Crazy Days of...summer or winter?

Seems like global warming may be a lot closer than I thought. I swear that I remember having a long, cold winter as a child (but I might be looking through the rose-colored glasses once again (this seems to happen more as I get older)).

Anyway, what can I complain about?
I have three great kids, a wonderful wife, an awesome job, a lot of great and true friends, and more than anything.... I am completely content with my lot in life.
I used to dream up all kind of things I 'needed' to be happy at Christmas time, but this year I am at a complete loss for wanting. I guess it a wonderful life after all. A little bit of God goes a long way!

News of the Sad

Had a call letting me know that my biological father had passed away. I knew him very little, so the call came out of the blue!

The sad part is after 59 years of life, the only thing he had to show was trinkets and ashes. Just goes to show how choices can truly decide what kind of 'mark' we leave on the world. A distant cousin had to contact an estranged son who never really knew his father to come and claim worldly possessions. Dying without knowing he had 2 wonderful grandchildren (and one on the way).

It definitely makes me think about what kind of mark I want to leave on the world. Choices and Ramifications of these choices are what it seems to be all about.

Floor duty

This is a pretty sad admission, but i bought a steam cleaner for the house which has changed my life. My carpet is a constant battle with children, cats and a dog as my arch nemesis(s) (what the heck is the plural of nemesis?). Sad my life has become so boring.

Overall though, things could be worse. I could look forward to sitting on my porch every night, wait I do that too. I need some new hobbies.

Summer is quickly ending....

Jeff and i got done doing some classes for ETV this week, it went pretty well. It definitely reminded me how little time i have left until school starts. Got to get busy planning!!!!

i was pretty apprehensive last year starting this ITEC thing with Jeff, but this year I am completely stoked about trying out some new stuff!!! We also have a new ITEC member at Spring Valley, and I think it will be cool to have some fresh blood on-board! I will publish her name later, but i want to check and make sure they don't mind.....

Anyway, just wanted to get a new post up. Time to get back to watching 'House'.

District is Kickin good!!!

Man, Jeff and I are busy, busy, busy. lot of cool stuff floating through my head for the class next year. more Google Earth, GPS, Portfolios, Podcasts, Vodcasts, Wikis, Blogs...awesome!!!

I am still recovering from going to the Josh Groban concert. The kid is better in concert than on CD (which I think is saying something!), I was so moved by the music and singing in a few parts I started to get teary eyed. That is not usually my style, but the stuff was powerful. I would recommend anyone to try and see Josh.

i will get back to you after a bit with some more school info.....

License to Thrill Workshop

Maybe for the others, but for me it should have been named 'stuff I already do with other programs'. I did learn of some new free programs, but really everything they taught my classes are already doing above and beyond what they are talking about. No classroom applications are really discussed and it seems more oriented for the teacher.

GPS Geo-caching workshop

This was a pretty good one, even though I and Jeff have already done some of this at Richland 2. Got some ideas for extending my uses with World Geography and including more uses with Google Earth to help students get a real understanding of scale and size. Also, setting up caches with items that relate to each other within the curriculum. Students will then get together with their groups to discuss what these items have to do with their studies. Finally, students will get together as a class and the presenter (each student will have a task) will give the class their thoughts, which will be discussed.
Gotta love new Ideas!!!!!

VR Workshop

This is some of the coolest stuff I have ever got in touch with! Can't wait to get to making panoramics of historical sites, or 360 degree pictures of artifacts. This is going to be great.

ISTE Conference in Atlanta

So far, so good. Saw a presentation on Wikis, which was mostly about the presentor moreso than Wikis. It was still good, though, as I got to work on my new wiki at http://www.svitec.pbwiki.com. I will be working on it over the weekend, so check it out!

talk to y'all later on in the conference.

Conference in Atlanta

Me and my boy Jeff are tripping on down to Atlanta for the ISTE conference. I will get back with some details. Peace out!

So, I finally learned how to 'rotoscope'. my wife is probably going to divorce me now that I can create my own lightsaber pictures. Drear God, I'll have the kids with them next. Oh, I forsee some trouble in my future now.

The First One

I am setting up this 'blog thing' for other teachers and freinds (if I have any, I don't remember much after the school year). Hopefully, this will be a space for me to reflect on my time as a teacher and have others comment on it.

Right now, I am deep in the summer preparedness war. Which means I am deeply contemplating my curriculum and how I can make it better. I have a lot to work on, especially since next year my US History classes' end of course test will be for real. I have to figure out the best and quickest ways to transfer all of my US History standards AND keep the students emersed in technology at the same time. I think the technology part will actually be a great help, if I use it correctly. I'll keep y'all posted on how things go on this front (and will probably have more problems to report).