Tuesday, June 08, 2004
Good Idea, Bad Idea
Special "Last Full Week of the School Year" Edition
Good idea: Scheduling field trips during the final weeks of school.
Bad idea: Scheduling field trips during finals week at school thereby undermining any possible opportunity for review or preparation.
Good idea: Scheduling educational field trips to the local museums or concert halls and mandating strict behavioral requirements for participation.
Bad idea: Scheduling field trips to all sorts of random places...like the bowling alley, and allowing everyone who wishes to attend. One wonders why the organizers were surprised kids were rolling bowling balls at the pin resetter...deliberately.
Good idea: Making alternate arrangements for students to turn in extra credit projects when teacher is off chaperoning a nice educational bowling trip.
Bad idea: Expecting students to be capable of reading a sign posted on the door of the classroom. (Needless to say, no posters were turned in following my departure...although a bunch of students brought them in the next Monday assuming they could still get credit.)
Good idea: Assigning failing students to retake courses in summer school.
Bad idea: Informing failing students a full week before the school year ends that they will have to retake courses in summer school.
Good idea: Showing students your commitment to academic excellence by continuing to expect they do work in your classroom.
Bad idea: Showing students your commitment to academic excellence by continuing to expect they do work in your classroom.
Good idea: Demonstrating the dehydrating power of acids by mixing sulfuric acid with sugar.
Bad idea: Completing said demonstration with only 3 open windows, an open door, and 2 fans running on full blast to ensure proper ventilation of the fumes. Somehow this wasn't enough for my dissatisfied students, who began immediately to complain about the smell.
Good idea: Shooting dice in the back alley with your friends a la Guys and Dolls.
Bad idea: Shooting dice in the back of my advisory with your friends and then denying that these were your dice on the floor and your money on the table.
Bad idea: Cutting class and dropping by your science teacher's room when you should be elsewhere.
Worse idea: Admitting such to said teacher...
Good idea: Allow students to make up for failed credits by attending Credit Recovery classes after school.
Bad idea: Not retroactively reflecting the change in last quarter's grades on the school system's computerized grading forms, making our lives as teachers a lot more complicated.
Good idea: Spilling hydrochloric acid on one of my student's faces, scarring him for life.
Bad idea: Bringing in hydrochloric acid to demonstrate the corrosive effect it has on zinc.
Authors note: Wait a minute...the good ideas and bad ideas there are reversed! Oh and the good idea (which should be the bad idea) is entirely fictional. Please excuse this interruption. It will not happen again.
Good idea: Keeping track of all these things that wear me down over the course of the year.
Bad idea: Letting such things drag down my mood during this last full week of school.
Special "Last Full Week of the School Year" Edition
Good idea: Scheduling field trips during the final weeks of school.
Bad idea: Scheduling field trips during finals week at school thereby undermining any possible opportunity for review or preparation.
Good idea: Scheduling educational field trips to the local museums or concert halls and mandating strict behavioral requirements for participation.
Bad idea: Scheduling field trips to all sorts of random places...like the bowling alley, and allowing everyone who wishes to attend. One wonders why the organizers were surprised kids were rolling bowling balls at the pin resetter...deliberately.
Good idea: Making alternate arrangements for students to turn in extra credit projects when teacher is off chaperoning a nice educational bowling trip.
Bad idea: Expecting students to be capable of reading a sign posted on the door of the classroom. (Needless to say, no posters were turned in following my departure...although a bunch of students brought them in the next Monday assuming they could still get credit.)
Good idea: Assigning failing students to retake courses in summer school.
Bad idea: Informing failing students a full week before the school year ends that they will have to retake courses in summer school.
Good idea: Showing students your commitment to academic excellence by continuing to expect they do work in your classroom.
Bad idea: Showing students your commitment to academic excellence by continuing to expect they do work in your classroom.
Good idea: Demonstrating the dehydrating power of acids by mixing sulfuric acid with sugar.
Bad idea: Completing said demonstration with only 3 open windows, an open door, and 2 fans running on full blast to ensure proper ventilation of the fumes. Somehow this wasn't enough for my dissatisfied students, who began immediately to complain about the smell.
Good idea: Shooting dice in the back alley with your friends a la Guys and Dolls.
Bad idea: Shooting dice in the back of my advisory with your friends and then denying that these were your dice on the floor and your money on the table.
Bad idea: Cutting class and dropping by your science teacher's room when you should be elsewhere.
Worse idea: Admitting such to said teacher...
Good idea: Allow students to make up for failed credits by attending Credit Recovery classes after school.
Bad idea: Not retroactively reflecting the change in last quarter's grades on the school system's computerized grading forms, making our lives as teachers a lot more complicated.
Good idea: Spilling hydrochloric acid on one of my student's faces, scarring him for life.
Bad idea: Bringing in hydrochloric acid to demonstrate the corrosive effect it has on zinc.
Authors note: Wait a minute...the good ideas and bad ideas there are reversed! Oh and the good idea (which should be the bad idea) is entirely fictional. Please excuse this interruption. It will not happen again.
Good idea: Keeping track of all these things that wear me down over the course of the year.
Bad idea: Letting such things drag down my mood during this last full week of school.
