Tomorrow is the first day of school of my 8th year of teaching. I love teaching. I want to get better at teaching every year, and I wish other teachers felt that same way... many of them don't. Just like any teacher, I get frustrated with all of the foolishness - evaluation systems with maybe a million or two components (I still haven't figured it out), paperwork, students who get a little too feisty, malfunctioning fire alarms, uncooperative technology, more paperwork, professional development sessions that do all but develop me, and all the other things that get thrown at us everyday... but I do love it. It's tiring. It's overwhelming. It's the best job in the world.
At the end of last year, I gave students in my astronomy class surveys just to see how they felt about my class after 180 days of it. I had given an informal survey the year before, but this one had scales and more specific questions. (I didn't give a survey to my other class... because, well, I already knew I did a pretty awful job when it came to that. Not "awful" by normal standards... but awful by my way too high standards for myself. The kids learned (so it really was a success), but I did not love it, and that means they could have learned more. To me, that's awful.)
As far as my surveys, they were good, as usual. Many of the kids give comments along the lines of "I can tell you love what you do!" and "this was my favorite class!" but then when I look at the numbers, they tell a bit of a different story.
The first thing I noticed was there was a HUGE difference from class to class. Apparently my 4th period thought I was way to stressed and high strung. I'm always stress and high strung, but I guess during 4th period I didn't hide it so well... not sure why. Also, I asked about the favorite activity of the year and the least favorite activity of the year, and there were some that appeared in both places! Most noticeably, the solar system planet walk around campus - I think it was just a personality thing, because the kids that listed it as their least favorite said so because it was "too hot". :) One thing that was interesting to me was answers to the question "If you could give me advice on how to change the class for next year, what would it be?" I got a lot of "don't change anything!" (which I love, of course) but I also got a lot of "more hands on!" On it's own, this isn't too surprising, because they're kids and they like playing with things. I do a BUNCH of hands on things though... but really, I could always add more. But taken into consideration with another question - "Which unit was your favorite?" the data became a bit confusing. I did WAY more hands on things in the first 4 units - Sky, Sun-Earth-Moon, Solar System, and Light but only 28 students listed one of those as their favorite (49 listed one of them as their least favorite). On the other hand, 50 students listed units 5 and 6 - stars and the universe as their favorites, but those have way less hands on activities. I hate to admit this, but I lecture quite a bit when it comes to the universe. Maybe it's just they don't know what else to say for the question, so more hands on is a generic answer for them at this point? Or maybe they would just like the last two units anyway because the topics are just so different? Either way, I'm going to keep a close on the students this year when they're doing hands on things to see what exactly it is that they feel is the most beneficial part of them... other than to them it means they're not reading or taking notes.
Here's what really matters, some data:
(The thing that made me smile) out of the approximately 70 students surveyed, 100% of them agreed or strongly agreed with the statement "I learned a lot in this class."
36 students agreed or strongly agreed "we had more thinking to do in this class than in my other classes" 31 were neutral, only 11 disagreed.
22 students agreed or strongly agreed "we had more work to do in this class than in my other classes" 20 were neutral, and 30 disagreed.
And the 4 places I'm really going to try to improve this year:
"I felt challenged by this class"
Strongly Disagree, Disagree answers: 11 (adding neutral answers: 33)
"We had more thinking to do in this class than in my other classes"
Strongly Disagree, Disagree answers: 11 (adding neutral answers: 42)
"I enjoyed using Moodle"
Strongly Disagree, Disagree answers: 23 (adding neutral answers: 41)
"This class connected to my life"
Strongly Disagree, Disagree answers: 6 (adding neutral answers: 50)
As far as the data goes, I'm not really sure how to take "neutral" answers, because I'm not sure the students understand neutral. I think next year, that won't be an option and I'll broaden the scale a little.
So what does it all mean? Hopefully I can take this advice, the advice that matters most and do better this year. That's what it's all about, isn't it? Off to try to get some sleep tonight... the past 7 years I haven't slept at all the night before the first day of school, this year doesn't seem to be shaping up too different. :)
Tomorrow, the learning continues.
