Donuts and a Dog

On Monday I had my students read the following story. Then they had to find any "math problems" in the story and write expressions for them. An example is shown below.

One day, Michael and three more people decided that they were bored. For the past week, all they had done was watch the new Soldier Boy video and learn the dance. First they thought they should get a snack. They bought three packs of eight donuts. While they were eating their donuts, two fewer than the total number of boys decided to throw their donuts at a dog. They threw one-third of the total number of donuts and hit the dog in the face. The dog was upset for two more than three minutes, but then it realized “Hey! Those are donuts!” and so it ate them.

While the dog was eating the donuts, one less than the total number of boys thought it would be a good idea to get something to drink. They bought a twelve pack and divided it evenly among the whole group. They drank their Mountain Dew while they watched the dog. The dog decided that it liked Mountain Dew, so it stole two out of the total number of sodas. Unfortunately, the dog doesn’t have any hands, and its teeth were really weak, so it couldn’t get the bottles open. It went home and cried.

1. Expression for total number of people, p = 1+3 =4

Confirmations

This week I have been blessed by two independent forms of confirmation. Actually, come to think of it, there have been more than two, so I will put the total at 4, but I only will speak of two in this post. How's that for useless information.

On Monday, I taught a rocking lesson. There is no way around it. Basically, I had my kids read the story in the post above, and then we talked about changing words into numbers etc etc. What was even better though, is that my district math specialist, district math interventionist and school math specialist all visited my classroom on a walk through. And they came during my second best class. And they were rocking hard core.

My district math specialist said "This is awesome. I want to clone you."
me: "What?"
Her: "I want to clone you and put you in every school in the district. This is exactly the kind of stuff we need to be doing in our classrooms."

So...yea. That's a pretty glowing review.

The second confirmation was second hand, so that tempers it slightly. Basically, someone who's opinion I respect in TFA told my roommate and I that "It would be a shame if you do not go on staff next year. You might not be AMAZING teachers, but the things you are thinking about, the work you are doing, this is what this organization needs."

To temper these moral boosters, are three independent confirmations that I am a secret-selfish-jackass. What happens is that my default personality is such that I meet 95% of expectations (for personal interaction) placed upon me, but once the friendships/relationships become more important, I inevitably do a sabotage maneuver by not really thinking about the other person. I don't really have an explanation other than, "I don't think I have been challenged before." Which I think is true.

So the thoughts running through my head currently are "what does it look like if I really focus on something?"

Yet another reasons clubs suck

So you are probably thinking "Yea right. There is no way that this guy goes to clubs."

I understand this thought. But it's simply not true. See, here's what happened.
First, I realized that I enjoy dancing quite a bit. Second, I moved to Houston. Third, I decided "I'm gonna dance like crazy and not even care what anybody thinks."

Well steps 1 thru 3 worked perfectly. I know go dancing regularly, and might even be considered above average. I still, however, have a problem with a few things, in general.

To begin with, I am not a huge fan of grinding. I mean, I can do it, I can keep the rhythm whatever. But what happens, is I will be dancing with some girl and then I will get to thinking "This is boring. I keep doing the same motion over and over and over. I need variety." And it's true. In general, guys who are grinding just...uh...thrust. (i just wrote thrust. this is a ridiculous topic). The girl might do some other stuff, but the guy...nope. And yes, I can, and do, change the from side to side to other junk, but really, the options are limited because of the grinding necessities. The point being, it's just kind of boring.

And then comes the random people at the club. I have no idea what most of the people at the club want to do, but normally, I go out with a group of friends, and as long as a couple of them are willing to dance, I have no problem dancing around like a crazy person for hours on end. Sometimes, ladies will come over and then be dancing around near me, and I think "I don't want to freak her, (b/c i don't want to freak at all)." So that's awkward.

