Mistakes Are Good... As Long As I Learn... Right???

Hello interwebs... I guess it has been a couple of months... Lots of stuff going on and it is hard to find time to blog... But I feel the need tonight because I have come to some realizations today and I need to get it all out of my head so I can think rationally again. Then I can start to figure out a plan to fix things.

Earlier this school year I was offered the chance to teach an extra period during the day because our math analysis classes were too large. As a result, I lost my prep period. It seemed like no big deal at the time, but it has turned out to be a very exhausting gig. And I don't have as much time to get grading and planning done and copies made during the day. The extra money is nice though, so I will keep at it.

Because my planning time has been reduced, my AVID class has suffered. I am supposed to be getting them ready for college, but this year has degenerated into thrown together activities that don't make a lot of sense and study hall time that they don't take advantage of. There is no cohesion and I am doing them all a disservice. This realization came hard today when our AVID coordinator (a good friend) had a sit down talk with me. She was great. She wanted to help me get back on track and we will figure out how she can do that. I like teaching AVID, I just feel very inadequate with the curriculum. I don't know how to teach like that. I never have before, so it is scary for me. I just need to get over myself and do it. I will probably mess it up somehow, but that has to be okay. My students are walking all over me and I need to put a stop to it. I hope they understand that I am trying to help them. I am not sure how I will approach it yet, but it will happen. I have tried before to take better control of the class, but I can't sustain it. I need to figure out how I can.

This has been a difficult year for me anyways. I have had a lot more anxiety. The Common Core Standards have me all wigged out for whatever reason. I am unsatisfied with the Algebra 2 curriculum this year. Something just isn't right but I don't know what it is or how to fix it. I want to do things differently but I don't know how and it frustrates me. This is my eighth year of teaching, I should be able to adapt better and try new things without having an anxiety attack. I worry too much about what our administration and my fellow math teachers think of me. They probably think I am just fine, but my brain creates scenarios where I am deemed "not good enough for HHS" and they shuffle me off to somewhere else. I worry that new, hot-shot teachers will overshadow me and I will be just another old guy that is only good for teaching the classes that no one else wants. I WANT to do new and innovative things, but I am too insecure to step out of the box and try. I often wonder what I have to offer. I think that I'm a good teacher. I just don't know what makes me good.

I guess it all comes down to fear of failure. I know that I am not good at everything all the time. I am going to make mistakes. I would just rather make them privately so no one else knows.

Well... That's enough for now, I guess... Good night interwebs... See you next time...

Stay AWESOME...

Living By Some New Rules...

So... I ranted last Friday night... I removed the rant Sunday morning because I felt that I needed to do that... If you were one of the 7 unfortunate souls to read it before I took it down, I apologize for my sudden lapse in rationality... While I can say that it helped to rant and I am feeling better now, there is still frustration and anxiety... I will get through it and everything will be fine... I just need to take a chill pill and stick my nose to the grindstone...

As I was reflecting about that rant, I remembered seeing a picture on the internet about the 7 rules of life... So I did what any sane and rational person would do and got on Pinterest to find it... Lol... I found it in different forms, but I like this presentation the best... It has just a little bit of sassy to it and it makes me smile...

I am usually really bad at following the first 6 rules and pretty good at number 7... However, my friend, Mrs Bestie (she knows who she is), has commented to me that I have been slacking on number 7, too... This is what good friends do and I am glad she said something... So I am going to make the effort to get back on the horse and start keeping these rules the best I can...

Number 7 is easy to start with... Numbers 3 & 4, too... My difficulties lie in #1, #2, #5, and #6... Those things are soooooooo hard for me to do...

I dwell too much on past mistakes. I just do...

I think that everyone either doesn't like me or thinks I am arrogant or thinks I am only good enough for specific tasks.

I think everyone else is way better at life than I am because I do dwell too much on my mistakes.

I ALWAYS overthink things. It comes from being a mathematician...

I know it's not going to change overnight, but I am going to try my best... I'll get my AWESOME out again... Just wait and see...

Good night all you AWESOME peeps...

 

MTBoS (MathTwitterBlogosphere) is AWESOME...

So... This week is Mission #3 for my exploration of MTBoS. I got to look through a whole bunch of AWESOME websites that have a whole lot of AWESOME things on them. So I'll tell you about a couple that I really liked.

