We are completing the 9th day of school. I've enjoyed this course and the knowledge it can provide to students and am so excited for the school year. But, I've also been a little disappointed.
On the first day, we had students balance a checking account just to see where they were at. I was amazed at how many did not get the correct balance in the end (all the more reason they should be in this course!). Many didn't have the correct check numbers and didn't know how to handle a voided check - not too big of a deal - so I made sure to go over in more detail about that. I also had students complete a survey to just get an idea of how others manage their finances. Of the 72 surveyed, 19 still use a hand-written register and 22 stated they used some software or app. Students were only allowed to interview one person under the age of 25 and only one person per household. I saw 2 surveys that they clearly interviewed a person from each generation - balance by hand, use an app, don't at all. I would imagine as this current generation grows, more and more will just depend on the balance the bank tells them. That scares me!
As we wrap up our first unit, students had a project they had to complete. They could choose 1 of 4 topics, and it was either a presentation or a paper. We designed this awesome rubric on what we expected and how they would be graded. So many have been just basic information. Since we gave 2 days of class time (almost 3 hours) for researching and putting it together, I think I was expecting better. Only a few are MLA format. They were supposed to be a minimum of 2 pages (that's it!!) and several are just over a page. Is this what English experiences with essays? I'm going to have to monitor them a lot more with future projects that's for sure.
On a positive note, students are asking great questions, so I'm loving that. They are curious and want to learn more. I'm hoping that continues as we move into more topics.
Experiences of a high school teacher.
30 August 2016
17 August 2016
Amazing Department!
I have an AMAZING department! We added 3 teachers to our department this year, and 3.5 last year. Our growth in the number of students and section numbers has been great.
Going into my 11th year of teaching, I actually have the second most teaching experience in our department. My team is young! It's scary (because I'm not anymore) and exciting, and not common. But that youth brings so many ideas and willingness and hard workers. And I love them - they are my family!
With that background, I also remember what it was like being new to the profession/site: nervous and poor! The past two years I've given small gifts to each teacher in the department as a welcome back. It's included just a few commonly needed things - a pencil holder, pens, pencils, markers, post-its. This year, I decided to do something a little different as I know sometimes you just need a little extra to make it through the day. So I got a little bin and just filled it with various candies, and then a few pencils, sharpies, and post-it. I made a cute label to go on the top of each and then created a saying to go with each item. It's a small thing I can do to welcome them back, thank them, and wish them an awesome year! (and now that the year has started and I gave these out to my team, I can finally post this!)
Going into my 11th year of teaching, I actually have the second most teaching experience in our department. My team is young! It's scary (because I'm not anymore) and exciting, and not common. But that youth brings so many ideas and willingness and hard workers. And I love them - they are my family!
With that background, I also remember what it was like being new to the profession/site: nervous and poor! The past two years I've given small gifts to each teacher in the department as a welcome back. It's included just a few commonly needed things - a pencil holder, pens, pencils, markers, post-its. This year, I decided to do something a little different as I know sometimes you just need a little extra to make it through the day. So I got a little bin and just filled it with various candies, and then a few pencils, sharpies, and post-it. I made a cute label to go on the top of each and then created a saying to go with each item. It's a small thing I can do to welcome them back, thank them, and wish them an awesome year! (and now that the year has started and I gave these out to my team, I can finally post this!)
16 August 2016
Classroom Decor
As the new school year gets ready to start, I've been working on cleaning up my classroom and reorganizing a few things. This summer I decided I needed to fix my pennants. As I was getting more (which I got two more this summer - University of Oregon and College of Idaho!) I realized I wasn't utilizing my wall space well enough. So I lined them up a little better and attached them to the wall that students would see immediately when they walked in. Having a lot of Seniors this year, I really wanted to highlight the college mentality. And I love that I am representing different colleges than what they may be familiar with.
When I first started at my current school (2011), I had created THINK posters. I really liked this saying and I wanted to remind my students to always think. This year I saw on Pinterest an addition with Social Media. I'm constantly reminding my students about this, so I decided to add this to my wall too.
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| Found on Pintrest |
Here is Social Media Images File if anyone would like to have them. I'm sure I will need to change them out in the future, but for now this seemed like a good collection of frequently used media.
The last set of pictures below are just additional signs I have in my room. As a math teacher, I remind students often about the "how" and "why" explanation to problems, not just "what did you get". And the most common question - "when will I need this?" I saw this answer in a summer school classroom a few years ago. It summed up perfectly how I felt so I recreated it (file here). I don't think I've been asked the question since I put it up last year, but a new set of students will be walking in tomorrow morning, so we will see!
I'm still working on reorganizing some other things. As the year gets ready to start, I realize I've spent a lot of time making sure everyone else is ready and set, but I sort of forgot about myself...oh well! I'll figure it out as I go along.
02 August 2016
Reconciling Accounts
We are offering Financial Algebra for the first time at our school this upcoming school year. Myself and my former student teacher (I say that because we work awesome together and we hired her last year!) will be teaching 2 sections each of the third-year elective math course. I'm both very excited and crazy nervous! When I taught Integrated Math 1 the past 2 years, we discuss simple and compound interest and I become SOOOO passionate about the topic. Last year we even discussed credit card statements and the "minimum" payment!!
As we started preparing things for this year, we decided to do Chapter 3, Banking Services, first. The first two sections are on Checking Accounts and Reconcile a Bank Statement. It got me thinking ... does anyone use a check register or reconcile their accounts anymore? My counterpart said she just looks at her account balance online. Although I'm about 5-6 years older than her, I kept a written check register for the longest time (probably stopped in 2005 - my husband still keeps receipts for me because I used to make him do it all the time!!). I've been using Quicken for almost 10 years to manage my checking and savings accounts. I enter every transaction and categorize every expense. Am I the only one???? In asking a few others, I feel like I am! So, I wonder at what generation did that switch occur?
We decided to introduce the idea of how to balance a checking account by seeing if the students could with little to no direction. We figured this generation isn't writing a ledger of transactions, but depending more and more on the information provided online by their bank. I also decided that I wanted to see what others did, so I'm having each student quickly interview 3 people (Survey document) as homework on the first day. I haven't yet decided if I want to do a Google Form yet for the data, but I think the results may create a great discussion in class.
Since we only have 3 days figured out of this course, I'm back to planning. But, what are your thoughts on reconciling accounts?
As we started preparing things for this year, we decided to do Chapter 3, Banking Services, first. The first two sections are on Checking Accounts and Reconcile a Bank Statement. It got me thinking ... does anyone use a check register or reconcile their accounts anymore? My counterpart said she just looks at her account balance online. Although I'm about 5-6 years older than her, I kept a written check register for the longest time (probably stopped in 2005 - my husband still keeps receipts for me because I used to make him do it all the time!!). I've been using Quicken for almost 10 years to manage my checking and savings accounts. I enter every transaction and categorize every expense. Am I the only one???? In asking a few others, I feel like I am! So, I wonder at what generation did that switch occur?
We decided to introduce the idea of how to balance a checking account by seeing if the students could with little to no direction. We figured this generation isn't writing a ledger of transactions, but depending more and more on the information provided online by their bank. I also decided that I wanted to see what others did, so I'm having each student quickly interview 3 people (Survey document) as homework on the first day. I haven't yet decided if I want to do a Google Form yet for the data, but I think the results may create a great discussion in class.
Since we only have 3 days figured out of this course, I'm back to planning. But, what are your thoughts on reconciling accounts?
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