Tuesday, July 18, 2006
More Training
I'm in training at my school district this week. So far we're getting told about learning methodologies and taxonomies. Yeah, it's about as fun as it sounds. Who'd have thunk you need to break complex ideas into simple ones in order to teach them? Apparently we need to be told that very thing using fancy words because we're too stupid to figure it out for ourselves.
For the last couple of days my learning partner has been a fresh from college teacher. She's had all this stuff recently in classes, and I've seen it all recently in my ACP (Jimmy: that stands for Alternative Certification Program). She has learned this stuff more recently, and more formally, than I so she's been helping me understand what they really mean when they use the fancy jargon.
Every few minutes the instructor will ask a question and tell us to discuss it with our partner. Many times I would find myself not paying attention and frantically rewinding in my brain to try and figure out what the question was. This as I'm turning to my partner and see her looking at me like she's being nice and giving me first shot. At one point I can't remember the question at all. We just sit there staring at each other and she finally says, "I wasn't paying attention." Whew. I tell her I wasn't either, and we come to a new understanding of how similarly we feel about this. It's too bad they're making us switch partners from time to time because we get stuck with people who are really into this and like to nit-pick silly points. The elementary teachers are the worst at picking at the fine distinctions that really don't matter. I wonder why that is?
For the last couple of days my learning partner has been a fresh from college teacher. She's had all this stuff recently in classes, and I've seen it all recently in my ACP (Jimmy: that stands for Alternative Certification Program). She has learned this stuff more recently, and more formally, than I so she's been helping me understand what they really mean when they use the fancy jargon.
Every few minutes the instructor will ask a question and tell us to discuss it with our partner. Many times I would find myself not paying attention and frantically rewinding in my brain to try and figure out what the question was. This as I'm turning to my partner and see her looking at me like she's being nice and giving me first shot. At one point I can't remember the question at all. We just sit there staring at each other and she finally says, "I wasn't paying attention." Whew. I tell her I wasn't either, and we come to a new understanding of how similarly we feel about this. It's too bad they're making us switch partners from time to time because we get stuck with people who are really into this and like to nit-pick silly points. The elementary teachers are the worst at picking at the fine distinctions that really don't matter. I wonder why that is?