Sunday, August 18, 2013
Thursday, August 8, 2013
NITARP- summer 2013
team "they might be giants" with curiosity :)
Our week started with our trip from Orlando to Phoenix to Burbank then to Pasadena. The girls and I had smooth travels, which I was very thankful for. Our first day took us around the building we'd be working in with the other NITARP team that was there, then to our room to start working on the 200 stars we "looked at" as a team. (When I say that, what I mean is that we went to the Kepler Exoplanet Archive website, typed in a star ID number, normalized a light curve, looked a periodogram, looked at another periodogram, made a phase curve, then phase binned that light curve.) Each of the 4 small teams of our one bigger team had 50 stars to look at, then we combined all of our work. The result? Graphs, graphs, everywhere!
That afternoon, our team headed to Mt. Wilson, which I knew about, but for some reason I didn't realize how much history was there. It was very very cool. Let's be honest, who doesn't love Hubble? (the man... and the telescope too).
outside the 100 inch telescope
inside the dome :)
sea level Florida girls at 5700 feet!
The next morning was our tour of JPL which, of course, was awesome. We got to see where spacecraft are assembled (one was in there too- http://smap.jpl.nasa.gov/) an indoor Mars yard, a cool museum with lots of my favorite solar system exploring robots (Cassini & Juno were there!!), and, typical for me, I spent what was probably too much money in the gift shop. Our tour guide also shared some really cool JPL history with us, most of which I didn't know and hope to learn more about soon!
I want one of these outfits :)
can you spot the martian?
We headed back to our graph wallpaper work room and got back to it. We had a bit of re-looking to do, but got a good bit of work done. The third day was our only full day to work which was a bit difficult after only working half the day the first two and the jet lag catching up to me, but we powered through. We realized that day we probably should have packed graphing calculators, as we became VERY familiar with the Stefan-Boltzmann law. By the end of the day, a new excel spread sheet, a few histograms and scatter plots latter... I think we found something. Maybe not exactly what we thought we would find in the first place, but definitely something. Science is so cool. I can't wait to share the feeling of working hard to solve problems to find (or maybe not find) an answer with my students this year. One of my favorite things about the week - other than the cool people and the nerd fun - was probably that 8 of our team of 13 were girls! Before heading back to Florida the next day, we had dinner with some friends and found a pretty cool antique shop where I scored some old Life magazines with Gemini 2 and Apollo 10 on the cover and one of my students found some cool old disneyland swag. Looking back, the trip was definitely better than I expected in every way - more fun, less stress (from a teacher point of view: it was my first time traveling (WAY) out of state with students and staying overnight somewhere with students), more learning... just awesome all around. If you want to see NITARP from a student point of view, check out http://sinesinthestars.tumblr.com/, the blog from one of my students :)
One of our fearless leaders summed up the experience in a pretty great way - "We know things about the Universe that no one else does..." - and even though it's cool, I can't wait for our next step... making our science poster and presenting it at the AAS in January. Until then...
Wednesday, June 26, 2013
NITARP updates!
If you keep up with my blog, you know that one of my projects this year is NITARP, the NASA/IPAC teacher archive research program. What that means is that my adventure started in January at the American Astronomical Society meeting in Long Beach and has been going strong ever since.
Throughout the second semester of the school year, eight students and I worked hard to graph and record data from the 50 red giant stars assigned to us. I thought coordinating that many students that needed a high level of precision would be difficult, but I think trusting them to do the right thing and then them actually doing the right thing has helped me grow as a teacher. Even though everything wasn’t totally perfect and the data from each star didn’t have the same format, it all worked out ok. We have 6 pretty distinct steps in our research, and steps 1-5 were done by the team before the school year was over. The students found the star in the Kepler database, made a light curve, normalized a light curve, made a periodogram, then created a phased curve for the periodogram. (sounds really difficult, right? wrong. that's why NITARP is so awesome. my high schoolers did that!) I’ve put the last step (and the part with the most work…phase binning) on the 2 girls who will be going to California with me. They picked up on the process way quicker than I did, and I think we’ll be good to sit down and try to find the patterns sometime in July to get ready for our trip to Caltech in August. We mostly met after school and a few of the students on the team worked on stars after they were done with classwork.
