Tuesday, August 25, 2009

Day 1

One day down... 179 to go?

So I spent my day talking through my powerpoints and handing out lots of papers. The powerpoints went relatively well... I know it's not the "cool" thing to do right now, but it has to be better than being read to from a handout (like I've done in the past). I even linked to an Aretha Franklin video of "Respect". The date on the video was 1967 - can you think of any current songs that will still be around in 42 years? The kids couldn't.

They seemed pretty impressed with TextMarks. I plan on updating the assignments daily (must remember to do that!) so they can text in and get the homework if they forget to write it down or are absent. I actually had a former student in the hall ask me about it after hearing from one of his friends! I told the kids to pull out their cellphones and give it a shot. One kid was like, "I've been waiting to do this all day!" Funny.

I spent a brief moment on Twitter, talking about the new account I've set up for my classes. None of the kids have twitter accounts and didn't seem interested, but I'm still going to give it a shot. I was told in my 7th period class that twitter was "dumb". It definitely hasn't hit that age group yet!

All in all, a good day. The weather wasn't so bad (we don't have a/c), though tomorrow's supposed to be warmer. The best thing is that this day is over - I always dread this first day and all of the boring talking that needs to happen! Now we can get to the fun stuff. The math. :)

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