An "A-HA" Moment

This week in my college class I was asked if I had any "a-ha" moments to report from my teaching experiences in the past few weeks. My mind was blank. Nothing to share.

Over the past two weeks, I have been teaching a science unit on geology and rocks. The kids have had varied interest in what I have been teaching, but love to spend spare time in class examining, rubbing, playing and hanging out by the "Rock" table (a table covered in all sorts of rocks and minerals) in the back of the class.

However, yesterday I taught a lesson based on erosion. I started the lesson with a brief 7 slide Powerpoint with photos of erosion in the natural world. One of the pics was of a beautiful sandstone arch in Utah. Then we did "experiments" to simulate erosion by blowing, crushing and dripping (wind, pressure and water erosion, respectively) on sugar cubes (rocks). After blowing and crushing the cubes, the students got into groups and slowly dripped water on the sugar to watch the effects it had. In one of the cubes, as the water crumbled away, an arch formed. The kids were so excited to see that this photo they had viewed 20 minutes ago was recreated in their sugar cube.

I had my "a-ha" moment and I had to smile.

After IEP

I survived the IEP in one piece and only managed to break one law, according to my supervisor. Not too bad in my book. The meeting was a long one, but overall successful according to the people participating. I had a minor internal debate to bring the meeting to a close without full input and dialogue with the student's parent. However, I realized it would be best for the school and parent to take the extra time and hopefully have both parties feel they are on the same team. Most importantly the student will now receive the additional support they need to succeed in school.