And kids who should have had formative time in public pools at a critical age did not have that time. My only source is that I have a 10 year old who can swim well now but had a lot of catching up to do.
Middle school science teacher, entomologist, snow lover in NC. Begrudging Swiftie and jazz fan because of my family. Beyoncé lover in my soul. Proud Cornell and NC State alum.
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And kids who should have had formative time in public pools at a critical age did not have that time. My only source is that I have a 10 year old who can swim well now but had a lot of catching up to do.
It’s fabulous!! Thank you!
#WaldenGrayScienceClass teaching resources!
American Chemical Society’s Middle School Chemistry www.acs.org/middleschool...
Also there weren’t swimming lessons
Present company excluded but I wish more people realized that good teachers are the product of *years* of training and education and professional development and mentorship and practice, not magicians who go into the classroom and just wing it on Charisma.
#WaldenGrayScienceClass 8th grade
7th grader requested The Gambler this week
But I don’t remember spanikopita being on the menu for takeout.
#WaldenGrayScienceClass
Drew Ensign deserves all the evils being thrown at him for all of eternity
This.
Yes. And many schools now have chromebooks that are locked down.
I’m 4 years into this particular role and I only now feel confident that I can get sub plans done during my planning periods. Meaning I’m not working overtime so that I can be off-site doing professional development.
Outside of contract hours aka the only time we have to do the things we want to do for our jobs
#waldengrayscienceclass physics
I really got to see this clearly for the first time last weekend. An all black leafcutter bee with an abdomen just covered in pollen. Spectacular.
This is a 100% positive thing by the way. All around A++++ situation.
Have you been texting with your kid’s friend’s dad (who is also your colleague) since 7:45 this morning to coordinate a multifamily museum of life and science trip to max out your membership entries? No? Are you jealous?
Just FYI we have reached the point where educators do not even acknowledge a school shooting to teach other or their students. Meanwhile there’s a lockdown drill scheduled soon and we just do that.
I do SO MUCH microscope work with 7th and 8th graders to break them in on using scopes. So many teachers aren’t willing (or able?) to do it and the kids’ experience of the wonder of science suffers.
Yeah. Turns out the “I’m a provider” option is possibly the only way to actually talk to someone
I wish everyone who touches this the absolute worst. The worst.
It’s Monarch migration time in NC! I planted these joe pye weed last year for exactly this reason! It’s a teeny tiny patch with huge value. #NativePlants #Gardening #Monarch #Butterfly
I, yet again, encourage folks to join education. Not feeling bad for folks not being offered $100k jobs straight out undergrad doing mostly nothing for society.
As an occasional teacher of kids who were formerly homeschooled and often age out of their parents’ abilities to teach them, it’s interesting to see where they are socially and academically when they enter a formal education environment.
Selection pressure for the win! It always amazes me how comparisons like this look so very different to the trained eye but at first glance are interchangeable to a novice.
Oooh is this the pole borer?? Blew my mind when I first ID’d one
Aaaaaah!!!! #WaldenGrayScienceClass
They’re closing lab buildings??!!
And families want to move into Chapel Hill Carrboro schools. They can’t afford it. Do they think this is permanent? Will these older households just age in place and the houses never turn over?
Getting completely off instagram and tiktok has really shown me how much the other middle age people in my life are at the whims of online trends. Right now it’s the protein and the (frankly very shitty) Dubai chocolate bar. It’s not good. Any Japanese kitkat is far superior.
Yup. Phones can’t be accessed. Our students have then in their bags and genuinely I am not seeing them out at all. We’re 3 years into gradually tightening phone policy and it’s a non-issue.
It’s very complicated to parent a tween and a toddler and teach teens and also be reading the dismantling of the government in real time. So I’m off to eat fresh baked chocolate chip cookies I guess.