First... Dailydesmos.com... I didn't actually solve any of the challenges, but I got to play around with a really great free online graphing calculator... I even got the free app for my ipad. It is the best online graphing calculator that I have seen so far... I am sharing the website/app with my students tomorrow so that they have a good resource. Many of them can't afford a real graphing Calc and this will give them access to an AWESOME tool...

Second... www.visualpatterns.org... Pattern recognition, sequences, and series never got better for me... The patterns are challenging, but accessible to kids. It is also fun for me. I like puzzles a lot, so this site gave me some brain stretches to keep me sharp. Can't wait to try some of them when we get to that part of the curriculum. It'll be so fun...

Third (and last review)... onegoodthingteach.wordpress.com... A site where some teachers share the good things that happen every day amongst the chaos and frustration that exist in this profession. It is always good to find the good things amongst the bad so that we don't give up completely on the crazy, wonderful madness that is the teaching profession.

So... Here is my one good thing for today... (With a little background...)

Friday was an emotionally bad day for me for various reasons... That night I wrote a rant on my blog about it all... (If you were one of the 7 unfortunate souls that read that, I am sorry...) Anyways, Sunday morning came around and I felt that I needed to take it down, so I did. In the wee hours of Sunday morning I had some inspiration to reorganize my classroom and give the kids a new seating chart. So after church I sat down at my laptop and reorganized everyone in my Algebra 2 classes... They now sit in groups of four with an A student or B student at each table group... I didn't know how it would work out, but I had to try something...

Fast forward to this morning... My Math Analysis and AVID students took it in stride and made no complaint... There was some resistance from my Algebra 2 students, but most of them accepted their fate and got to work... I had them working together on Factoring because the quiz last Friday was very top and bottom heavy... A lot of kids got it, a lot of kids don't... My one good thing was that I was able to relinquish control (which is really hard for me) for three whole periods and the kids ACTUALLY worked together and helped each other. It was AWESOME... Was it 100%? No..., but it was in the high 80s at least... Did some of those kids that didn't understand gain some understanding? Absolutely... I think it was a step in the right direction... We'll see how this journey continues...

Stay AWESOME...

There is AWESOME stuff on the Internet...

I recently found this AWESOME, AMAZING, WONDERFUL thing...

It's called the Math Twitter Blogosphere (MTBoS) and they are doing an AWESOME thing for math teachers that want to get connected. They have cool missions each week to help those of us that aren't connected to get connected. Teaching math is hard sometimes and can be overwhelming if you do it alone. Connecting with people that share your passion can make it so much easier.

I missed the first mission last week because I missed the tweet that announced it. Oh well... I just jumped in this week instead. (Kind if like D&D when someone is late to the group and the DM has to insert them into the game somehow...) It was AWESOME sauce...

This week's mission was all about using Twitter... If you don't know what Twitter is, look to the right and you will see my feed... It's fun, and really useful, and fun... I haven't used twitter to its full potential even though I have had it for over a year. This MTBoS has opened my eyes and helped a lot... Just after one night of working on a mission...

Part of my mission this week is to talk about something Twitter... So here goes...

I participated in my first ever Twitter chat tonight... It was AWESOME... It was an Algebra 2 chat. (So, boring for all you non-math people, but exciting for me.) A few things were talked about and I even added some comments here and there. I actually got a couple of amazing teaching strategies that I will actually be able to use and share at work... Seriously, my mind was blown... It was so cool... It was so neat to see how other people do things and how they teach different concepts. I think that this whole experience will help me to become a better teacher and I am so excited to do that. There is so much out there in the Twitterverse that I don't think I will ever get all the good stuff, but MTBoS has given me an opportunity to find some of it... Thanks guys...

Stay AWESOME sauce...

Building A Testimony

This week was Testimony meeting at church. I didn't go up and bear my testimony at all, but I did ponder a few things. I have been pondering these things for the last couple of months during testimony meeting, but have never felt the need to go up and share them. Not even today. For some reason I feel the need to put it out there now. Not sure why.

So here goes...

First and foremost, I asked myself what is (or what should be) the basis for a testimony. As I thought about it, I went back to the time that I was in my mission in Finland. That was back in the time before "Preach My Gospel" and we had the six discussions and "The Missionary Guide."

Well... In Finland, I gave A LOT of first discussions. Not many sixth discussions... (Actually... One sixth discussion). So, that information came flooding back to my mind and I determined that the principles in that discussion were a good starting point in building a testimony of the Gospel. Good thing they were the first things that we taught anyone, right?

