, but it works OK. We find the YouTube video we want to use, and copy the URL. Then we go to the district’s “safe video portal” and paste it in. Then we can approve our own video, and use the safe portal to show it at school. It’s a bit clunky, but it works fine. Yesterday I added a video. I hadn’t even showed it yet, when I got an e-mail from my principal. I have only added a couple of videos before, but both of them were of the nutty variety, rather than the “educational” sort.  One of them is near the top of the most [...]

more -->


Mr. Coward has been teaching on the beautiful central coast of California since 1989.

Archives

May 2012
M T W T F S S
« Apr    
 123456
78910111213
14151617181920
21222324252627
28293031  

Recent Comments

Links

Privacy Policy

Tags

cartoons Charlotte Doyle Class Activities clickers CPS CTEL Flashback grammar high school idiosyncrasies irony Mailbag Me mechanics middle school teaching Monsters on Maple Street Moodle online learning oral reading Outsiders CHapter 5 Outsiders Chapter 7 RaffleKing Ray Bradbury Reading Richard Cory Seventh Grade Behavior Stories of Seventh Grade substituting Teaching Teaching Tips teaching with technology teaching with technology teaching writing Technology techology testing The Earth Men The Giver The Midwife's Apprentice The Outsiders Tips Tips for teachers Tom Sawyer Wiki Writing