Brushing the Cobwebs Off

It's almost time to get back into the swing of things! I'm still teaching at Front Range Community College this summer, but I haven't even looked at curriculum for the coming fall at Rocky Mountain High School (for shame). I'm beginning those endeavors next week as I move into my busy July month. I also signed up to coordinate the Summer Day Camp (Vacation Bible School) for our church this year, and that is happening July 14th - 18th.

I came across a couple of blog posts that I wanted to share. I'm realizing that as a teacher, I was super excited to have the summer off, but the summer is flying by like never before. I'm going to a benefits orientation at the district office next week, and I start orientation and work on August 11th. Not to mention all of the things that I need to take care of in between.

So, this blog post made sense to me, and I'm going to slowly burn through most of these things. One of my students brought up the "slow burn", which I determined that I do without even realizing it. I have to work in all my spare minutes to get things done; otherwise, they don't get done. Anywho, I digress...

The blog is here: http://www.edutopia.org/blog/top-12-summer-tips-teachers-vicki-davis?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=post&utm_campaign=blog-top-summer-tips-teachers-link

I also found this 70+ Resources for Social Media in the classroom that was an interesting read. I'll be looking through it more over the next week to determine what really is good and what can be set aside: http://www.edutopia.org/social-media-education-resources?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=post&utm_campaign=resource-roundup-social-media-image-repost

Take a look and see what works best for you, and have a happy and safe July 4th Weekend!

Summer Institute 2014 High School Computers

We are finishing the 2014 Summer Institute Course for High School computers, which constituted working on the curriculum for the Game Design 2: Mobile Applications class. We were also able to look at Web Design, Computer Applications, and Game Design I just a bit.

I found quite a few tools that will work really well for the classes I'll be teaching in the fall. I'll even begin to incorporate some of these elements into my college class this summer.


One website is: http://www.gcflearnfree.org/topics
This website has topics on typing and extra practice for students using any of the Microsoft Office Applications. I have quite a few students in my college classes that come in not knowing how to keyboard. This is essential in today's world. Having extra step-by-step lessons on any of the MS Office applications is also helpful.

Photoshop Tutorials: http://entheosweb.com/photoshop/default.asp
I'm teaching Photoshop in the Fall to the Game Design I high school students, but it is not an in-depth course. These are good tutorials to help with backgrounds or sprites for the students' gaming worlds. It is also helpful for anyone who needs to know how to use some of the functionality of Photoshop, but not the whole suite.

Also see: http://tv.adobe.com/
Once again, these are easy tutorials to go through these less in-depth projects that are needed to create some of the objects for Game Design and Mobile Apps.

Mobile Applications Platforms & Tutorials:
MIT App Inventor: http://appinventor.mit.edu/explore/ - MIT's App Inventor is the easiest of the three that we used to create Mobile Apps. It is similar to Scratch in that it has an interactive GUI that makes it easy to

Live Code: http://livecode.com/ - This was one that was a step above the MIT App Inventor, but it isn't all coding either. We are going to introduce this to the students and allow them to use this as an option for their final projects.

Codecademy: http://www.codecademy.com/ - Great tutorials for how to use Python

Learn Python the Hard Way: http://learnpythonthehardway.org/book - Good basic tutorials for how to use Python

There's also the resource: http://www.chromeexperiments.com/ for web-based development. This is really great to see what is new or up-and-coming!

Maybe some of these will help you in your own education! Good Luck!

19th Week: Goodbyes...

Well, this is my last week at Poudre High School. It's been so nice. I've only come in to teach my Entrepreneurship class in the afternoons. I've spent a little more time here and there trying to get caught up on my grading and making sure that Mr. Long is in the loop on the students in my class.

I had one student this week who was in danger of not graduating because she was failing my class and several others. She turned in a lot of work, and completed her final business plan and turned it in. She passed, but she is still failing some of her other classes. She's a sweet kid, but she has missed a lot of class. She was gone at least half the time. She is smart, and she does good work when she is in class. I hope that she turns things around for herself.