Here they are..

1) God is our perfect Heavenly Father and He has a plan for us.

2) Jesus Christ is the Son of God and gave us a perfect example to follow.

3) Heavenly Father calls Prophets to reveal His plan to us.

4) Joseph Smith saw Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ and was called as a prophet for our time.

5) The Book of Mormon is a second testament of Jesus Christ along side the Bible

6) The Holy Ghost will testify of the truth when we sincerely ask.

There is some pretty AWESOME stuff here and I honestly believe that if a person can accept these six principles fully, then they have a good basis to build the rest of their testimony on. The rest of the Gospel just flows from this and can change lives. It's amazing...

I can testify to you that I know that these things are true. All of them...I didn't realize it until today that my own testimony has developed from these things. I really didn't understand the Gospel until I was in that frozen northern country serving the people and teaching these things over and over again. Apparently I learned a few things for myself. Go me...

Have an AWESOME week...

A morning walk with John Bytheway...

As many of you know, I have started walking, jogging, running every morning. I keep track of my time and miles with my iPod. Today I decided to listen to a talk by John Bytheway entitled "Be Thou An Example of the Believers." I decided I would walk until he was done talking, so I took a different course than I usually do in order to make time for the 55 minute talk. It is a really good talk and I recommend it to everyone and I will let you borrow it if you want. (I have it on CD, too.)

Anyways... Here is what stood out to me...

He talks specifically about this scripture and goes into some deeper meanings...

Here is the scripture...

1st Timothy 4:12... "Let no man despise thy youth; but be thou an example of the believers, in word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity."

When talking about the phrase "Let no man despise thy youth", he brings up a primary song that most of us should know, "Give", said the Little Stream"... He refers to a line in the first verse that says...

"I'm small, I know, but wherever I go the grass grows greener still."

He goes on to say that the stream shows a little humility by saying that it is small. (I also thought that maybe the stream may have been feeling a little inadequate. As many of us do from time to time.)

And then comes the "but".

And it's a really big "BUT" in my opinion... "Wherever I go the grass grows greener still."

So... The stream knows it is small, but it also knows that it can have a huge impact on the world that is travels through.

Now there was a lot more to the talk, but this really stuck with me the whole walk and I wanted to add my perspective...

Each of us (young, old, in-between) has things that we struggle with... that help us to be humble. Each of us KNOWS that we have these inadequacies within us that maybe no one else knows about. We are all like the Little Stream in one way or another. We are all "small" and we all "know"...

And then comes the "but"... That wonderfully, AWESOME "but"...

Wherever WE go "the grass grows greener still"... We have all been given something special from our Heavenly Father... A little piece of AWESOME... And we can take that AWESOME and use it to overcome our inadequacies for the betterment of the world around us. There is great potential in all of us. No matter how small or insignificant we may feel. Remember what Alma taught his son, Helaman... "By small and simple things are great things brought to pass." (Alma 37: 6)

So... Find and embrace your AWESOME (whatever it is) so that wherever you go "the grass grows greener still."

Have an AWESOME day...

Summer Fun

So... Summer vacation this year has been interesting in our house. We have had some theme weeks to keep the kids entertained. I think my wife and I should be up for Parents of the Year... Just sayin'...

 

 

 

So far it has been fun...

Have some AWESOME fun with your family this Summer...

 

Rules of Life... (For Me Anyways...)

Got this idea from another Blogger that I found while lost in the Twitterverse... In no particular order...

1) Be nice to everyone even if they aren't nice to you.

2) Love deeply... It's the only way to go...

3) Pray... Always...

4) Go to Church.

5) Read the scriptures... Daily... (It really helps)

6) Exercise... It's good for the soul...

7) Take your Wife out once in a while... (Or husband, or girlfriend, or boyfriend)

8) Continue learning after you are done with your "formal" education.

9) Read... A lot...

10) Go outside...

11) Love your job...

12) Cuddle with your kids....

13) Eat whatever you want once in a while... It is good to indulge sometimes, just not all the time.

14) Make a difference to someone else every day...

15) Eat Reese's Peanut Butter Cups because they are sooooooo good...

16) Spend time with family and friends. Doesn't matter what you do.

17) Follow your dreams wherever they take you...

18) Do something nice for someone else... Every day... Doesn't have to be a BIG thing...

