Things Learned

I attended seven full days of a teaching seminar a week ago. Here are some of the interesting things I learned....

Questioning is at the core of learning.
70-80% of questions are at the recall level
Most teachers call on overachievers
Teachers give students on average one second to respond
Frequently, teachers give answers
5% of questions are asked by students
Teachers ask an average of 50 questions in any given lesson

"It's not fair to the students if we teach in the same way we learned."

Be a performer, perform 7 shows a day(if that's how many classes you have)

I especially liked this last one and never thought of teaching in this way. The speaker has taught in Austin schools for 33 years, and has no plans for retirement. He suggested that even if you are not naturally enthusiastic and energetic just act like you are putting on a show, and go back to being yourself when you get home. If you are fired up about being at school and about learning, the kids will naturally pick up on that attitude. He also made this same suggestion about pessimists. If you are a pessimist by nature, you've got to at the very least pretend to be an optimist and cheerful otherwise your colleagues and students will pick up on your negativity and dread being around you. He also said that by pretending to be an optimist maybe you will 'accidentally' become an optimist!

We also spent quite a bit of time studying and implementing Harry Wong's classroom management techniques and Madeline Hunter lesson planning(25 hours altogether).

Thanks SOOOOO much to all of you who took vacation time off of work to help watch the kids for the week. I learned a great deal and am very glad I was able to attend.

Bad Mother In Red Chair

Oh Man. I totally just realized that I posted the wrong child's red chair picture. Ben's isn't for a couple of more days. Whoops. Walker and I were just talking yesterday about how the dates get to run together after a while and it becomes more difficult to remember. So I rushed together and grabbed Rémy after nap time to play 'dress up' for the red chair! ;) At least it wasn't the other way around, that way Ben can't play the 'I'm the second child and you always forget about me' card later in life.

Here's our little 18 months old! Her hair gets more curly and crazy every day! She keeps me on my toes as far as learning goes. From the minute she wakes to the minute she crashes at night it's, 'What's this, what's that?" She wants to know, she wants to find, she wants to keep going until she figures out all the answers to her questions. Her new favorite past time is reading to herself. She pulls out every books she owns (which is too many since I work for HPB and feel like I should get her every book she'll need until she's in third grade) and sits in her chair and babbles, occasionally saying a familiar word. She has really blossomed with the sign language, I think she knows approximately 30 or more signs. Many of these she can also say the word, but for the words she can't yet pronounce, this really comes in handy to know what she means. She has started imitating someone's laugh. Not sure who it is. She throws her head back and scrunchces her nose and lets out a 'fake' laugh. She has also become the 'bobo' detector and the 'burp' detector. In fact, if you are a new mom in need of either of these services, she will let you know if your baby has a stinky diaper or needs a wipe to clean up spit up, all for a very nominal fee.

In Red Chair

I'm four months old! I can laugh out loud and smile until my cheeks hurt. With a great effort and much of an ab workout I can turn over. I love my sister and follow her around with my eyes all day long. I've never met a stranger and I love anybody that will smile at or talk to me.

I tried rice cereal for the first time this morning. I wouldn't say much about it, I could take it or leave it. My big sister can now feed me a bottle, and I love sitting in her lap while she feeds me.

Mom can't fit her hand around my thighs anymore. What can I say, I'm a growing boy.

Oliver & Marie finally get married

I have a few things I could say about Oliver and Marie. I'll sum it up in a few paragraphs instead. I met Oliver and Marie in junior high. Marie and I were on the tennis team together. I was second, she was third, so she was always challenging me for second position...and beat me on several occasions!

Oliver was one of the school photographers for yearbook so he would photograph the teams. I then went on to high school with Oliver, having a few classes together. He and Marie started dating late in high school. They continued dating after Marie graduated in 2001, but her family moved 150 miles away. For the last EIGHT years Oliver has made the trek to visit Marie and her family every other weekend. As the best man pointed out, this is 300 miles round trip, 62,400 miles over the last 8 years. He has gone around the world 2.5 times for Marie!