Choosing students to travel with me was WAY harder than I expected, as all of the students were super dedicated. I had two seniors on the team, and even though they knew they couldn’t travel, they did a TON of work. One student even came in after the school year was over for seniors to work on stars! The other 6 students worked hard each day we met and I had to go back to their applications on my own and with other teachers several times before making my final decision. It wasn’t easy, but I chose the two students who I thought enjoyed the project the most, were most dedicated, and expressed an interest in pursuing a science or engineering career in the future.
Sending out rejection emails (which I regret a little, I should have probably told them in person) was one of the most heartbreaking things I had to do as a teacher, but I’m trying to take it as another learning moment in my teaching career courtesy of NITARP. On the other hand though, sending out acceptance letters was really exciting and the two students going with me seem as excited as I am to keep going with the research. We just finished the process of booking plane tickets, and all the field trip paperwork is submitted to my school and the county. I also sat down real quick to chat with their parents to make sure they understood what their student was going to be doing and where we would end up once we got on the plane in August.
We’re getting more excited each day to travel to California and meet the rest of them. Hopefully we’ve actually figured out something about red giant stars too J
In sort of related news, Kepler isn’t doing so hot, but our research is using data from quarters 4-11, so even though the telescope isn't quite working now, our research isn’t affected. You can keep up with the latest Kepler news at: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/kepler/news/mmu.html
Also, if you're a teacher and want to do some real astronomy research with your students, you can apply for the 2014 NITARP class now! http://nitarp.ipac.caltech.edu/news_item/368. The application is open in the hopes that the NASA education/public outreach budget works out in favor of awesome stuff like this :)
I do lots of professional development things, and I have to say being part of NITARP is one of the best (and only) opportunities out there for teachers to do real science with real data and real scientists.
Thursday, June 20, 2013
Honeywell Educators at Space Academy - Day 4 & 5 - June 17 &18
photos:
doing biology things!
DNA extraction
I love this place.
Hubble IMAX movie
hanging out in the mars part of the museum :)
spirograph robots!
rocket launch at Homer Hickam launch pad!
quick stop in HAB 1!
"I remember this rock, it was my favorite one" - Alan Bean, Apollo 12
size: J. YOUNG
(I freaking love John Young)
Size Ken Mattingly.
hopeful for our lander...
not so much. RIP Eggstronaut
Dan Oates, talking about SCIVIS, a Space Camp program for visually impaired students.
HOMER freaking HICKAM.
graduation!
dancing on the moon
goodnight
I can't believe this week went so fast, but it did, and now it's over.
Tuesday (even though I don't really know without looking at the schedule because the days all blend together) we did a fruit DNA extraction lab, hung around checking out some rockets and the SaturnV center, took our team photo, and watched the Hubble IMAX movie. Even though I've seen Hubble over 20 times (and that's probably a low end estimate) I still love watching it every single time... especially with people who have never seen it before. I got a chance to see Charity and pick up my Huntsville swag bag that I won from the Madison County tourism folks awhile back, and it filled up my suitcase even more...but now I have a really cute Huntsville lunch box :) We also participated in a lunar base challenge which was pretty fun and I'm definitely going to attempt it with my students. Each team got a different set of requirements to build something on the moon (medical, observatory, hotel, mining... we had a launch facility), a budget, and a little bit of time to do it. Then we all had to present to each other and as always with team Columbus... a bit of hilarity ensued.
Yesterday (Wednesday) we did a few more activities like that one including the lunar lander (RIP egg) and rover (it would have been a good one!) and ECLSS- Environmental Control and Life Support Systems where we had to filter water that looked DISGUSTING at the beginning. We later learned it was a mix of dryer lint, vinegar, food coloring, glitter and some other things...ew. But our group's looked pretty good, and we all took a sip at the end. (We promptly ran back to the table and all took a drink from my diet coke, but I don't think anyone was watching.)
