And the first school week is over.
Well, my school week is over. Alex still has today and tomorrow. Then again, I did start on Saturday. He got one last free weekend. Me, not so much.
On Saturdays I take Fundamental Concepts of Biology. Basically, biology for non science majors aka easy biology. Or at least I’m told it’s easier than General Biology. I have lecture in the morning, then a 30-45 minute break for lunch (must remember to pack lunch!), and lab in the afternoon. It seems like its going to be a pretty easy course work-load wise. Most of the work is done in the class itself. There are 4 lecture exams, which will most likely drop to 3 exams as the professor is letting us vote on if we want 4 exams or 3 exams and an extra lecture in the next class. Yes, I’m serious he is actually letting us decide if we want to drop an entire exam. Anyway, then there are 2 lab exams. Finally there is a term paper. And since we have officially jumped to 9th grade English, the term paper is something we are being walked through. Read: We get graded on choosing a topic by a deadline, get graded on doing an outline which needs to be based on a generic outline we are given by another deadline, writing the paper which needs to follow the outline we wrote by another deadline, and finally giving a small powerpoint presentation on the topic on week 14 of the class. Not counting studying for the exams which is a given, the term paper is really the only course work we need to do outside of class. Oh yeah, and occasionally we can earn extra credit by writing up a lab report on the labs we do in class. Speaking of extra credit, every exam, both lab and lecture, has extra credit questions on it. He said in total there are about 75 extra credit points that can be earned. Thats the most I’ve ever heard of in any one class I’ve taken so far. Since I have always done the extra credit offered (ok, there was one exception in my health class…) if I don’t make it out of this class with an A then I’m a total idiot.
On Tuesdays I take Foundations of Special Education. Because I’m an elementary education major, it just makes sense that I have to take education courses. This semester I’m taking two. Special Education is obviously one of them. This course work-load contains weekly quizzes, a mid term exam, a final exam, 2 article reviews, and one formal interview. Sounds like a lot, right? Well, let me start out by saying that every quiz and exam is open book/notes. In fact the exams are take home, so we have an entire week to do them! Woo-freaking-hoo! Can’t beat hearing that on the first day of class, let me tell you. The article reviews are also pretty easy. Basically we just find articles written in education journals regarding anything having to do with the field of special education and summarize and then critique the articles. Nothing I haven’t done before in other classes. Now the interview is where it gets interesting. I need to conduct a formal interview with either a special education teacher, an adult with a disability, an administrator or counselor of a school which provides special education services, or a parent of a child with a disability. Now, lets think for a second. Where am I going to find someone who meets any one of the above criteria? Obviously, this is a rhetorical question. I don’t think I need to state why.
My second education course is on Wednesday. I’m taking Educational Psychology. Half of this course grade rests on the weekly quizzes and classroom participation/warm ups. Basically, show up to class, do the “warm up” (read: pre-quiz) and before you leave class take a quiz, and that right there is 50% of your grade. In order to turn in our warm ups and quizzes we have a colored folder which is passed out by and returned to the professor at the beginning and end of every class. The warm ups must go on the left of the folder. The quizzes are placed on the right. The color of the folder determines the group we are in (all yellows in one group, all reds in another, etc.) Apparently we aren’t in college anymore; we are in elementary school. The other half of the grade rests on the final exam (no midterm!), writing up a lesson plan and being able to assess and discuss what instructional methods are used in that plan, and finally a written report on 2 classroom observations. I’ve written up a lesson plan before, so I can do that again no problem. The classroom observation is new stuff for me though. I’m thinking I’m definitely going to ask Alex’s teacher if I could observe her classroom (and help out too, of course!) I’m not sure what other classroom I’m going to observe though. It needs to be in a different environment than the first observation which means Alex’s school is out. Andrew’s school is a bit of a drive, but it would be cool to see his school and know what a typical day is like for him. I could also ask the middle school Alex will be going into. I’ll get more information next week on what is required for the assignment, so I’ve got a while to think about what option is best.
And that sums up my classes for the next 15 weeks.
More posts like this:
- Now final grades are in. – December 19, 2007
- Another semester bites the dust. – July 24, 2008
- Final Grades are in! Well, almost. – December 19, 2007
- Snow seriously messes up my day. – January 27, 2009
- Grades are in. – December 13, 2008
AsuKa
September 7th, 2008 @ 3:32 pm
how old are you? 8th grade? 9th grade? MOM!