Presentation Skills

I attended a presentation yesterday and really wonder how people become "consultants". Does having Dr. in front of your name do it? Having a book published? What does it. The person I saw was brought here (to VA) from California. She was not brought here just for this particular presentation but it was part of a few that she was doing while on this coast. I have heard many people speak highly of this presenter and she did have some good ideas. However I was not impressed with her at all. There were numerous references to personal life experiences (failed eharmony and match.com matches), a borderline inappropriate joke, a very dry presentation. I almost feel like if I could have gotten as much out of it if I had the handout and the powerpoint without sitting through the whole presentation. I wonder how much it cost to get her here. I wonder if I am the only one who was not impressed with the presentation. I did make some mental notes about things that I will make sure I pay attention to in myself as I present to others.

On-Line Learning

There are many things that I like about online learning. The freedom to work when I have time and not having to go anywhere to go to class are two of the biggest. I do have some problems with online work and that is with people who do not do their part or do it very late. I struggle with relying on others to complete tasks. In a face-to-face class discussion /projects are worked on right there. In an online course where discussion is a part of it (which has been every online course that i have taken) you have to wait for others to take part in the discussion before it can continue. For example if something is due on the 15th it does not help too much to post on the 14th at 10:30pm. There can be no discussion or at least not much since it was so late. So then it is more of a comment board and not so much a discussion board. While I know that there can be discussions after the due date I find that many times people do not go back. They move on to the next task. I wonder how these teachers would handle this in their own classroom. A question is asked or a comment is made and no one in the class answers or responds until 4 seconds before the bell rings. Would this work? While online is different for many how long does it take for people (especially teachers) to get on board and see the benefits of participating a little more fully and a little earlier.

Testing, Testing Everywhere

It is somewhat amazing to watch the way a school functions once it is time for a standardized testing. We are currently involved with benchmark testing and there seems to be a glazed look on many teachers' faces. Teachers talking about the results, the amount of time they have to spend analyzing the results, what they can and can't do for follow up. I do not envy them at all. When I was a classroom teacher there were not benchmark tests for my course (thank goodness). I wonder if the students feel the pressure that their teachers feel for these tests. Do they understand what their teachers are going though? Do they care? Does it make a difference? The students hear about the importance of their SOL's but are the benchmarks more of a concern for the teachers?

Election

While everyone has been talking about this years presidential election I was really impressed with how it was handled in our school. The 7th grade Civics teachers really did a lot to make this a very memorable learning experience. They put on convention, held a debate and then had the entire school vote. Not everyone could vote. You had to register first. The students played a role in the entire process. They worked on voter registration. They researched the candidates and their stances on certain issues. They were the ones debating in front of the entire 7th grade while it was broadcasting throughout the entire school with the help of the media management system. They worked the polling stations on Monday. Talk about authentic. The election was held on Monday with Senator McCain winning with a 53% vote to Senator Obama's 47%. In all, there were over 590 votes cast from faculty and students. To hear the students talk about the election and to see them working all of the different aspects of the electoral process was very exciting. It made me wonder why more teachers don't do activities like this. I know the answer already. There are two that I hear the most. SOL's and time. It was a lot of time on the teachers part. Planning, setting up, working out all the logistics were a nightmare. Fortunately for the students, this did not stop them. The second reason being SOL's. They taught all the required SOL's and I have the feeling that when tested on these our students will do very well. These are the types of things that we should be doing with our students. I don't think all need to be done on such a a large scale but these are ways to really make the connection for the students.