Almost there

It certainly has been much longer than I wanted since my last post. I think this is because the time from my last post until now has been my longest stretch without any kind of break in the school schedule (minus Good Friday) plus it was the final stretch before the big EOC. The past 7 weeks have been very tiresome and a struggle to get through. In fact, as the lack of sleep began to really wear on me last week, I couldn't resist taking a nap in my underwear on the couch when I got home around 4. I was interrupted when my wife came home with an unexpected friend, so I put pants on but just got in bed and slept until 5am the next morning. I'm more rested now, and I only have about 3 more weeks of school left!

So last Thursday my Biology students took their EOC test, and I got mixed feedback about how they think they did. I haven't seen the test, but hopefully results will come in within a couple weeks. I'm fairly optimistic though. They took a predictor test back in March before I had covered all the material and about 68% of my students scored proficient or advanced. This was HUGE to me and my class since last year only 11% scored proficient or advanced on the EOC at my school. I gave them a practice EOC about 2 weeks before their actual test date, and 100% of them scored proficient or advanced! I was really excited about this, and I think that gave my students a lot of confidence. The morning of the test, I gave them cookies that Mrs. K baked  and added a personalized note to each student to give them a last bit of encouragement before the test. Many of them said that it was more difficult than the practice test, but everything else that led up to the test makes me confident that we'll be happy with the results.

My other 5 classes of Conceptual Physics do not have an state-made EOC, so I have a little more time with them to get them ready for the final assessment that I've made. With the extra time, I was able to do a really fun lab activity with them. I got equipment over the summer to make 2 liter bottles into bottle rockets and shoot them over 50 feet in the air. We learned about free fall and projectile motion so we could calculate how high each rocket flew in the air. I had the students bring in 2 liter bottles so each student could make a rocket with a partner. I had them make nose cones and wings or fins out of card stock, then we filled them up halfway with water, pumped in some air to build pressure, and let it fly outside. Here's a video my fellow freshman science teacher took during his planning time. I have pictures too, but I guess I shouldn't put them up here since they have the students' faces in them. I upgraded to the iPhone 4 not too long before this, so I was excited to use it.

I was freaking out while I was planning this because I didn't know how the kids would act if I took them outside. I had to come up with all these extra alternate plans if the kids didn't want to cooperate. I contracted other teachers during their planning to hold students that didn't follow expectations and also be extra eyes while I had them outside. Fortunately and surprisingly, I only had to send one kid to another room. The rest of them were not unmanageable because, for the most part, I think most of them were really interested and engaged. They wanted their rocket to go the highest.

These two days were probably the most fun I've had at school. I wish I could do that kind of stuff all the time. And the frustrating part is if I had the resources and knew how to use them to teach, I could probably do way more stuff like that, and my kids and I would have much more fun.

Other good news:
I had two of my biology students apply to the St. Thomas Hospital Science Scholars program where they had to write an essay and I had to write a recommendation a couple months ago, and they both were accepted! They'll get to shadow doctors for six Saturdays next year and participate in lab experiences with other high achieving kids across the region. They even get their own lab coats to wear around the hospital.

I think the challenge for last few weeks of school is to gather enough motivation and get the kids motivated to focus and learn even after taking all their EOC tests last week. It's kind of weird to me that their final test essentially is given almost a month before school lets out. It leaves us with a lot of freedom the month after the test, but I think the students are going to be even less willing to do any kind of work. I'm planning to do more fun things with my biology class like dissections and good science movies, but I'm not finished with my Conceptual Physics classes, so we'll see how that goes. Either way, I can't believe I'm almost done with my 1st year of teaching. I just need to make it until then.