19) Happiness is a journey. Not a destination.

20) Always be AWESOME sauce... Never Ketchup sweat... (Or Mustard pee)

A Few AWESOME Things From This School Year...

This school year brought some great things...

1) AVID... Not gonna lie... There were some ups and downs, but I think it all came out good in the end... It is helping me come out of my shell and into the world outside my classroom...

2) Twitter... Got into that whole craziness... It has been super helpful with finding out new things and checking up on kids that need the extra care. I am not the most interesting "tweeter", but it is fun to interact with everyone.

3) Discovering that I had an opinion on school policies even if no one important listened or did anything about it. I think that after 7 years I have finally begun to understand what education really is and what it needs to be. I have also come to understand that our campus needs some work and that I can't just sit back and "hope" someone will do something about it. If I think we need to change things, then maybe I should get out there and be a voice.

4) Discovering that others believed that I had something to offer. In the past, most people on campus never paid much attention to me. This year seems to have been the year when others have started to ask me for my opinion or advice on things. Not a lot of people, but the right people. It feels good to know that others recognize that I might have something good to offer.

5) My students... Both those that were actually in my class and those that I got to hang out with and get to know better... They are truly AWESOME and have been a positive influence on me this year...

It has been a good year of growth for me and I am looking forward to next year and the surprises that it will bring....

Stay AWESOME everyone...

Teachers and Storytellers

“The purpose of a storyteller is not to tell you how to think, but to give you questions to think upon. Too often, we forget that.” ---Brandon Sanderson

This came from a book I have been reading entitled The Way of Kings. Obviously by Brandon Sanderson. It is a fantasy novel and I am on my second read for this book. It is pretty amazing what you find on the second read that you completely missed on the first read.

This quote is one of those little gems that presented itself. There have been others, but this one stood out and really got me thinking. What if we changed just one word?

What if we changed the word "storyteller" to "teacher"?

Being an educator, this really got me thinking about what we demand from our students. Do we want them to be able to think and feel and react to the world around them in positive and beneficial ways or do we want them to get high scores on their tests so that our school "looks" good?

I have found that those who do the latter are not preparing kids to be useful people and citizens of the World. Have I been guilty of this in my short time as a teacher? Probably yes. Is it all that I have done? Absolutely not. I try really hard to not fall into the trap of "getting high scores". High test scores cannot be the final goal of education. It doesn't help the kids and it doesn't help the World.

I want my kids to think and feel and react appropriately. I try to give them opportunities to do these things each day and I know that I am not successful every day with every kid. But I am trying. I can't open up a kids head and pour in the knowledge and experience my short 35 years have given me. I just can't. It's not fair to me as a teacher, but it's also not fair to them as my students. They need to do it themselves. They need to fail once in a while so that they know what success really feels like. They need to understand that they have within them the potential to do great things, AWESOME things, without having to be told what to do every step of the way. They CAN do it, if they BELIEVE that they can.

I have learned that telling them "how to think" doesn't work out the way we think it will. I hope that I can be that teacher/storyteller that gives them "questions to think upon" and I hope that they realize that I did them a favor by doing so.

Stay AWESOME everyone...

The Way Things Are Measured

Three day weekend got me thinking about some things...

First, I thought about how I have defined friends in my life. I have many, many, MANY awesome friends in my life. They are wonderful people and help me to overcome a lot of challenges. Some of them I see more often than others and some of them I only see on social media because they live so dang far away. Still, these people have been an integral part of my development as a person and I am truly grateful for what they do for me.

It occurred to me this weekend that the QUANTITY of time spent with my friends is not as important as the QUALITY of time we spend. I have always had this thought itching at the back of my mind that if I am not hanging out with my friends consistantly on a daily or weekly basis, then that means they are upset with me or that they don't want to be friends. I know that it sounds stupid, but it just nags at me for some reason. (I have to get out of my head sometimes. It's crazy in there.) I realized that even though we don't get to spend a lot of time together, that doesn't mean that we aren't close friends and that we aren't important to each other. It just means that we are busy with the everyday challenges of life that overwhelm us. When we do get together, it is truly AWESOME and we have so much fun.