We spent a little time roaming around the Davidson Center and there is a LOT of Apollo 16 John Young stuff there. The space suit sizes are actually labeled with each astronaut's name because they're custom made. I tried on Ken Mattingly sized gloves, and was able to look inside a size: John Young space suit. The CM from Apollo 16 is there too :)
Probably the highlight of space camp for me though was getting to listen to Homer Hickam speak about October Sky, his new books, and all kinds of NASA things. I haven't read Crater or Crescent yet, but they're next on my summer reading list! We all got a signed copy of Rocket Boys, but the best thing was that he totally gave me a shout out during his presentation. We had been tweeting earlier in the day, and the day before... but my team members were greatly amused because I may have freaked out a tiny bit (ok, a LOT). We did get a team photo with him, but I've yet to see it, so I really hope it turned out :)
We graduated last night, then had dinner under the SaturnV, next to a CM that went to the moon with John Young inside, by a size John Young suit and an actual John Young suit. What was probably my favorite part of the night though was the fact that we all were dancing on the moon... it was painted on the floor.... but it's still really fun a to think we were dancing on the moon :)
I'll be posting actual photos from my camera when I get home. I didn't take too many because the Honeywell people were following us around almost all the time, and I really wanted to enjoy the experience and the people without having my face behind a camera too much. Almost all of the photos I've posted here and on facebook so far are from my phone. Hopefully this weekend I'll get a chance to get the good ones posted somewhere where everyone can see.
Like the last time I was here, I think the best part about the whole experience was the team. I hope that we stay in touch better than the last team I had... I looked most of the people from the Gagarin class of 2000 a while back on facebook when I found my space camp journal, but I didn't add them. I think I may do that when I get home just to see where they all ended up. My team was fantastic, my team leader was fantastic, and this whole week was more fun than I ever could have imagined it would be. I love it here, and if you're a math or science teacher you absolutely need to apply next year: http://educators.honeywell.com/ it will be the best professional development you ever experience. Honeywell and all of the people at Space Camp were more than good to us, and I hope that maybe next year I can figure out a way to get back again. Anywhere where there are SaturnVs and lots of nerds feels like home :)
Off to the airport soon... back to work at my other home at Kennedy tomorrow!
in tweets:
@HomerHickam of course! I read Crater, but not Crescent yet... time for some summer reading! :)- My
#HESA adventure ends tonight... Goodnight from@SpaceCampUSA in Huntsville :)#TeamColumbus pic.twitter.com/JDqCtpIFlD - Nothing like dinner and dancing under the SaturnV
@SpaceCampUSA after graduation!#TeamColumbus#HESA pic.twitter.com/5OVrw2ipuE - Thanks to
@HomerHickam for hanging out with the#honeywell educators@SpaceCampUSA!#HESA pic.twitter.com/SzZwfc0Zhz - Check out
@HomerHickam's Helium-3 novel website! http://www.helium3novels.com#HESA pic.twitter.com/mAZU3qsWMM - Oh my goshhhhhh. Homer Hickam just called me his twitter buddy.
#holycrap - Ahhhhhhh!!! Homer is here!!!
#HESA - Dan Oates telling us all about SCIVIS... Space Camp for visually impaired students.
#HESA pic.twitter.com/GrdJ0MgC6l - "I remember this rock, it was my favorite one." Alan Bean Apollo 12. display
@SpaceCampUSA Davidson Cntr#HESA pic.twitter.com/z7LkYw8uuq - Pre Entry Descent and Landing...We were really hopeful that our lander would work well.
#TeamColumbus#HESA pic.twitter.com/cKgmkoNWuS - running a little behind: here's my blog from day 3 of Honeywell Educators @ Space Academy!
#HESA@HON_Citizenship http://danielle-miller.blogspot.com/
#HE@SA in full throttle! Check out photo of crew members from Orion mission today#Space Camp pic.twitter.com/eRrr291jBq@SpaceCampUSA -#TeamColumbus should be in the Davidson center from 1130 to 1230... Lunch from 11-1130. can't DM you back :)
4 men, 4 women will train globally for missions to low-Earth orbit, an asteroid and Mars. Meet the 2013 Astro Class. http://go.nasa.gov/1290bq3#TeamColumbus is full of scientists! We're extracting DNA :)#HESA@SpaceCampUSA@HON_Citizenship pic.twitter.com/yoXYbO17iC- Watch out kids, I'm about to do some biology stuff. Extracting kiwi DNA
@SpaceCampUSA!#HESA#TeamColumbus pic.twitter.com/by2sIJWyBw
danielle miller 
HON_Citizenship 
2013 Astronaut Class
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