Lab Coat Friday!

The results are in! My first quiz had an average of...drumroll please...83%! Good, not great, and there are a lot of lower grades I'd like to fix. I think the pacing was rough for a lot of students--the last question was a lot of points, and the time was tight. I am not surprised by the results. I knew the students were able to rock graphing (and I knew a few of them would forget to label their axes). I knew they rocked at the scientific method, and I knew they were not perfect on controls. I think they were over 50% on controls, which is a good sign. I still do need to review it in every single lesson between now and the first unit test next Thursday.

First test Thursday! More importantly, we begin real content Thursday! Geology. We get to look at pictures of mountains on Friday.

The kids continue to surprise me, and show me what it's like in a world where being smart and kind is cool. The other day, a kid ran to the principal in the morning and said that the afternoon before, students were being loud on the bus. Were they fighting? No, just really loud and shouting and playing. Okay, the principal would speak to the children. Keep in mind that this is a public city bus. Still, our kids reflect our school, and need to be leaders. Cool. Self-policing respect.

Furthering the agenda of respect and achievement, the school suspended a student for two days for texting during class. Students are expected to drop cell phones off in class bins when they enter the building, and get them back at afternoon homeroom. This student had "forgotten" to do so and was caught texting during history class. A two-day suspension is a far cry last years' "Well, we can't really confiscate the phones, so you can ask the student to give it to you, but if they won't, you can write them up, and maybe they'll get ISS, or maybe not, especially if it happens a lot." Moreover, when the student returned to school on Friday, he was required to stand up in front of the entire school and apologize for disrespecting his teachers and classmates, and the school had to welcome him back. He was even questioned by a teacher, who made him "improve" his apology by giving better reasons why he hurt his peers and why he won't do it again. I don't think he'll be making that mistake again soon.

Friday was Lab Coat Friday. It's a thing now. I invented it. I ordered a labcoat on a whim a few weeks ago, and needed some help with motivation on Friday, so I declared it Lab Coat Friday. It made me feel a little bit like a nutty professor, and my colleagues loved it, and the kids got a kick out of it. The kids definitely recognized a lab coat when they saw it, and complimented me about it all day. The principal stopped me in the morning and had to take a picture.

Lab Coat Friday!

I ended my week with a heart-melty moment. After watching the dismissal room for an hour (kids who don't get picked up at 3:30 hang out and do homework until 5), fending off requests to clean, do work for me, and grade quizzes, I was standing outside with a few dozen students and some teachers. A colleague of mine approached me and said, earlier today he saw a student of mine, a quiet girl who sits in the first row of one of my classes, who had left class to use the bathroom, RUNNING back to class. Like, she really wanted to be back there. When I wished her a good weekend, on the sidewalk outside the school, she turned to her 6th grade friend and whispered (I think), "You'll have her next year. Her class is great [thumbs up]" and gave her friend a big thumbs up. Heart melt!


My weekend of running wasn't quite as successful as I had hoped, due to some poorly timed meals and general tiredness. My Saturday run was cut short because I ate too soon before my run (bad idea) and my GPS was acting all funky, so I didn't know how far or fast I was going. That's not a good excuse, but if I had known I'd gone 2.65 miles, I could've sucked it up for another .35. This morning, I went to the gym and cranked out about a half mile before my shin started hurting, so I stopped and lifted some weights instead. I didn't get my 10 miles this week, but I came close: 8.3, plus two weightlifting sessions. Next week, I'll get my 10.


I'm exhausted, but this job continues to impress me every day. Tomorrow: independent and dependent variables!