Case in point... This very weekend, we were able to get together with a family that we consider our Best Friends. I will call them the "Besties". They are the same age as we are. (Literally... The wife is a few months older than me and the husband is a few months younger than The Pretty One...) They have 6 kids between them. It is a His, Hers, and Theirs kind of family. The two older kids don't live at home with them, and the four younger are around the ages of our kids, so everyone gets along and we have so much fun together. Anyways... We hadn't been able to hang out with each other for at least a month. (It might have been longer). We went over for a birthday party for the oldest child who was visiting from Seattle. We were only there for about an hour and a half, but it was AWESOME to be with our friends and just hang out and have fun.

So... QUALITY is much more important than QUANTITY... Remember that...

Second realization.... Just because someone doesn't want to spend time with me or get to know me doesn't mean that I am a bad person or not worth knowing.

There are people that I come into contact with on a regular basis that I respect and that I think are successful in some way. I would like to know these people a little better, but they don't have the same desire to know me. I often wonder if there is something wrong with me. I ask myself, "Why don't they like me?" or "What have I done to make them not want to be friends?" It is silly. It doesn't really matter what they think of me or why they think that. What matters is that I am comfortable with who I am and am capable of doing good things. I can still learn from these people, but it will always feel awkward to be with them.

So... I don't HAVE to be friends with EVERYBODY in order to learn from them.

Third realization... (Last one, I promise)... I can't measure the amount of success I have by the amount of success other people have.

I look around campus and see the teachers that the students really like or look up to. I see people that influence students so much that they get mentioned in graduation speeches. I see people that the administration asks to do things ALL the time while everyone else doesn't get the opportunity to participate. I see these people and wonder why I am not one of them. Why am I not popular and cool like they are?

And then I think, why do I need to be one of these people? Why is it important? It really isn't that important. I don't need to be popular and cool to be successful in my career. I have my own little sphere of influence on campus. I don't come out of my classroom much because I am needed there. There are kids that come to my room because they know it is a safe place to be themselves without the criticism and judgements of others. I do what I can to help those kids that want MY help. Maybe I am not graduation speech worthy, or in with the popular kids, or in the in-crowd with administration (sad that that even exists). But it doesn't matter. I am doing the very best that I know how and I have been successful with a LOT of kids in my short 7 year tenure as a teacher. They weren't necessarily the popular and cool kids, but they were AWESOME in their own ways and I am grateful for the opportunity to have helped them to overcome difficulties in their lives.

So... Don't measure your success by someone else's scale.... Make your own scale...

Have an AWESOME day...

Happy Valentine's Day

To The Pretty One... She will probably kill me for posting these.... Lol...

Best day..... EVER....

We are so cute...

Still cute....

Getting older.... But still cute...

 

12 years later... Still cute...

It's been an AWESOME ride.... I love her with all that I am...

 

10 Quotes That Made Me Think

So... I was reading my friend's blog.... **cough, Stacy, cough**... She reminded me of that TED Talk that I had mentioned in a previous blog and talked about how she had made her students do the "10 Things that I know are true" list as an assignment in her English class... I thought that was really cool and it got me thinking about blogging again... So, I decided to do another list for you all... It took me all afternoon to decide what my list would be, but I finally settled on this topic...

So.... Here they are... In no particular order... 10 quotes that really got me thinking...

• "When you get into a tight place and everything goes against you, until it seems as though you could not hold on a minute longer, never give up then, for that is just the time and place that the tide will turn." ---Harriet Beecher Stowe
• "So many of our dreams at first seem impossible, then they seem improbable, and then, when we summon the will, they soon become inevitable." ---Christopher Reeve
• "Being challenged in life is inevitable, being defeated is optional." ---Anonymous
• "You must learn to walk to the edge of the light, and then a few steps into the darkness; then the light will appear and show the way before you." ---Harold B. Lee
• "Things should be as simple as possible but not simpler." ---Albert Einstein
• "Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new." ---Albert Einstein
• "If you cant explain it simply you don't understand it well enough." ---Albert Einstein
• "Life will knock us down, but we can choose to get back up." ---Jackie Chan (Karate Kid)
• "I believe that everyone else my age is an adult whereas I am merely in disguise." ---Margaret Atwood
• "If your day didn't include making someone smile, you're doing it wrong." ---Anonymous

 

That last one has become my favorite.... I like to think of it more as my main goal each day....

 

Oh... One last quote...

 

"Anybody can be cool, but AWESOME takes practice." ---Lorraine Peterson

So... Keep practicing all you AWESOME peeps... Remember to always be AWESOME Sauce... (Never Ketchup Sweat)...