Evening before Graduation

Sitting at the station waitng form my bus. In the background loud cries from graduating students on trucks echoes in the hall, making the waitinghall appear still and silent.

Entering the bus, I know that I have lots of work to do, preparing for my perfomance as a toastmaster tomorrow. I will have to think and write and contact my fellow toastmaster this evening.

It is only an hour and a quarter, but I haven't had the proper time to plan and practise our program. In fact, the program is not ready at all - only a rough outline. Still, I'm not nervouse, which make me nervouse! Somehow I know there will be something turning up.

Strange...

Strange, that one never seem to have enough time. Is this the backside of flexibility and creativity?
#betweenclass

morning poetry

at commutertrain
high speed washes away sleep
grabbing rosary
#betweenclass

Tue w 2 – A day of Other duties

Came to work and found myself alone in my office. Everything was dark and desolate. The cleaners had been there during the Christmas holidays so it wasn´t all cathacomb-like –which it always is when you leave it and time passes.

I saw signs telling me that at least one colleague had been there. The umbrella stood there like a welcoming stranger in attention. It was a new umbrella (for me anyway) and we greeted each other in the way only possible between between humans and objects.

My desk is never “a funny story”. Rather to be regarded as an excavation site where one can do all sorts of finds; from dinosaur fossils to signs of extraterrestrial life. This day it was even less fun and looked rather challenging.

I began to scrape and scratche and scrabble and scrooge the little piles and started clearing things up. I even dared going down one of the mines – the drawer labelled mentor - and could break a lot of finds that could be excavated and thrown inthe furnace of the bin.

"Mining" lasted all morning and was relieved of various mentor jobs of the more "boring" variety - check the students attendance and type warnings to some. Also had a half-hour conversation with a parent.

Walked around and accomplished some tasks and finished the day with a meeting in the library.

Mon v 2 - The beginning of the end

The school started after Christmas break. This week is the last week of the fall semester, making it both a beginning and an end. Suitable for the month of January, which was named after Janus - the god with two faces, one front and one back - this time of year is a bridge between the old and new. Janus looking both forward and backward with his two faces.

My start was more chaotic and not as wonderfull and "dreamatic" as Janus.
There was a study day and the information for this day was difficult to find and rather sketchy when finally found.

After a holidayI forget everything - feels like that anyway - and I need to update everything I had in my head before the holidays, including what would happen on this day.

Thought at first that I was free, after consulting with the schedule on the web viewer, but happened to find an old term planning by chance and read that it was a "studyday" (meaning that pupils are free, or working from home with asignments, and the teachers are engaged in conferences, workshops or other duties) with discussions of educational literature in the team. That was like ... a bummer?

Overslept and tried to reach various colleagues via SMS, but without success. Decided to work from a library instead and be accessible. Announced my oh-so-media-silent-colleagues on my choice and got to work.

Did some administrative and technical jobs, but also got some pedagogical work done as well.

Sat w 49 - Freedoooom

Done with examinations! Phiew! It has been tough. Time to relax and just enjoy an open fire.

Not long till christmas holiday. Suddenly it seems so near.

Sat w 49 - Soon finished examining national tests

Soon finished examining national tests. Really upset with collegues who can't read the forms but insists on extra comments. Waste of time!

If one knows the levels of quality (grades) then the form is enough. We check all levels obtained in the form. The teachers could easily answer their students question why they got a certain grade or not. They should also teach their students self-evaluation.

Finally they should let their students work with their articles and revise them. Giving them an opportunity to learn and improve.

Språk i blogg - Language in blogg

Kommer att blogga på svenska och översätta till engelska så fort jag hinner. -

Will write in swedish first and translate to english asap

En fråga - a question

Skall jag skriva på svenska, engelska eller både och?

Should I write in swedish, english or both?

Friday w 47 - work piles getting smaller

Early bird and quite tired, but woke up during my way to school. Had a good day without stress.

Swedish
Gave the class the speech assigment belonging to the national test. Saw some examples on the screen and atarted to work with the speech. The content of the speech must be done before next lesson. The class was doing ok.

Other duties
Checking up importent info and making important calls. Tic:ed off some stuff from my to-do-list and filed some new.

Swedish
Did some new planning with the class and checked up their progress. Seems only three or four have managed to formulate a research topic and find good sources. Some seems very lost. Shall I change task for them? They are writing a sort of extended essay.

Most of the pupils got to work and I was busy running around answering question and helping some verify their research topic.

Some went to the library other to group places. Got almost everybody going but the time ran out and they must work a lot at home.

