My Anatomy Student

(Before anyone asks, no, this is not an actual photo of my student!)
I just received an email from the math teacher of a kid I teach in Honors Anatomy. This student was not going to be in my class for the midterm tomorrow so he came into my 6th period class to take the exam early. He had told me that his math teacher would not mind him missing the start of his class for this but I told him to check with him beforehand anyway. When he came in to take the test I again asked him and he assured me that he had cleared it with the teacher. After the test he asked for a pass because he said the teacher wanted to know that he had been in my class. It sounded reasonable so I gave him a pass to class. This teacher said that he knew nothing about it and the kid came in 20 minutes late for a test they were taking. I recommended that he mark him as unexcused absent and penalize him accordingly. I will be taking action with this student the next time I see him as well. Honors student? Apparently not when it comes to telling the truth.

And they wonder why teacher blood pressures are usually so high!

FCAT Writes 2008

This year the state of Florida is requiring all high school students to pass the FCAT Writes test in order to graduate. I gave this test to my 10th grade homeroom and it's official. They are for the most part terrified at the prospect of having to pass this test. Parents have been building it up in importance to the point that many of them had that "deer in the headlights" look while testing. I really don't think they have anything to worry about as they seemed to try their hardest and took it very seriously. I do have qualms about putting this much pressure on them to succeed on a test that in my opinion has dubious value in actually demonstrating proficiency in writing. I think they would do better if parents and the state would tone down the pressure and let them show what they know without putting them through this ordeal.

The Strangeness of Growing Older

I took the day off and went to my doctor for a doppler ultrasound scan of the neck arteries and heart. My doc thought he heard sounds of a possible blockage in one of my carotid arteries and wanted to check it out considering my heart problems a year ago and my age. The results won't be back for a couple of weeks but I got to watch the screen while the test was being given. There is a little plaque in the carotids but not anything that appears excessive. The heart seems to be doing ok from what I could see and hear. Valves were closing nicely and I didn't hear any obvious backflow. Of course I'm not a doctor and I don't even play one on TV so I'll have to wait for the official results to be certain. I guess that 37 years of eating fatty foods have left some deposits in the old blood vessels. I've been a vegetarian now for about 15 years. Last year I started a walking regimen and I average about 3 miles per day now. I've also been taking flax/borage oil each day. I've dropped 20 pounds the past year, now down to 176. I would like to slowly lose another 10 pounds and get rid of the rest of the belly fat that has creeped up on me the past few years. Hopefully continuing the diet, oil pills, antioxidant vitamins, and walking will clear out most of the small amount of plaque deposits that are there. I plan on getting healthier doing this over the long haul and avoiding doctors as much as possible. In the meantime I'll let you know when the official results are in.

I am so tired of it all

The science and math departments were required to sit through a sales pitch by a statistician who is trying to unload her FCAT pretest and remediation questions to our county. Sound good? It's 26 science questions given to the kids. Now I'm not a statistician but I wonder how 26 questions can adequately measure all areas of science that a student should know! The results are analyzed out the wazoo and sets of science questions designed to remediate the potentially weak areas on the damn FCAT test are given to the students daily until they know everything they need to know to pass the test.

Let me point out two things. First, we are expected to teach all weak areas in all branches of science to do this. Frankly, I am not a chemist nor a specialist in physical science. I am a biologist and that is what my training has been in for the past 27 years. I have no desire to "teach" chemistry. The other thing is that the FCAT test is one of the worst tests I have seen for science. There are so many gaps in testing coverage of science areas that a student could do well on the test and still be practically illiterate as far as understanding science is concerned. Since the pretest is based upon the FCAT it is destined to have the same huge coverage gaps.

The students no longer need a teacher. They need a computer with a set of FCAT questions on it. I love actual teaching and would hate to be around to see its final death in Florida.

The FCAT test

Well, we are halfway through that enormous waste of time and money called the FCAT. The kids just wasted 2 days with the reading and math sections. Next week is the science and norn referenced tests, which will waste 2 more days of teaching. Yes, that's 4 days of teaching lost to this pitiful excuse for a comprehensive test. I emailed 6 state representatives about this garbage test. Wouldn't you know that 4 of the emails bounced! They can't even keep their email buffers clear and we expect them to make decisions about education??

Our new governor Charlie Christ wants to bribe us further to teach the test by "rewarding" the 25% of teachers who best teach the FCAT with a 10% bonus. This is up from the 5% bonus that Jeb Bush wanted to bribe us with. I think I will tell Charlie where he can put my bonus. This simply disgusts me. Our county turned down the state bribe by 70% against, 30% for. In true democratic tradition we are now threatened with having to implement their program anyway, at our own expense. Why did we even bother to vote on it? When it comes to education Florida is rapidly becoming the fascist bubba mecca of the South. There's nothing like good old boy politics to completely screw up the educational system in a hurry.