thoughts about this week.

This week has been both exhilarating and exhausting.  I had the privilege of being invited down to the state capitol to attend Superintendent's Technology Day.  I was supposed to talk with legislators about how I use technology in my classroom.  That didn't really happen since my people were busy with other stuff.  Apparently they were considering how they can persecute a man who doesn't share their value system by voting to not accept his prayer.  I think that's just pitful, but this isn't the time or place for that I guess.  It reeks of religious persecution and I thought our country was founded in part to avoid that kind of stuff. I was able to meet a great guy from the OSDE, @ittosde.  He and I were able to talk some about the online learning environment from my classroom, eg. discussion boards, online homework, and a blogging project I am rolling around in my head for after spring break.

Today was especially exhausting just because I was teaching material that is both important and difficult conceptually to explain.  In physics 1 we have been talking about color, specifically light color, and today was about blue sky, cyan water, and red sunsets. It was great to do away with some long held misconceptions and actually explain and help kids understand phenomena that occur and can be observed on a regular basis.  I think I was just exhausted because both phys 1 blocks were crammed full of material and the kids asked good questions and were engaged and that can be a bit draining.  Very fulfilling though.  I love teaching what I teach.

The easy thing:  I must say that SNU impressed on me the need to make my content relevant to kids.  When you are teaching them observable phonemena that can be seen later in the day or immediately, its really hard not to connect it to everyday life.  Physics is just fun!  Students hopefully leave my class challenged and better informed about the natural world around them.  They used to call it natural philosophy and I am a firm believer there is a reason for that.  It was "knowing" "nature".  Pretty cool.

This post is a bit disconnected and you can probably tell I didn't do a lot of pre-writing; I'm sorry @mishelleyb.  I never was one to make an outline, first draft, and all that other writing stuff you teach in Comp 1.  Maybe you could have the paper resource center look this over and get back to me with some edits.

Thanks for reading.