When I moved to UNT Oliver was the only person I knew. He introduced me to Walker, so that Walker could show me around. And it's all mushy love stuff from there. We owe it all to this guy. We were soooooo honored to see this special couple be married.

We really treasured the time catching up with old friends.

Rémy Learning ABC's

This is her first experience with these magnetic letters. I set them up last night so that when she woke up and came in the kitchen for breakfast she would find them.

I thought she knew six letters prior to this, but it turns out she knows ten: a, b, c, e, i, m, o, p, u, y

We have a set of flash cards we have used twice, other than that we sing the alphabet song every once in a while, so I am curious how she is picking these letters up so fast.

Flipping over

This guy decided it was time to turn over today! He was so happy with himself for doing so!

Best and Worst

Do you have a favorite teacher? What's her name and what grade did you have him/her? Why do you remember him/her being your favorite?

I don't have ONE favorite. I have a few.

Mrs. Kuykendall, Galloway Elementary, Mesquite, 1st grade
Mrs. Mauk, Galloway Elementary, Mesquite, 5th grade
Mrs. Taylor, 9-11 Latin, North Mesquite HS
Mr. Melillo, 12th AP English, Forney HS
Mr. Stamper, College Math

I liked these teachers for different reasons. Mrs. Kuykendall loved me and loved to teach her class. She always had a smile and a hug to share with us. I don't remember anything content-wise, but I do remember feeling like she loved me. In 5th grade Mrs. Mauk used the curriculum 'Voyage of the Mimi' and we adopted a whale for the year and received monthly updates from whale spotters about where our whale was and what he was doing. We did lots of group work this year and had lots of fun learning. She was a strict teacher, but not harsh. Mrs. Taylor loved Latin and loved her students. She played tennis, drove a red convertible and would remind us that she only had five years until retirement. We dig into Greek and Roman mythology and history and translated many texts. I saved her life one day, securing my place as her favorite student. Mr. Melillo led a very lax class but still had the students' respect. He has read most any book on the planet and taught a college level class, which helped me test out and get college credit. Mr. Stamper taught Algebra, Trigonometry, Geometry and Calculus at the community college. He knew his math front and back and also knew how to explain the 'how' and 'why' of math....which is essential if you want your students to want to learn math. This is the first math class I enjoyed taking and ended up taking every class he taught.

I'll not name my worst teachers, as some of them I can't even remember their names. In general, they were uncaring or not concerned with me as a student, did not know how to maintain control of their classroom, and were not structured enough with their content to make any real progress.

Do you remember your best and worst teachers? What impression did they leave you with?

119 Best Things about Dallas

In this month's issue of D Magazine there's an article on the 119 Best things about Dallas. I always enjoy reading D Magazine. I especially enjoy their 'best' issues. I won't list all 119 things here, but here are a few of my favorites....

1. We have manners
50. You can wear cowboy boots with your suit
52. Because making $47,000 here is like making $143,269 in Manhattan
54. Because we get things done
100. We love a good fight
101. We love our dogs more than ourselves
115. We embrace homegrown restaurants
116. Only someone from Dallas could be left for dead in a blizzard on the side of Mt. Everest and survive.

Did you know?

I remember watching this a couple of years ago. I have been at a teaching seminar all week and they played this updated version. It's pretty captivating.

Did You Know?

Something Beautiful Podcast II

Listen to part II of Annie's interview on the Something Beautiful podcast.

Sister Brother Smiling Photo

What a Stud Muffin!

Such little hams!

Aunt Melinda sent Ben her signature blanket in the mail this week, so I was snapping a photo of him with his blanket so that I could email her the picture.

It was totally by accident that Rémy crawled up in the chair with him and then they BOTH started smiling. They're starting to become more familiar with one another. It'll be so fun once they can play together and get into mischief together!