Now, enter last night. Most of my friends were out of town this weekend, but me, two other guys and a female friend of ours decided to check out this new club we heard about. It's pretty cool, with all these different rooms with different atmospheres, but since we didn't bring girls to dance around with, my roommate and I had to go walking through the dance floor trying to find girls to dance with. Now I am not interested in taking any of these females home with me. Really, I do not even want to freak them. I just want to dance with/next to them.

We were shot down at least 5 separate times. It was ridiculous. I mean, I do not think I will win any fashion modeling tryouts or anything, but I am not an ugly person. I have been described as attractive. Same goes for my roommate. WTF. Maybe I just need a sign that says, "IASANSKWJWTD "- I am a single, attractive, non-serial killer who just wants to dance.

I guess the acronym needs some work.

Yea i'm late

sorry i haven't posted all month. school is cranking and i find that any energy i have when i get home i want to siphon (why is this not spelled with a y? can anyone tell me this?) into other outlets. pathetic i know. Of course, at this point, who really reads these things anyway? :^)

Lot's of updates, so I am going to brush over them all, and then, hopefully, just start posting regularly. That's the plan anyway.

• I joined an ultimate team! I played at sectionals this past weekend in Austin with Red Angus, a club team in Houston. They are pretty good, but definitely not Machine caliber.
• Austin is awesome. It beats Houston in every single possible category. If anyone is thinking of a move to Texas, Austin is my recommendation. And, the fields at UT were pillow soft. I layed out a lot.
• I caught a lay out huck for a score at sectionals. Go me. I also THREW a scoober score! Hah! And of course, I had the requisite "I'm tall and going to D you" action. Those are the highlights.
• This summer I hung out with this girl who is awesome. There was mutual attraction. But she was in GR. I left. Now she's dating some one else. Figures. :^)
  
• I started a Bible Study. Actually, I was prompted to start a Bible study after attending a small group from my church and being thoroughly disappointed and thinking "I could do at least 8.354 times better than this myself! And I will!" And I did.
• Our fourth roommate finally moved in! We now have 4 guys living in the most fly house ever possessed by TFA members in the history of the world. Seriously. Our place should be on cribs. We have a pool. It's a three story townhouse. We have a gourmet kitchen with a two level dish washer, wine fridge, double ovens, industrial gas range, and custom cabinetry. Not to mention the chandelier that hangs over the third floor bath tub!
• School is going sooo much better this year. Really there is no comparison with last year. It's like going from T-ball against 2nd graders to playing 1AA (I'm definitely not in the pros yet). Still, extremely good.
• I still don't know if teaching is for me. A friend of mine told me that she did not really start loving teaching until her 3rd year. That baffles me. Who knows.
• I am currently eying Denver, CO and Portland, OR as my next likely stops. They both rock, and they both have a Big Picture School. Assuming I want to teach. They also have engineering of some sort, since they are big, with Lockheed being in Denver, and I have no idea what, in Portland.
• I am still 6'7"
• I bought a mountain bike. I love to ride it.
• We are throwing kickin parties at our place fairly frequently.
  

Yea, that's about it, I guess. Umm...more later.

People Who Should Be Replaced by Elmos and Litepros

Oh man. The title was just suggested by my roommate and my eyes are watering. But seriously. I am talking about a large group of...um...teachers? at my school.

I am starting year 2, and there are individuals who I am still not sure what function they actually serve. Really, when you think about it, if it is not immediately apparent what you do in your place of employ, you are either A) so awesome that you are used only on an as-needed basis or B) you are so useless no one wants to use you for anything.

I have some personal exposure to some of the individuals to whom I am referring, so I know that if they fall into category A, they must be hiding it pretty darn well.

In other news, Mr. F and I want to write some grants for Elmos and Litepros. We feel like these two items will really bring our teaching to the cutting edge of technology. Or in other words, they will help us to do less work. And yea, our teaching will probably be more entertaining for our students, but really, it's to do less work.

As a result, we reach the natural next step: they should just fire the useless people and replace them with the Elmos and Litepros that we want.