I survived!

Thursday was the first day of school and I survived. Wow, it’s a fast pace… class after class after class. I decided to give myself permission not to worry about taking attendance because I was more interested in making sure I had everything else going smoothly. Attendance would have required me plugging in my computer, remembering the log in and password to get on the net at school, and then logging into our online attendance system with a different login and password. Complicated, but I was able to do it on Friday. And I had lunch duty on Thursday too. The middle school group is outstanding – well behaved, intelligent, cute, and respectful. The high schoolers are great except for a few who have that look on their face like they could care less about what I was saying. BUT, overall, I’m really excited about the year.

It’s going to be an extremely busy year. I realize that with a lot of planning, the day runs very smoothly and everyone has fun (me & the students). I like to know where papers are and make sure the students have stuff to do at all times. I did a lot of Q&A in science on Friday and I think it went well.

Next week I told the students (the middle schoolers) that we were going to dissect a potato. Some of them got wide eyed… then I told them I was just kidding. Actually we are going to do a controlled experiment with manipulated variables and responding varialbes using a potato. One half of the potato will be exposed to light while the other half of the potato will be kept in darkness. We’ll count the spuds coming off after 1 week and again after 2 weeks. I thought about doing the keeping flowers fresh lab, but flowers are more expensive than potatoes…

Friday we had chapel. We’ll have chapel every Monday and Friday. Chapel consists of worship music and a short message. As I was sitting next to some really nice teachers and singing worship music, I realized… I’M AT WORK!! Praising God at work!! I love it.

Today I planned lessons from 1-7:30pm. I met up with a friend for dinner and felt good to have a break. But planning lessons is fun because I really like the topics. The high school science topic is intimidating because it isn’t my specialty. The middle school topics are less intimidating. And Pre-Algebra is just plain fun.

It’ll be good to keep a journal on this blog. I know there will be trials too. I also want to give thanks and praise to the Lord for this blessing He has prepared for me and given me. And I want to say and believe that everything I do is all by His strength. But I try hard and I forget to ask Him… but I need to take time to continually ask Him to help me with planning and what I’m going to say and how I’m going to keep up the energy to do this until May! God is so good.

Preparing for Life Science

Things are going well in preparation for 7th grade life science. One challenge has been getting a good night’s sleep because I am both excited and anxious. I’m also dreaming about teaching. I can’t remember the specific events in my dream, but I don’t think teaching was a pleasant experience in my dream. I don’t know what teaching will be like and the anxious part of me wonders if the first day will be a disaster. Will the students know that I’m nervous? Or will I pray so much ahead of time that the Lord will strengthen me so that I’m not nervous. I know the Lord will strengthen me and help me – and I may still be a little nervous on the 1st day. I need to live out what I say I know (trusting Him for my first days of school and knowing He will sustain me). More prayer needed (personal time in prayer and meditating on God’s promises).

On a bright note, I planned out the year in Life Science using the tools from the Prentice Hall text book (pacing for each section) and an Excel spreadsheet. Initially I planned everything and forgot about holidays… so things looked great! But with holiday’s inserted, it looks like I may run out of time at the end. I think I need to cover all 16 chapters in the book, but in my plan as is (providing an extra lab day, lab-review day, and test day for each chapter), I will only be able to gloss over 3 of the last 4 chapters of the book (Unit 4).

My textbook is new and looks pretty good. My textbook has lots of teacher resources. However, my textbook is a secular science text book and some of the California Standards (the Big Idea, Main Objectives for teaching in 7th grade life science) place a heavy emphasis on the theory of evolution and, of course, the theory of Creation (which I believe to be true because I trust scripture and place my faith in God’s word AND scientific evidence does not contradict, but supports what is in the Bible) is not discussed at all:

(taken from the California Life Science book, Prentice Hall, Copyright 2008)

Standard Set 3: Evolution; Biological evolution accounts for the diversity of species developed through gradual processes over many generations. As a basis for understanding this concept:

a. Students know both genetic variation and environmental factors are causes of evolution and diversity of organisms.

b. Students know the reasoning used by Charles Darwin in reaching his conclusion that natural selection is the mechanism of evolution.

c. Students know how independent lines of evidence from geology, fossils, and comparative anatomy provide the bases for the theory of evolution.

d. Students know how to construct a simple branching diagram to classify living groups of organisms by shared derived characteristics and how to expand the diagram to include fossil organisms.

e. Students know that extinction of a species occurs when the environment changes and the adaptive characteristics of a species are insufficient for its surviva.

Standard Set 4 (which I will not copy out in it’s entirety) reads: Evidence from rocks allows us to understand the evolution of life on Earth.

WAIT A MINUTE!!! Evolution is a theory not a fact. So I’m going to dig deeper. I have lots of ideas on how to get the students to think critically about the scientific method and how presuppositions affect the final conclusion for the theory of evolution and the theory of creation.