Reinventing the Wheel

Finally, the end of the summer session is here. Actually, I shouldn’t say finally because it’s gone pretty fast. I think I might be the only one who is a little disappointed that we’ve had half our classes cancelled (mostly in the last week). Not having taken a formal stats course, I was looking forward to the Chi-squared statistic lecture in 695. /math nerd/ Also, the discussions we’ve had in 649 and [(402+490)/2 == 446???] have been really interesting. Especially the discussion about ID and evolution. Every time that discussion comes up, my eyes roll to the back of my skull and I get this vision of me being fired for making fun of creationists==ID-ists. I guess I haven’t learned as much from our diversity class as I thought, because I still don’t have much tolerance for even engaging in that ‘debate.’ Just the fact that teachers have to qualify their units on evolution with statements about belief/religion/faith is ridiculous. Does one need to ‘qualify’ one’s unit on gravity incase some people have faith that little magic invisible pixies pull all objects to the ground? I don’t see the need. Obviously, the magic pixie theory is possible. Obviously, the magic pixie theory is impossible to verify by the scientific method and in fact there is no scientific evidence that supports it. This might be why it’s not discussed in a science classroom. Ok, enough…

One thing I was hoping for out of the summer session was this: how do we actually use this stuff in our content area classrooms? Socratic seminars and substantive conversations are great, but how do I use them in a physics or math classroom? I have to believe there is a way and I can’t believe I’m the first one to think about this. Is there some resource from which we can get ideas or will we have to reinvent the wheel? This applies to the 504 Tech class too. It’s great that we’re learning how to start a blog and use RSS feeds and make podcasts. But I could have done all this stuff myself in like an hour instead of two or three 3-hour sessions on Friday afternoons. And if I had one-on-one help from experts like Jeff and Liz, it might have taken less than 45mins. Then I could concentrate on how to apply this new stuff to a physics or math class. Hopefully we’ll have a chance to do this stuff in the content area class.

Overall though, it’s been an all around amazing six weeks. Amazing instructors, amazing classmates, and an amazing amount of work. Also, amazing. Meow.

The future: We're going to Leelanau in NoLo, Mich the week of Aug 10. Yes, I did just coin the term "NoLo." There's a lot of baseball to be played in the next 2 weeks: 3 regular season games, one more that isn't rescheduled yet and then the tourney. 31 days until football season + I saw The Dark Night last weekend == me am happy.