My daughter, 18 at months “yellow! Mama hold! Eat broccoli! Clean owl. Isabelle drink!” My son at 18 months “OOOoOOooooOHH! Whoa! Babadyyyyyyyy!!!!!” then he almost dies throwing himself backwards off the couch into the coffee table
Whaaaaaaaaat
If kids are staying late at school, there is always an adult present who can access a phone. Also, the laws only pertain to instructional hours.
I am so so so grateful as a middle school teacher in a state with a new law like this. So relieved.
I do not understand spending hours every weekend cleaning the same car over and over. Weeding bermuda grass out of the same garden? Yes.
I went into Whole Foods to grab sunscreen recently and it bummed me out.
Does anyone have access to The Canadian Entomologist? I'm looking for Mank EW (1939b) Scotochroa and a closely allied new genus Scotochroides, (Coleoptera, Melandryidae). The Canadian Entomologist 71: 181–183. I have a Scotochroa from an unexpected location I want to know more about.
It’s a trap!!!!!!
#WaldenGrayScuenceClass illusions
He almost always makes dinner and it is almost always delicious. It’s always a good thing.
Today I cleaned up a sweet balance bike for my toddler and gave him a doll stroller. My neighbors played with him. I got to brush my tween’s hair and read Anne McCaffrey with her. I got to facetime with lots of family. I didn’t get in a car. My husband made a delicious dinner. A good day.
The fabric on this American Girl doll stroller got gross with mold after a couple summers on a NC porch. I do not sew (that’s my husband’s hobby) but I made this little seat during naptime today on a whim. No pattern and no template!! And basically no sewing skills. Just gumption. I’m proud.
This is my surprised face
On this chart, is the first decile the highest 10% of household income or the lowest?
I pointed out to them that 7th and 8th graders are completely forgetting to add periods to their sentences and capitalize letters in handwritten work. All because of autocapitalization and autopunctuation. They were aghast. That’s how I convince them that I require complete sentences.
Bahahaha OH NO
*psst* when you ask students to agree to a no generative AI rule and explain that you won’t use it either, there is zero pushback. They will even explain how spellcheck tools now do generative writing and how it’s no longer in their own words and agree that it’s not acceptable to turn in.
Good luck! Houses in Briar Chapel have been on the market for months. It hasn’t been like this in a loooong time.
My grandma lived to 98 years old with ankles like that. He *will* die eventually but I dunno about poor circulation being the cause.
The market is a-changing
Boooooooooo hisssssss
They want to hang out and do geography games and cooking and art and model trains and gardening and watch formula 1 together.
I’ve done two days of exercises reflecting on the culture of knowledge with 7th and 8th graders. Why do you feel like an expert about your special interest? Who do you think are experts? How is that knowledge shared? The kids need more clubs. Hang outs. Teen centers.
Risking it all printing on green paper during the middle of a school day.
Me. To everyone who says there are no jobs out there.
#WaldenGrayScienceClass AI ed
Yay!
My body wouldn’t cooperate with getting an IV during my recent labor because it was a precipitous freight train to babytown and I was not happy.
Yes!! Had a baby a year snd a half ago. People are definitely rejecting everything.
Yoink!!! This is great
#WaldenGrayScienceClass
Really appreciating my colleagues right now. The no phones, no AI approach to starting the year seems solid. I am not alone in the no AI camp. Thank jeebus. Also Alpaca for lunch today. Good lord that food is good.
Climate hope #WaldenGrayScienceClass
Challenge: Post your last photo taken in Washington, DC to show what a hellhole it is
Getting to hear new music is a perk of teaching 7th and 8th grade
Ooooh thanks for the update!
Aaah thanks. I’ll need to read it. Sorry I hadn’t. My undergrad experience was very research intensive, with lots of small group seminars after initial intro classes. I’m under the impression that CompSci does not teach science as a process. Just like it may not teach engineering principles.
I was going to say. Folks doing scientific research have acute critical thinking skills. Tons of reading and discussion and debate and their discipline requires breaking down arguments and building them. This isn’t just theoretical science.
