Home sweet home

2017 is looking like it is going to be an even better year than I first realized!

Back in April or May of 2016 I found out that there were plans to move my teaching position to a new school about 15 miles away from my hometown for Fall of 2017. I don’t have anything against the town or the new school. It will undoubtedly be a really good thing for everyone... Except for me.

Now, I realize that the good of one should not outweigh the good of all. But I am also selfish. I love what I do (most of the time). I love where I teach. I went to school here. I grew up here. My daddy still teaches here. I am home.

This is my HOME.

When I came back to JHS after working in industry, I didn’t feel like I was starting something new. I felt like I was going home.

Now, yesterday I got a phone call from my principal. He told me that I will not be able to be moved to the new school because it will not be finished by the projected date.

Home sweet home.

It may only be one more year, but I will take whatever I can get J

and again...

Seriously... Dealing with this AGAIN this year... My poor child is doomed to be stuck with those kids until she graduates... Or we move...

I wrote a letter to the superintendent a few years back explaining the horrors of having to deal with them in a classroom all day long (since they didn't change classes then) and we got a reprieve last year. It was nice not to have to worry about a student hitting her or spitting on her. With the other issues we had last year, I probably would have had a nervous break down.

I firmly believe that the rights of special education students surpass the rights of regular education and gifted students in the classroom. Which is no politically correct to say, especially since I am in education.

But it is the truth.

And sometimes the truth hurts.

Censored

I finally got my daughter's report card from last year (I wasn't worried about it because now that parents can log in to the home portal and view grades, I had kept up with her scores) and included with the report card was a ██████████████████████████████████.

Now, last year was the first year I had not checked up on her teachers to make sure that the standards were being taught. I had never had an issue with any of the teachers in the past, and I started a new program at my job (going from curriculum to another) and in hindsight, I was a slacker. I put my job priorities over those of being a good helicopter mom... *snicker*


Her grades on her report card ███████████████████████. Now, I had issues with ███████████████████████ and even got ███████████████████████ over my ███████████████████████. I ███████████████████████, even if only ███████████████████████because at the time it didn't matter much anyway. What was done, was done.

But ███████████████████████. I cannot go back and undo what I did, or even redo it. It wouldn't make much sense now anyway. All I can do is put my faith in the teachers she has now. And I do have faith in them. Every one of them is good at what they do and she is a bright child.

Oh, and ███████████████████████.

P.S. If you (███████████████████████) see fit to ███████████████████████. The old ███████████████████████. Can you say, BLOCKED?? Sucks, huh? :)

CS4HS Day 1

First day of class! I'm excited and nervous as heck! Here are some examples of the posts we have had so far...

What is Computer Science?

Well here we are at the very beginning of the CS4HS MOOC.  One of the reasons for this course is to help prepare teachers to teach Computer Science in high school classrooms across the country.  It will be very interesting to see what your understanding of Computer Science is at this point in the course and your thoughts on how important you feel the subject is to our high school students.  So our question is: How would you define Computer Science and how do you feel it should it be presented in the high school curriculum?

Computer Science to me is an understanding of how computers work. Not just the binary code, not just the networking cables, but all of it. Too many people know how to use a computer but have no understanding of the terms data or application program.

 

 Why am I Here?

One of the most important things we must understand in order to be successful in any task we do is to have a grasp of why we are doing it.  We also would like to know a little bit about our students and their motivation for taking the course so let me pose a question to you.  Please answer the following question: Why I am taking this course and what is it I hope to achieve from successfully completing the course?

I have a background as a COBOL programmer and my degree is in MIS. I have been teaching Business Education for the past 10 years and just recently changed my program in Career Tech to be Information Technology. Finally after 10 years I am teaching what I love! 

I have seen that there is a need for this type of program in my high school. The interest that has been shown so far has been very high and students have sought me out to ask about the new classes. I look forward to working with these students because of their passion and love for everything IT.

Wikipedia is not the Devil

Dear Whoever-says-Wikipedia-is-the-devil,

Stop.

Just stop.

Yes, I agree that Wikipedia is a bad choice as a reference for a term paper.

But for everyday information on a topic it is wonderful, and usually (not always) correct. There are very few places on the Internet that have such diverse topics all located together in one site.

So, shut up.

Thanks,

Leigh