The cohort (or most of it anyway) took a little field trip down to Tupper Secondary this morning. If you are dying to know how this went down, stay tuned for another exhilarating post in The Long and Dusty Road…..

Tupper Tech was an interesting experience. I think what grabbed me the most was Mr. Evans treatment of the whole shop as a job preparation course, including punch in, shop culture and respect, and my personal favourite – Behaviour modification.

I got the impression that many of my cohort felt Mr. Evans a bit dated in his beliefs and methods, but I think he nailed it in terms of prepping the grade 12 students for their very jarring entry into the real world. Granted, it may not be as unforgiving as he makes it sound, but a little overtraining is still preferential to under training in terms of overall prepared-ness. He seems to focus a lot on an area I think is very underdeveloped in students: The ability to take criticism. When delivered correctly, criticism need not be viewed as nit picking or minutia, as long as the critic is trained and knows how to deliver. I was once told by a friend who was in a near fatal accident “I learned everything I needed to know when I stopped talking and started listening”. There is a lot to that statement, and I have taken it to heart and practice ever since.

Mr. Evans aso stated the importance of not burning bridges, for example: If you get fired of your own accord, learn from the experience. Come back to your ex-employer, shake his hand, and ask for an exit interview to help you improve. This could very well turn an impression 180 degrees in the employers eyes, and maybe get you a recommendation or reference down the road – if you are willing to listen.

The ITA also provided valuable information at Tupper, and I hope they will be a valued partner and resource to me when I begin my teaching career next year.

Okay, so I guess you’re going to have good days and bad days, yesterday was the latter. I think I did a bit too much in-head self glorification coming off a couple of good presentations, the crash was imminent.

Oh well, lesson learned, time to move on to Pecha Kucha. So this standing in front of a room full of academics has always been a bit of an issue for me, and trying to pull it off without crib notes is a whole new level of difficulty my mind, so how am I going to overcome this? Apparently, through repetition and practice. If I wasn’t down to 4 hours of sleep a night I would consider toastmasters, but I think that may have to be a spring/summer endeavor.

Other than that, things are pretty good. I know more about Bordieu than the average Joe, have a decent handle on protective factors of resiliency, and have a framework in my head of “how I’m going to pull in that distant loner kid in the back row whom I’ve never heard speak, and turn them into an engaged, functioning pillar of future society”.

By the way, this is a free form blog, so I only correct horrendous errors in grammar and spelling (don’t want to interrupt the stream of conciousness for such triviality – sorry English cohort).

In other engaging news: Entering week 18 with no running water. Actually, the only things running are my friends when they see me coming with “favour please” virtually tattooed on my forehead, and my nose this week as we enter cold season (when exactly is that?). My new National guitar! Wow, so shiny and clean, and buzzing on the saddle somewhere!? Yes, have to rip my baby apart and sleuth out the source of this audible atrocity – its totally messing up my flow and I need the sanity blanket it provides. On that note, please see my artist of the week section on R.L. Burnside. This guy’s gonna knock your socks off!

Breaking news: As of Saturday, Oct. 21, we have running water! Please friends, don’t ever take for granted the priveledge and joy of turning a tap, and having something (preferably clear) come out. We have it good here.

Theory to Practice

 An eye opening visit to Fraser Heights secondary

Last week I had the pleasure of visiting Fraser Heights Secondary for some insight filled observations on teachers, lesson delivery methods, and new curriculum integration. I have to say, these people are really on the cutting edge as far as I’ve seen.

Joe, one of the Home Ec. teachers, who was also involved in writing the new curriculum assessment drafts, gave us a full day guided tour of the Home Ec. labs, Maker space, Robotics class, and wood and metal shops. I met some excellent and insightful teachers there, and had what I feel is my first real practical experience with the theories I’ve been studying at UBC so far.

Joe tells me they have been utilizing inquiry based learning for several years already, and some of the activities I saw in the classes/labs were quite impressive. Students design their own dishes, attach a personal and/or cultural significance to them, back up their choices with personal or cultural context, and requisition the raw ingredients which are purchased by the department. Then, of course, they make it. One of the students was even working on an entire semester curriculum style design for foods 11 – impressive indeed!

I was curious to hear where the assessment criteria was going in the new curriculum, and Joe gave myself and Akina (from my Home Ec. cohort) a very detailed description of how they were assessing the inquiry based units. I have to admit, a lot of it was over my head as we have not investigated this quadrant of teaching yet, but I did garner the fact that the evolution of the students progress within their process was the guiding parameter.

Joe opened up his lesson plans, unit plans, and classrooms, giving us a chance to interact with students from grade 8 to 11, talk to them about their aspirations and experiences, and field a lot of questions about life in UBC!

As I mentioned, I also poked my head into the VEX robotics class, spent some time with the metals teacher, and got ta chance to speak with a 10 year career TOC (who is also an opera singer). A whole different take on teaching from her as you can imagine.

Sooooo, a big shout out to that school and the above mentioned departments for making my visit a memorable one, passing us some business cards for networking, and generally making the day enjoyable and educational. Hope I cross paths with them again in the near future.