One of the pupils keeps asking for help all the time and doesn't try to think by himself at all. Wonder the students expects me to do the work for him?  He doesn't seem to understand or remember the assigment even after multiple explanations. He claims he does not understand what he reads. Will talk to him to see what it's all about and maybe consult a pedagogue of special needs if neccesary.

Unfortunatly, I have seen some pedagogues of special needs from high school, or even earlier stages, "helped" their students getting through their courses, almost doing the assigments for them, instead of helping the students couping with their handicap and do things by themselves; thereby improving and developing them, instead of handicap them futher by doing things for them.

When lesson was over I packed my things and went home. Weekend. Yay!

Interpretation
Have to use my eyes and follow the signals and act immediatly instead of waiting. Some waiting is correct in order to understand and decipher but then it's time to act.

Thursday w 47 - an ordinary Thursday

Got in later then plannedu because of traffic problems. Snow has fallen and always seems to catch everybody by surprice even if it comes every year!

Religion class
Watched streamin movies about hinduism today. Wanted to show a movie from our "stash" but it was already taken, so we used both SLI and Youtube and watched. Afterwards we commented and discussed and took notes.

Students showed very patience and creativity when things didn't work as planned and contributed to the lesson with information, solutions and feedback.

Religion again
Had last lesson on christianity and a reward for the three best on the test, just for the fun of it.

We had made a competition with the "learning tests" to add some extra fun to it. Everybody had the opportunity to do the tests once each day and got their results immediatly. Everybody knew who had the best points and had a last go at them before reward was given.

The point with learning tests is to learn. The pupils are given study question and can look up information in the book or internet and study. The test is a multiple choise test where many alternatives can be true. Some of the answers are directly from the book while others require that the student understood the meaning behind the wordings of the book. The questions and their answers comes in different order for every student and they have 20 min to complete the test. Only the best results counts.

I follow up these test, which are more fundamental, with other tasks where the pupils must use their knowledge to solve problems, show how things are connected and build new knowledge.

Interpretation
Even if I think I know what will happen and have a plan, I must scrutinize it more. I didn't prepare enough (did only the intellectual part, but not the visualization and contemplation-part etc) on my way to school which gave negative result. Not much but still.

Wednesday w 47 - long time passing untill open house

Had a long but lesson free day which ended with an open house. Sat and examined hand-ins and updated the lesson logs for every course I have all day long.

Am waiting for log ins to Euphorus (a cheat finding database which can be used together with Fronter) and sended a mail telling their people I couldn't log in.

Did som mail job, readin, throwing and filing mails. Always avoid that because it takes a lot of time, but finally I have to deal I get quite a lot of mail.

Participated in the open house in the evening answering questions and directing people to the builder program (which I belong to beginning next school year).

Interpretation

Realized a bit more what great Power lies hidden in plain sight in Person.

Tuesday w 37 - game day & PBL

Tuesdays are much more relaxed. Only got one class where pupils study something they decide by themselves (school work). The problem here is to get them to do proper work and the collegues have therefore given the pupils the task of setting a goal for todays studies and follow up their result helping them evaluating their efforts. Did they finish what they planned?

Football training
Started this day with a football training session (not the everyday-start-of-the-day!). I was invited by one of the trainers and thought it would be great to see the sport students in their natural enviroment so to speak. It was also a great opportunity to watch how sport teachers and football (soccer) trainers works.

It went fairily well, being me. Am not a sporty type and don't train much. Haven't played football many times in my life. I had a good workout. The part where you control the ball and send to a partner back and fourth went...well, let's say that "feeble" is an understatement!

Did better when we played short matches. Managed to make a goal (unheard of!) With good support and a nice ball from one of the teachers. My team won 2-1. And, oh, did I say that the teachers played against the girls? ;)

Other duties
We had breakfast after training and after that I had a transfer-talk over a mentor student.

Sat and helped pupils with their paper and discussed imported things with a collegue. Got some tips about Skype and other stuff (ict-related) and installed it on my Droid.

Had some time for updating my lessonlogs on Fronter and go through my planning of courses. Communicated with former pupil on Skype and a teacher of a course which I'm attending. Had a session with a teacher, teaching her Fronter.

Religion
That done went to religion class. Had a visiting teacher student in class whom I prepared by putting the lession in context. Good conversation. Then had a great lesson (because of both me and the pupils) where we worked after PBL and entrepreneur pedagogy. The pupils where focused and creative and shared their knowledge, building up a great lesson.

Interpretation
Most important work is the work which is invisabe. All participating and conversations is a way of letting in Power to the people, groups and organization and building relation which will make them and me grow. Teaching in class is only the tip of the iceberg. This is also part of Teaching (growing).

Monday w 37 - time shortage

Busy day like all Mondays. Four lessons and a mentor class in a row. Hardly time to eat and no proper time between lessons.