I have a couple of other students in my class who are failing as well. They just don't seem to care. One is sleeping in my class, and the other is playing games. This has been ongoing throughout the semester. Their attitudes have been less than stellar. I've talked with them and told them the consequences of not getting their work in to me by the end of the week, and neither of them seemed to care much. There is one more student who is failing, and the same thing is happening with her at the end of the semester as was happening throughout the semester. She is apathetic and doesn't really care about the class or about learning. Now, all this being said, I've connected with these kids in different ways throughout the semester, but now that the end of the semester is over, it seems as though they have given up. I still have one more day with them next week for finals week.

We took finals this week. Our final was at the beginning of the week with the seniors. Seniors are gone. It seems awfully quiet around here without them. I wish them the best of luck in college and beyond. Graduating high school is such a huge stepping stone, from childhood to adulthood in a matter of weeks it seems. I only hope that as a teacher, I have helped to prepare them for what awaits them in the future.

As I move into this summer and the fall, I plan on continuing this blog, but I'm going to change it a bit. I may post weekly updates, but I will mainly post "lessons learned" and "successes" and "failures" from my lessons. These are the big takeaways that I want to continue to reflect on throughout my career, and the things that I want to share with others. Education is so much about experiences. We learn from each other, and we learn from the world around us. I want to bring that into my classroom as much as possible. I look forward to Rocky Mountain High School being my home even for a little while. Saying goodbye to Poudre High School is bittersweet. I really enjoyed the people that I worked with - especially Mr. Long, but I'm also ready to move on and begin this career that I've been working for the past year.

18th Week: Whew! I made it!

It's not over yet, but I'm feeling the pressure lifted and excited to be almost finished! I have one more week at Poudre High School, and then I start teaching summer school at Front Range Community College. Then, I have Summer Institute for Poudre School District for the job at Rocky Mountain High School. Then, I get to take a break for a while and just teach summer school. I'm so excited about having my summer (life) back. I'm looking forward to spending time with my family and working out and working in the garden. I don't think I'm going to have time to do everything I want to do, but I hope to make a good dent in it all.

Focusing more on the present, though, I had really great classes this week. Everyone worked on their final business plans, and we reviewed for the Final Exam, which will happen on Monday and Tuesday of next week. The final business plans are looking good, and I'm all caught up on my grading. (Grades are turned in at FRCC, by the way.) The Jeopardy game in Entrepreneurship 5th Hour for the review went over very well. I was excited to see so many people engaged.

UPDATE: Rocky Mountain High School

INCOMING UPDATE...

So, six applications, three interviews, and one job offer later... I was offered the job at Rocky Mountain High School! I know that it is only a semester, so I hope that I'm not "shooting" myself in the foot by accepting it. I just really enjoyed the interview, liked the other business teachers there, and looking forward to a good experience. Moving forward, I plan to stay positive and see this as an opportunity for growing my teaching experience. After all, it is another challenge along this crazy journey...

I'm making the arrangements to get paperwork and schedules set up now. It looks like I'll be starting some training in June, and then I have to start back to school in August before the other teachers start.

GO LOBOS!

17th Week - Final Evaluation and Moving on...

We completed my final evaluation this week, and it turned out very well! I made an "A" in my student teaching experience, with which I am very happy. Mr. Long seems to be happy with the results as well.

Anyhow, I had an interview at Mountain View High School with both Mountain View High School and Thompson Valley High School. The Principals were both there and the heads of the business departments. The interview didn't go as well as I would have liked, but it didn't seem like a good fit anyway. The high schools at Thompson Valley School District are changing their schedules to a full class schedule on Monday, Tuesday, and Friday with block days on Wednesday and Thursday. I wasn't very excited about going back and forth between the two schools throughout the year. I really wanted to be in a place and stay there. The interview itself was very stuffy as well. I didn't get a very good vibe from it. I didn't get the job, and that's okay.

I was called later in the week from Rocky Mountain High School's assistant principal, and we set up an interview for Friday of last week. This interview was fun. It was relaxing, and the questions weren't stuffy or difficult to answer. It was more of a "getting-to-know-you" session, and I really liked all the people there. Long story short, it seemed like a good fit. The drawback is that it is only a semester job. They don't know if this job will turn into more than one semester or not. They won't know until October if the job will open up for the following semester.

At Front Range Community College, I finished up the Spring semester with my two classes taking finals and completing their projects. Now, to finish grades and write my lessons learned from the semester. It was a good semester overall. I had a great group of students, and I'm looking forward to this summer. I really love teaching these classes.