Wk 3 - Day 9

the morning with ms. b went along fine. the students were working on the cosmic object lab. they were rather "squirrely" and tried to start the lab without reading the handout. they spent too much time re-weighing objects instead of moving on to the next step. ms. b reined them back in, the first time i'd seen her do this, and reprimanded them for not using their time efficiently. she then listed off what she expected of them and sent them back to work. i walked around emphasizing that they take their time with drawing details as thoroughly as possible instead of rushing through their work.

mrs. s's class is a day ahead and worked on a shoelace invention. she had an activity where the students were in groups of three and had to create an invention that would keep shoelaces from untying. she implemented my suggestion that the students nominate one member from their group to present their invention on the overhead to the class. i thought the presentations were very creative...magnetic shoelaces to a spray that kept the laces sticking together.

i sat in on my first parent conference today. one of mrs. s's students and her mother came in for a visit that they requested. the mother was concerned about her daughter's performance and wanted to let the teachers know what was happening with her daughter. the student has adhd and had been refusing to take her medicine. the mother wanted to have the school administer the medicine so that she didn't have to fight with her daughter anymore. on one hand i think that is something the mother should have to deal with on her own...there's too much that the school is responsible for already for students. on the other hand...being the aunt of a teen that refused to take her medicine...it's a load off the parent's mind to know that their child is taking the medicine even though it's not at home. other issues discussed were the student's lack of organization, problems with math, and needing to ask questions if she is having trouble with something. mrs. s made a comment on how frustrating it is to sit in on that conference because it's the same old situation but a different day...and it won't make much of a difference. i understand mrs. s's frustration...the students aren't held accountable for anything. "all we're doing is babysitting" is a comment i've heard from many teachers here...i hope i don't ever feel like i'm a glorified babysitter.