2:nd year
Started with the 2:nd year. Had a bit of problems with my printer which took time and initiative from my lesson.

We worked with their papers today. Had to change the deadline since we lost some lessons due to my sick leave and and other shool activities. They must finish each step in a week, which leaves us four weeks to complete the whole paper. Had to put some preassure on them to get them to work.

Somehow I doubt that they will make it, well some of them will of course, but many will turn in crappy papers, I'm afraid. Well that is also a learning experience.

They sat and talked a lot and lost their focus time and again. I told them that and had a little lecture of the importance of paying attention to what they are doing and saying and what other are saying, especially teachers since they give them instructions. Even when saying that, I noticed at least five, maybe eight people who didn't listen.

Had mentor class without my mentor collegue. Even if information was short, pupils had a lot to say and ask which resultet in me coming late the next lesson.

3:rd year
Gave them the second part of the national test in mother language, which is speech. They refreshed their memory about the laws of speech and trained referring to sources. We also watched examples of speech and discussed the grades.

They where focused and and payed attention. Most of them worked hard.

1:st year
Had to dash of to the next lesson (on Mondasys, they are all piled on top of the other with only a few minutes between) and help the librarian to rig the projector and computer. Had forgotten to publish the whereabouts of todays lesson on Fronter but one student had seen me and messed the class so they found me.

Lesson went good but they where a bit noisy and lost their focus when they felt that they understood the point and were fed up with examples or found something embarresing. (At their age they experience more things as embarresing then later in life. Lessons are always artificial and lectures often tries to catch the people with least understanding to ensure that everybody gets it, but that is not always ok with pupils.) There is also a conflikt in the group between some of the boys and at least one of the girls.

The librarian got her point through and made the lecture interactive with test text and finshed with a youtube clip. Message repeted three times in three different ways. Perfect to the book.

Short talk afterwards, evaluating the lessonand he pupils reactions. Planned the next lesson briefly and finished the day.

Interpretation
The days theme is shortage of time because I haven't prepared myself mentally (focus, visualisation) and spiritually (meditation contemplation, IP and Dialogue).

My other duties require a lot of attention this time of year;organizing the national test and planning the budget etc. The shortage of time is also due to schedules of course but that is out of my limits and is therefor just something I have to deal with.

Still the message is clear: prepare and do the right things. Prioriate the most important things first. It starts spiritually and then goes over to mentally to end with pure intellectual planning and then of course keep track of time and act.

A good friday

Early bird after a late evening. Early to work with lot of class-free time. Could finaly catch up with other duties, even re-filing First lesson was turned into self study class (students request) and the second was cancelled because of some fellow collegues who wanted to re-do the deviding of tests. Took an hour!

That sorted went to a meeting with the librarian whom I have a twinning project with (about finding and valuating good information on Internet and use it correctly in essays and papers; quoting and referring sources) and prepared the next session.

Even managed to file importand papers and sorting out old stuff and return books and piles of papers to their right places.

Weekend with some peace after all hard work and strain.

Horrible day

It has been a horrible day. Started with the deviding of national tests where only four persons out of ten came. When faced with this circumstance we made a decision on how to devide the tests examine them.

Later this day people who weren't there was not pleased with the results and complained and forced through a decision which means that we'll have to do the whole thing again.

Still haven't finished the budget and a student in despair knocks on the door proclaiming that he is in trouble because he had not studied and needed some advise and encouragement which he got because he needs it and really had come to a decision to start studying.

Sat with him for at least half an hour giving him advice looking through his study situation,  schedual made a study plan and calmed him down.

When that was sorted I had to go to catch the train and buy some stuff. Had to take the budget home to finish it.

#teacher Busy body

Lots of work tomorrow:

sorting and dividing tests among examinators (myself included) early, making the budget for the department of mother language and having a study talk with a pupil and parents as well. And ah, yes, lessons as usual.

 

One thing's for sure - you don't get bored - you don't have the time! ;)

National test

Today is the day of the great national test in mother language. Lots of students are nervous and keep asking things I already have said.

Desided to upload some basic instruktion on an event on facebook.

Amazing to see how quickly some people answered their invitation and started diskussions in that event.

Now they got their instructions and only have to deal with their own wild hourses. I wish them all good inspiration and a good learning experience.

Time is wierd

Tims is a wierd thing. Sometimes running away, sometimes creeping at a murderous slow pace.

An author once said that if you want to experience a long life, you should sit in a dentists waiting room or stand in a que.

Even teachers must learn

Had a driving lesson today. It went fairly well. Learned some good things which will become much better. Had learned todays lesson and got another.

A good teacher must be a person who also is learning something to keep the learning process fresh in mind.