I.T. to Teacher

Tuesday I was approached by the head of the science department where I am subbing and asked if I would teach another physics class so she could observe me since I was only observed by the principal before. Of course, I said yes. I took this to be good news because my competition had been observed the day before. I figure if he was impressive then they wouldn't ask me to do a second observation. So Wednesday I am observed teaching one physics class. I think I did well. I think there are things I could have done better, but I didn't do anything poorly. We'll see how that turns out. I haven't heard anything yet.

I just got a call from the public school I interviewed with a month ago. They want me to come in for an interview with the principal on Monday. You'll recall that last time I interviewed with a couple of deans. I'm not sure if anyone from the math department will be involved in this interview or not. Hopefully I won't have to do a third interview just to get someone from the math department there. As always, we'll see.

While showing a video today I had one senior girl who had her back to the TV, her knitting out, and was talking non-stop to her friend. I think if she shut her mouth for too long her head might explode from the pent up conversation energy. Several times I told her to be quiet to no avail. Finally, I told her that she needs to be quiet because other people are trying to watch the video, not listening to her talk. She looked around and seemed surprised that everyone but her and her friend were actually watching the video. Imagine that! She was quiet after that, though.

I think things went well today. The lab Headmaster was observing went fine. The kids were a little adventurous with hooking wires to the batteries so I got to show some guidance, but they were a good group and I didn't have any problems. He left when the kids finished their lab and started their homework so he missed playing with the Van DeGraff generator (static electricity machine, for those who have forgotten) at the end of class. It was a shockingly good time.

Go ahead and groan; that one deserves it.

I've been teaching (yes, teaching) math all week. I've enjoyed it. Teaching the same class for multiple consecutive days is a new experience. I've actually been giving them quizzes on stuff I've taught them. That's cool. There have been quite a range of grades, from the 40's up to perfect quizzes, so not everyone is understanding what I'm teaching, but most are. One of the other math teachers said they saw several students sitting after school outside the math classroom with their math books out and asked how the sub was doing. The students all said that I was teaching them everything they need to know. That's good enough for me. When I was sitting watching the kids take a quiz on material I taught it seemed surreal that I could be a teacher. But, when I'm up in front of the students it feels natural. An interesting week.

Today, I managed to get behind in the schedule the teacher set for me. There were short classes today, and the quiz the teacher made took much longer than she anticipated so I didn't get any teaching done. I cancelled the homework for tonight (no complaints heard) and talked to the other math teachers to see what to do about it. They weren't concerned. They're teaching this class tomorrow (more on that in a bit) so they'll just teach what I didn't get to today.

Tomorrow I'm teaching physics. Well, I'm showing a video to most of the classes, but in two of the classes I'm running a lab. During some part of the lab classes (not sure when) I'll be observed by someone (not sure who) so they can see if I'll be a good teacher or not. I hear Monday my competition is going to be teaching the physics class for their observation.
Hopefully this means I'll hear one way or the other soon about this job.

Not much has been happening lately. Lots of subbing, but nothing of interest to report.

We recently sold our VW (sorry, Shawn) and bought a new-to-us F150. The day after we bought it I encountered the truck owners curse. Have you ever seen the bumper sticker "Yes, this is my truck. No, I will not help you move."? How true. On this day I was helping my bro-in-law haul bricks and sand for a new brick-walk in their backyard. Now it's not like they roped me into it. We bought the truck to use as a truck so I was happy to get to try it out as such. Since we bought it as a truck we have since removed the ridiculous lid that covered the bed; I wanted a truck, not a trunk. Anyway, my truck was loaded up with (we calculated later) ~3000 lbs of bricks and sand for the drive home from the hardware store.


Note the difference in the vertical positions of the front wheel and rear wheel. Yeah, those are supposed to have the same gap for the wheel well. You're probably thinking "3000 lbs! What were you thinking? Don't you know that's a half-ton truck?" Yeah, well, I thought a half-ton truck was referring to it's weight, and I knew this truck weighs at least 4000 lbs so I figured it was a 2 ton truck. Silly me thought trucks like the S-10 were half-ton trucks. No, I don't know how much an S-10 weighs; I was just guessing. Recently I learned that the half-ton term refers to how much it can carry, not how much it weighs. Oops. Now I know... and knowing is half the battle.

Yesterday I applied online for a math position in the Crowley school district (south of Ft. Worth). More to come....

Today I had an interview at the school I've been subbing at. Headmaster, who you may remember from my earlier interview for a long term sub position, interviewed me for either a high school physics or 6th grade math position. There wasn't a lot to talk about since I know about the school and he knows about me, but he wants me to teach a physics class so someone (department head, physics teacher, him? We'll see) can see how I would do as a physics teacher. That's fine. I think I did well teaching the math class, and because of that I can make adjustments so I'll do even better when I teach the physics class. He wants to make a decision on the physics job by May 1. That's a lot sooner than I was expecting. I may have to make a decision about where to live much earlier than I was expecting. As always, we'll see....

(music swells)

ANNOUNCER: And the award for 1000 hits on a blog goes to...

(drum roll... artificial tension...)

IT to Teacher!!!

(crowd of hopefuls goes falsely wild in case the cameras sees them)

(the blogger virtually goes up to the virtual microphone while virtually waving to the virtual crowd)

Thank you! Thank you! Oh wow, it's great to be here today. Whew! I never thought I'd be the one up here today. (fumbles with a folded paper) Ok, lots of people to thank. (reading off the list) Thanks to my lovely wife for making all of this possible... um... to my in-laws for giving me this chance that has worked out so well... uhhh... my loyal readers! yes! thanks for reading, uh, loyally I guess, I've done this for you. Ok, they're giving me the "hurry up" sign. My family has been great. Thanks to the kids for the stories, keep them coming, ... my dog for all of her hard sleeping, my phone for the pics, my computer for it's keyboard, and, of course, my mouse "clicky" for all of it's hard work hitting "refresh".

(music swells)

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