Stayed late to grade math tests yesterday aftn ’cause I knew I’d want to be with the grandboys when I got home. Taught first period, worked with a colleague second period finishing assigning grades to Math 3 tests and deciding what to do with them: scores ranged from 15 to 99, widest spread I’ve ever had. Spent part of third period explaining what some of the major difficulties were that some of the kids had run into and then encouraging the ones who’d undoubtedly never seen a number that small written on their tests to try to put things in perspective once they’d gotten over the shock. Tried to tell them that they are all smart enough to do well in the course if they really want to do so; I’m not sure they all believed me though I know the statement to be true. They will have to learn some different ways to approach learning, however. For those who stick with it, the end result will be worth it–for which I happened to get more evidence in the form of those “course questionnaires” that seniors fill out when they ask you to write a college rec letter.
Fourth period was a joint senior English class with the Han and Flowers classes. Rev. Han gave a short introduction to utilitarianism, and we broke the students into small groups, one from each class per group, and had them discuss questions that my two colleagues had come up with (with minimal input from me). It seemed to go very well, much better than when GH and I tried it last spring, and we’re in the process of trying to figure out why and build on the success of today’s class.
Then did some work over lunch, but it was long enough ago that I honestly can’t remember what! Sixth period, had a great (I thought) junior English class (see previous post). Seventh period, I answered emails; 8th period I had a meeting with a parent. Ninth period I wrote a bit and visited with John Naruk (who had stopped by). About 3:40 I went to the gym to watch volleyball. Re-read a little John Searle (Mind, Language, and Philosophy) while the guys warmed up to see if it might work in next semester’s senior English course and thought to myself at the time, “Wow. This is so St. John’s.” Reminded me of the time I was reading Hume during the Ultimate Frisbee team’s trip to nationals several years ago… Enjoyed visiting with some students in the stands, some volleyball parents, and some coaches. Was fun to watch my students play, of course.
After a couple of VB matches, went home for dinner but decided to come back for the football game. Quite enjoyed it, though viewed it through multiple, superimposed lenses at once: my being a student, when I first taught at SJS, going as division head and being responsible for order and such, and then tonight. What prompted the insight, interestingly, was looking at the field all lit up and seeing its pronounced rise in the middle. Which reminded me of the field we’d played on, which got muddy and had puddles sometimes in the winter. Looked up and saw the “new” single-standard goal post and it briefly wavered and shone through an image from a game many years ago with the more traditional H-shaped, metal-painted-silver goal posts I remember from high school. And the image was darker because the lights were so much less intense back then.
And standing on the track in the fall of 1982 or 1983 yelling to one of my former Comp Sci students (who was a football player), “Kick their Ass!” And not until afterwards realizing that perhaps this was not an appropriate thing for a teacher to yell at a school event– even to an individual kid at a football game. Even though he was a safety of some sort, and I’m sure no-one else could hear it. He later told me how much it meant to him, however, and I didn’t get fired, so I suppose it all turned out well….
Discovered that if you hold an empty water bottle lightly in your fingers and sit anywhere near the Drum Corps and Pots-and-Pans group, you can estimate the resonant frequency of the bottle by hearing what “instrument” makes it vibrate in your fingers. This also seemed to me to be such a St. John’s moment. Later in the game, discovered that this same experimental setup works for approximating the resonance frequency of an adult human skull as well…
Enjoyed visiting briefly with some of my students in the crowd and saying hello to some parents. Also enjoyed watching some of my students on the field, and some of them play quite well. I do like seeing my students have success at things.
And now dinner with my mother at 7:30 tomorrow morning, and then it’s the weekend. Reminding myself of what Dan Lyons used to say: “Ah, it’s Friday! Only two more days left in the work week!”