Use Sparingly

I am 5 days from ending my student teaching. Most of the heavy lifting is over. Have I finished all my observations? Check. How about getting your final check-out meeting with your field instructor? Yep, check! You've been observed by your principal and master teacher? Most certainly. How about submitting your portfolio? Yes, although I will admit that I probably spent more time on the actual teaching than the portfolio itself, part of my field on what is the most important thing (teaching or photocopying and compiling?).

This past week also marked my 9th week of student teaching, and the beginning of my handover of responsibility. I've still taught math, writing, and science, which means I've been teaching quite a bit. But I am ok with that. The more experience the better. The only downside is having the kids seeing two very different styles/tolerances. Noise is one of those things where I am ok with a reasonably loud bubble, and my MT isn't quite as keen. You'll remember that I posted on this previously, and need to remind myself of that.

Now I have new found time! I can blog a bit more, which is great. The second thing is that I can go through my Google Reader, chalk full of 196 posts. Some of the best are...

• Brian at Learning is Messy was reflecting on his current (soon ending) 1:1 student/laptop ratio, and what that has meant for his kids and in his practice.
• The Reading Zone had a post about grading in the reading/writing workshop, as well as how to curriculum map. Both of those are things I am starting to think ahead to. Both posts have some books worth checking out (I can speak to the quality of the Strategies That Work book)
• I absolutely love seeing Dy/dan's posts come through my google reader. I think he inspires me to think about how we can use a variety of content to get kids thinking about math in real-world contexts. This looks at a music video where you can mute instruments, and what would that mean to the number of combinations that could be created. This one looked at a comparison between two very different math classes, and their interest level. I think one can read a ways into it, particularly from a class point of view and the notion of gatekeeping.
• The Doc is In had a pie graph that made me laugh, but not in the "ha ha ha ha ha!" sort of way, as I think it (sadly) ends up getting it right.
• I also read some running/sports blogs. The Science of Sport goes a little deeper into running, thinking a little (well, a lot) more critically about things. This looked at performance enhancing drugs in sport (sport being running, as they are non-US), and this looked a little deeper into pacing at the London Marathon vs the World Record. For me, it is like Dy/Dan's posts, but in a running context.

My last note comes in reflecting about an email I had with a principal friend. We were talking about the end of my student teaching, what was next, etc. Finding a job is paramount, but it will be a hurry up and wait type of situation as we had a RIF's all over the state. I mentioned how I was also running a marathon in Portland on the fourth of July. I told her I was hoping to be around 2:35, maybe a little more or less (certainly 2:30's). She was surprised I was able to manage both things- training (heavily at that) and student teaching. I hadn't thought about that. It is just what I do, and there wasn't much of a choice.