Homecoming Week Begins

Yes, it is the beginning of homecoming week here at school. To make matters worse, if our football team wins its game this week, we will be the conference champions outright. Here's why it gets worse:

1. Of course, very little education will be done this week (especially toward the end), because most students are more concerned about what they will wear, or how badly they will beat their opponents this week.
2. To make matters worse, the school is basically taking Friday "off". Yup, that's right, no real school. Oh sure the students will be in school, but the whole morning is scheduled as "float building". Then lunch. Then the homecoming parade. After the parade, there will be a pep rally. After the pep rally, school is dismissed.
3. During our weekly meeting with the students, we told the students that we expected them to work hard this week, have fun with the homecoming activities, and show school spirit. After that announcement, the Head Football Coach, announced to the teachers (and the students, because they were present) that football players probably won't participate much this week, "Because they have to maintain their concentration". Granted, they do have to concentrate, but by announcing this to the teachers (and the students), didn't he just guarantee that the football players aren't going to do a darn thing this week. (I can just hear it, I'm not working because I'm concentrating on the game, and I'm saving all my energy for the game.)

As you can tell, I'm a big fan of the homecoming activities. (Actually, I do see some point to them, but often it is overblown. To much fun and not enough learning.)

I'm not very happy with Head Coach's announcement. (To top it off, he never seems to put any information in the daily bulletin/announcements. Next thing I know, kids are being dismissed from class for one of his activities.)

Only other important thing today, I ordered my desk calendar for next year. Yippee!!!!
(And no, I did not get much grading done today, which means I'm even more behind. Crap!)

Run down for the day:

• ESCI - Reviewed for tomorrow's test. I thought they would do o.k., but after the review session (where I give them actual questions from the test), I'm not so sure. I gave them all but 2 questions today, and we probably only got half of them correct.
• Chem - Worked on some problems with naming compounds. Most of the students seem to understand. Tomorrow we work on the second half of the problems, writing chemical formulas.
• LSCI - Continued with notes. 10 minutes into notes, my overhead projector died, again! Stupid projector is really ticking me off. (I did fix it later.) Notes when really slow, but we had a nice class discussion as we went.
• PSCI - Review work. Sadly, I have the feeling in this class that I'm not working as hard with these students as I should be. Although it is toward the end of the chapter, which means I'm having the students do more review work.
• BIO - Review work. Tomorrow I give them a quiz. The same quiz in fact that I gave last week. Let's hope they do better. (I have even told them it is the same quiz.)
• Study Hall - I have several students that do not believe they need to study in class. Normally, I wouldn't have a problem, because in the past, students like this, just slept, or read comics. However, these students insist on disrupting the whole class. (And yes, some of the students ARE trying to get their homework done.)
• Adv. Bio - Students spent the day reading/summarizing the new chapter. It's pretty much a preview of what we will be studying the rest of the year, so I don't put much effort into drilling the material into their brains. Started the chapter today. Will be done with the chapter Thursday.