I normally don't post to the blog on Thursdays during my current long-term assignment. But today is the last day of school before winter break -- and so following Tina Cardone's old rules, the last day of school before a break counts as a special day. So it's time for "A Day in the Life" for this special day:
8:45 -- Today, even periods (and fifth period) meet. Second period is a seventh grade class -- and the first of two classes with the aide. The presence of the aide is the reason I don't blog on Thursdays. (But ironically, the aide was out on Monday. So maybe I should have blogged on my regular schedule and just pretended that Monday was the last day before winter break.)
There are thirteen students in this class -- and this week, a majority of them are online. But of these 13 students, only five have submitted the inequality assignment on Google slides so far. And so I spend the first few minutes reminding students to submit that assignment, even if it means that they will have less time for the Unit 4 Test. After all, recall that the test won't count in this quarter grade, and so again, I want to spend more time on items that count in the grade and less time on items that don't.
9:00 -- I begin the Unit 4 Practice Test on Go Formative.
9:35 -- I sing "Rudolph the Statistician" for music break.
9:45 -- I give the real Unit 4 Test. Only some of the students finish the test, and of those, two guys earn perfect scores. (I don't have the final stats for this class, because some of them are still taking the test as of the time this blog entry is published.) A few girls score 16/18 on their test. And of those who have finished, all of them have at least 11/18, which is a low D.
On the other hand, one student is absent. He is in my fifth period class as well, and he was absent both days this week. Another girl logs in for a few minutes and then disappears. She has done hardly any work for this class at all.
10:25 -- Second period ends and tutorial begins. Today tutorial is attached to fourth period, which is an eighth grade class -- and the second of two classes with the aide.
During tutorial, I notify the students who are missing one of both of the Edpuzzles, especially considering how much they are weighted in Canvas. I tell the aide all about grade weighting and "Imported" vs. true "Assignments" and why I'm making such a big deal about the Edpuzzles.
11:10 -- Tutorial ends, and it's time for snack break.
11:25 -- Fourth period proper begins. Normally, the fourth period cohort that meets on Thursdays is the worst behaved class -- this is the class that played around during Desmos so long ago. But lately, this class has mellowed out. It's partly because some of the frequent talkers have been online lately -- once again, the majority of the class is online today.
This is the special day for retakes. This time, the only condition I place on the students before I let them retake the tests is that they complete the weighty Edpuzzles first.
A few students do improve their Unit 4 Test on solving equations. But most of the students who attempt the Unit 3 Test retake on linear equations and slope fail it. One girl does improve from a C to a B, and one guy who's online eventually improves from 8 out of 22 to 10/22.
(By the way, I do excuse the Edpuzzles for that guy on Monday who didn't do them, since I led him astray to do another assignment instead. As I mentioned earlier this week, excusing them means that he now has a D rather than an F.)
1:05 -- Fourth period ends for lunch.
During lunch, the other teachers are discussing an unexpected development. The principal is seriously considering changing the bell schedule for this year. While some form of hybrid will remain, the block schedule won't. Instead, all five periods will meet each day.
And the order of the periods will change as well. This is mostly for the sake of a certain teacher who actually works part-time at two different schools -- odd days at one site and even days at the other. If the periods were in their natural order 1-2-3-4-5 then she'd be forced to go back and forth between the two schools in a matter of minutes.
(This is one reason why some schools divide the blocks as 1-2-3 and 4-5-6 rather than odd/even -- the former benefits both students and teachers who aren't scheduled for the entire day.)
Any change to the schedule will involve both the board and the union. And so it will be at least a day before we know exactly how the schedule will change.
1:45 -- Fifth period begins. This is the Math Skills class.
During this period, I give each student a "grade target" -- the number of minutes he or she must log in today on ST Math to reach a certain grade level. The minutes are taken out of 45 this week rather than 60, since it's a short week.
Most students hit their targets. Even the guy with the fewest number of minutes this quarter makes it to a C-, while the guy who logged only 22 minutes the entire first quarter secures a B second quarter. But the guy who is absent both third and fifth periods drops from a perfect 100% to a B+.
One girl needs only 21 minutes to earn an A, but she's a few minutes short and settles for an A-. That's because she's also in my third period, and we spend most of fifth period going over the assignments she's missing in her third period. (She ultimately earns a B- in third period.)
2:35 -- Fifth period ends and winter break begins. As I wrote earlier, I spend the rest of the day watching for students who submit last-minute assignments.
Tomorrow is the teacher day between the semesters. There will be a meeting by the principal, most likely to discuss the possible schedule change.
I have only one week left in this long-term assignment, and so the new schedule would only affect me for one week in January. Still, I'm always thinking ahead to songs I might perform in class. So far, I've only sung songs during 100-minute block periods (as opposed to all-class Mondays), but there might not be blocks when we return. I haven't decided yet, but it's possible that I might sing anyway -- after all, if I worked at a school with traditional 50-minute periods, does that mean I'd never sing there? I consider songs to be part of my repertoire, and so I'll still find opportunities to sing.
With this unexpected meeting, I might not get to see the department chair to discuss whether we're starting January with the geometry strand in Unit 6, or a Unit 4 retake. In fact, I wasn't sure whether to make Math 7 or Math 8 the focus of today's post. Had it been definite that we're starting geometry in January, I would label today as Math 8 in order to have a full week of Math 7 in January. Instead, I label this post Math 7 to avoid unnecessarily having two Math 8 posts in a row.
Things will become clearer tomorrow, but I won't post on the blog that day. Instead, I'm now switching to my winter break posting schedule. As usual, I'll blog (at least) twice during the break.
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