Mr. Arnold’s Teaching Blog

We’re going to try out edublogs again.  For a long spell the site was quirky and it looks like they have taken care of a lot of these issues.  Blogger is blocked on our county domain, so that’s a tool that can’t be used unless I am out of the area and on another network.

Stay tuned, it has been my goal to add student users for a couple of years now.  This has been a process that has gone through several iterations, blocks, denial of service, and other “tech” issues.  I will be updating you when I have some good news!

We introduced a new procedure today, that is using sticky notes to respond or question literature.  I was impressed with the quality of the questions and the interesting thoughts from students.  One student asked why people find things interesting.  I related a story from a great book I’m reading called “Flow”.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_(psychology)

It’s also Magic Monday, so I’ve been performing and talking a bit about the history of magic.  The first magic book was published in 1584.  It was originally published to debunk ideas about flying witches and such, but only a few people read it, and it quickly became a manual of sorts for magicians.  C’est la vie!

Next week we’ll be finishing up with our geography unit and also delving more deeply into our economics.  We’ll take a unit test on Friday that will cover the first 5 weeks of class.  I’ll be doing a thorough review on Wednesday or Thursday.  I will also try to put the review up online for the first time, which will require Camtasia or digital video.  I emphasize life long learning…for all!!!  The students are continuing to enjoy the friuts of agriculture from our “orchard”-we have two apple trees that are continuing to produce “produce”!  Here’s a composite snapshot of one of our web albums.  Send me an email and I’ll give you permission to browse our galleries!

Many of our art entries were based around using a compass (not the magnetic kind) and related to astronomy.  I was very impressed at many of the entries!  You can always see our continuing collection at http://sites.google.com/site/mrarnoldsstudents/Home/art  Today, if students did their “running writing” assignment I will be teaching foreshortening and shadowing as part of our “mostly weekly” art class.  We’ll also be doing “Freakonomics Friday”-today’s concepts are specialization and trade.  This is standard SS4E2c and e respectively.  Remember, I do deduct points for late assignments so you’ll want to keep up with that weekly running writing!!! 

We finished last week with our economics lesson on scarcity.  A lot of students made the real world connection to gasoline scarcity because of Hurricane Ike.  We’ve also been covering resources, focusing on human and capital resources the latter part of the week.

We’ll be studying regions next week and also have a day of art on Wednesday.  I’ll have our class calendar on the homepage updated on Monday.  Our homeroom will continue to work on their state reports this week as well.

Today we reviewed resources and also wrote notes on human and capital resources.  You can always find our notes at http://mrarnoldsclass.googlepages.com.  We also had an in class assignment on bar graphs. I’ve been trying to upload the graphics from today’s assignment but edublogs seems to be very glitchy with graphics and posts this week (Monday’s blog is MIA!)…

KP narrates state project rubric.Today we took the first battery of COGAT tests.  I also did AIMS, which has replaced our system (DIBELS) from last year.  Students kept the environment very quiet, which is great for test taking!  Thanks.

We also covered resources and here’s a few pages from our flipchart.  Standard SS4G2-The student will describe how physical systems affect human systems.

 

“Working harder actually makes you smarter…”-Mr. Arnold.

My homeroom had a special guest this morning, thanks to Mrs. Hutchinson.  It was a bearded dragon! We took a few minutes off our usual busy morning routine to do some question and answer, as well as pet the little lizard.  Several students commented that the real bearded dragon looked a lot like Izzy, our class webkin! 

On the business end of things, students did a good job on their test of SS4G1.  I challenged them to a red dot test-this means that the student didn’t use any resources and just worked from memory alone.  I allowed a little more leeway in terms of location and accuracy if the student was doing a red point test.  We talked briefly about risk and reward before students got started.  We also very quickly went through test procedures.  We’ll be working all year on test strategies and tips to do your very best on any test!

Today we reviewed for our test on SS4G1!  We traced blank outline maps and then labeled them accurately