Not everyone should teach. Teachers are not paid a living wage. But those salaries were and are disgusting and greedy.
Our current economic crisis is terrible. AI is terrible. I don’t feel bad for CS grads who aren’t getting bloated salary tech jobs. Go get a teaching license.
*psssst* public schools need teachers, including in computer science, and IT support folks.
8th grade #WaldenGrayScienceclass
Hah. Yes. Just go to the cafe in the gardens.
Longwood Gardens should be on everyone’s bucket list anyways. The narrative of its founding alone is worth it but they manage a bonkers garden, do excellent public programming, and (as I understand it) are very forward thinking about horticulture and contribute to research.
We took a picture of the recipe in the gift shop and it was quite good. I seem to remember it containing truffle oil and shallots. Definitely worth making at home.
*sigh* It’s where many science teachers are too
And the Longwood Gardens cafeteria in that county makes the best mushroom soup. The best.
I really do need a new saddle and new handlebar grips. Both are disintegrating.
This bike has gotten me around Ontario and Webster, NY; Washington, DC; Ithaca, NY; Somerville/Medford/Cambridge/Boston; Chapel Hill; and the St. Louis suburbs. It’s a long term relationship. For 8 years it was my only commuting transport.
Bike is from Towpath Bikes in Pittsford, NY. I had disc brakes installed in 2019 so I could pull a kid in a bike trailer. The bike shop tried to convince me to just buy a new bike. NO SIR. I LOVE MY BIKE.
My noble commuting chariot. A 2005 Gary Fisher Tassajara. Bought with the waitressing tips from gross private golf club members who hit on me or treated me like dirt as an 18 year old. My shoes are from Glenn Swan’s shop in Ithaca. Desperately in need of replacement.
It was the portapotties for me too
Wow look at the scale of it!!!! It’s huge!
We scheduled two (paid) science department work days this summer (grades 5-12 for our tiny school) for this week and they have been deeply helpful. We can’t get this time during the year and it’s been wonderful. Just talking for hours about what works, what doesn’t, and helping each other out.
I dunno. I think the circa 2013 push for students to discover phenomena on their own and turn hard away from direct instruction was not good for science literacy.
That shading on the wing is perfection
CRP land also supports commercial beekeeping. It’s where many commercial beekeepers put their hives for much of the year. Whatever idyllic idea you have about commercial beekeeping being a few hives next to a rolling hay meadow, that’s not it.
The USDA CRP program already exists. This already exists here. It’s underfunded but that’s not new. Its impact and implementation is studied by scientists as well.
1. This is untrue, both about Denmark and that we don’t do this. We do. 2. Bees need habitat for their whole life cycle. The US DOES have a program like this that already exists. It’s the USDA Conservation Preserve Program (CRP) that pays farmers to set aside land as natural habitat.
Running to K Pop Demon Hunters is top tier. I have not been as hyped to run to an album in a bit. Not since Cuz I Love You because Soulmate is one of the very best.
7th grade #WaldenGrayScienceClass
Chapel Hill, where families can’t move anymore unless they make >$250k but why oh why aren’t there enough teachers?
Skipper caterpillars are so weird looking. This is a Silver-spotted skipper on wisteria at my house. Also - they eat invasive Chinese wisteria AND Kudzu. Well done lep. Well done. #Entomology #Caterpillar
I still miss going to a studio to practice yoga (time is scarce these days) but I snuck in a 20 minute Kirra Michel core flow from Peloton tonight and it was killer. I need a button to find classes with less Peloton pep talk because her cueing and sequencing are great
Didn’t get the PhD. Being belittled and insulted in academia with specific gendered insults for extra fun was my first push off that path. It all started AFTER I was awarded a GRFP to work in the lab too. Really something.
Mine was great too as a kid. Adding consults with multiple orthodontists to my to do list is a bit much right now. I still need to call Spectrum and threaten them with canceling my account. The list is long.