OK, I'll Write Something....

Well, it is Wednesday and I haven't written anything in my blog since Monday, Labor Day. As you remember, Tuesdays are my longest days of the week, as I have class at CSU from 8:00 a.m. until 3:00 p.m. for Project Promise and then I have my Business Methods class from 3:10 p.m. until 6:00 p.m. When I got home yesterday, I had dinner, we went shopping for awhile and I went to bed.

We did have a decent day, though, as Tuesdays go. We all were a little overwhelmed in the morning when Ali gave us our "Building the Adolescent" project, in which we need to review 6-8 of the more prominent Theorists of Learning and present them in a project aimed at the adolescent in the learning environment. It is starting to occur to us that we are all cramming about 12-14 credits worth of Graduate level coursework (a full semester's load for any normal Graduate Students) into about 5 weeks in the classroom. The projects really seem to be piling up and the deadlines are not all that far away.

We had a Guest Speaker, Natalie Kees, from the Education Department, reviewing a concept called "The Circle of Goodness." This was a rather simple depiction of the framework of counselling, from what I could see. Starting with basic character traits, the student is influenced by life circumstances, mistreatments and perceptions, which bring about a "Plan of Survival," which influences behavior. I guess that the message was that "all students are worthwhile." OK. Not much new there.

For our Methods class, we met up in the computer lab. Teresa helped us crystalize our "Curriculm Map" project that is due next week. I think I finally get the hang of where all of the standards originate and where they are to go on her map. We also talked a little bit about lesson planning. Then Teresa showed us some of the neat links and resources that she has posted for us on WebCT, as well as the resources available on CTTEC. We spent the last hour and a half or so investigating online resources, which was relaxing and useful.

I particularly like the idea of "Backflip," from backflip.com. This is an online service which lets you track your website favorite links from anywhere on the web. I have signed up for the service and am using it alot.