Monday, November 15, 2010

Last Minute Change of Plans

I had decided last week that I wasn't going to use modeling to teach my Applied Chemistry. This is a lower level class that is mostly taken by kids who have an IEP or are considered at risk. Essentially, we go through the first half of chemistry. I have taught it for several years and more or less have it set up where I am happy with what I do and how the kids handle the material.

So, today we started our new trimester. Can you guess what I did? My first class starts at 8:25. At 8:15 I decided to abandon everything I was comfortable with, everything I had worked so hard to build for the last five years.

I think they can do it. I think I can do it. The clencher for me was my class sizes. Both sections have less than 13 kids, so I am pretty sure I can give each kid the attention and help they need to get it.

I briefly thought about modeling one section and not other, but that seemed really insane.
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4 comments:

  1. AnonymousDecember 11, 2010 at 7:22 AM

    How's it going so far?

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  2. SmileyDecember 31, 2010 at 9:34 PM

    Tracie,
    Modeling chemistry has been the best thing I have done for my students in 21 years! I just started it this year so I like you are really out of my comfort zone. However, my student have been a huge help to me in making it work. We, my new colleage and I, decided to use modeling for all levels of chemistry and we found that the Principles of chem students (comparable to applied) actually do much better with modeling and the labs than do academic students. They like the structure and are great at thinking out of the box. Good luck. I admire your courage to try new things....we sound a lot alike in our philosophy. I hope all works out with family....I had a similar situation many years ago with a sister in law....

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  3. Tracie SchroederJanuary 1, 2011 at 5:50 PM

    Frank and M - It's going great! One of these days I'm going to get a post on it :)

    ReplyDelete
  4. Smoked RecipesJune 9, 2023 at 3:07 AM

    Grrateful for sharing this

    ReplyDelete