Do This and the Bunny Dies

By request Ms Cangialosi:

Because someone's beagles do this all the time ...

Fresh from today's test:

Nominated by @MathsPadJame,

Seriously? Nix The Tricks, Dammit!

I'm trying to hold it together, people ...

We've both had enough of that fraction mistake.

That's not even reasonable ....

One for the younger ones ...

---

Can't remember where I saw this first. (edit: Finally found out the original ones with the handwritten math came from Bowman Dickson, @bowmanimal)

I cleaned up the original images a bit and tried to keep it sensible, but between the kids' and my evil senses of humor ... this project has grown out of control.

We might as well just enjoy it.

Save the Rabbit!

Finally found out these original ones with the handwritten math came from Bowman Dickson, @bowmanimal. You can blame him for starting all this. ;-)

 Poor Kitten ... this happens all the time.

Such a shame how often that poor puppy gets it ...

Damn you, TI !

Because we all know a Fawn ...

Pandas are endangered, people. Cut that out!
from http://www.paulmcdonogh.com

Poor, poor Grumpy Cat.

Don't make him cry, people!

You heartless bastards.

I have nothing left to say.

Do You REALLY want him to win?

There's more!

Look at how sad he is ...

Don't you want friends ....

Poor bastard ...

SO very disappointed ...

It's just mean for you to do this ...

This just makes me sad ...

Do This All .ppt

 Do This All .pdf

Paranoiacs in Charge

Don't you just love it?

We have Google Apps on our domain and I guess I should be thankful for that but it really sucks when they tell you that "Hey! There are some really cool add-ons" but fail to mention that the ability to add add-ons has been disabled by the domain administrator .... the same one who sent the email.

New Feature in Google Drive.
Things like: Track Changes, EasyBib Bibliography creator and much more.
http://googledrive.blogspot.com/2014/03/add-ons.html

Now I'm excited ... maybe there are trendlines in sheets ...

Hopes are rising ...

Well, damn.

Getting in trouble for blogging.

There's an English teacher who publicly said things (link is dead, try googlecahe. Darren's got this which links to this paper's article and whose tech guy found a cached version of this rant and this one. Whew!) about her school, her admins, her students. She faces "disciplinary measures." I found some of it and I'm not surprised that the school took action.

Even if she didn't post from school, public attacks aren't the smartest thing in the world. "But she didn't name any students!" shouts the defense. That may be true, but her face is there, her name "Natalie M." and it doesn't take much for a student to "know she's talking about me." As soon as she found out that folks were reading her stuff, it needed to come down if she wanted to be that direct.

Having said that, one of her posts was "Comments that should be on the report card." Instead of "Not working to potential," Miss M. wanted some new comments:

• Concerned your kid is automaton, as she just sits there emotionless for an entire 90 minutes, staring into the abyss, never volunteering to speak or do anything.
• Seems smarter than she actually is.
• Has a massive chip on her shoulder.
• Too smart for her own good and refuses to play the school 'game' such that she'll never live up to her true potential here.
• Has no business being in Honors.
• A complete and utter jerk in all ways. Although academically ok, your child has no other redeeming qualities.
• Lazy.
• Shy isn't cute in 11th grade; it's annoying. Must learn to advocate for himself instead of having Mommy do it.
• One of the few students I can abide this semester!
• Two words come to mind: brown AND nose.
• Dunderhead.
• Complainer.
• Gimme an A. I. R. H. E. A. D. What's that spell? Your kid!
• There is such a thing as too loud in oral presentations. We shouldn't need earplugs.
• Att-i-tude!
• Nowhere near as good as her sibling. Are you sure they're related?
• I won't even remember her name next semester if I see her in the hall.
• Asked too many questions and took too long to ask them. The bell means it's time to leave!
• Has no business being in Academic.
• Rat-like.
• Lazy asshole.
• Just as bad as his sibling. Don't you know how to raise kids?
• Sneaky, complaining, jerkoff.
• Frightfully dim.
• Dresses like a street walker.
• Whiny, simpering grade-grubber with an unrealistically high perception of own ability level.
• One of the most annoying students I've had the displeasure of being locked in a room with for an extended time.
• Rude, beligerent, argumentative fuck.
• Tactless.
• Weirdest kid I've ever met.
• Am concerned that your kid is going to come in one day and open fire on the school. (Wish I was kidding.)
• I didn't realize one person could have this many problems.
• Your daughter is royalty. (The Queen of Drama)
• Liar and cheater.
• Unable to think for himself.
• I hear the trash company is hiring...
• Utterly loathsome in all imaginable ways.
• I called out sick a couple of days just to avoid your son.
• There's no other way to say this: I hate your kid.

Pretty funny, if it's kept to the teacher's lounge.

PD Follies - part six, Stepford Teachers

Sometimes people have conflicts. In a school, you can have some real petty politics with people choosing sides and teachers arguing.  There's always intrigue, spite and malice. There's that famous line about educational politics being "so nasty because the stakes are so small."

This person gets a department chair post over the objections of the members of the department.  That person gets a cushy schedule and glowing evaluations while this person gets slammed and is nearly run out of the school. A teacher commits a crime and the issue is ignored. The principal has an affair with the science teacher's wife causing a divorce. The other principal is committed secretly to a mental institution for three weeks in February; upon her return is even nuttier than before.

The faculty are evenly divided between hardline republicans and softheaded liberals. (I was the token liberal in the conservative camp.) The principal took the liberal side against the "Good Ole Boys," who were also the Upstanding Long-Time Members of the Community. When a G.O.B. can point to the classroom teacher's desk that had been used by successive family members for the last 50 years, any new principal should think carefully about taking on this cabal. This one didn't think. It wasn't pretty.

It got stupid, too. One teacher puts up a sign outside her door: "Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain.  And most do." The other replies with "But it takes a greater fool to say nothing."

Obviously we needed professional development to help teach us conservatives why we were wrong. Enter the

Conflict Resolution Specialist.

She was going to help us teachers get along and she was scheduled right after that infamous, vision statement debacle.  She was watching how we dealt with that and starting setting up.

Anything, I thought, would be better than mindless blathering about the differences between "21st century skills" and "skills for the emerging century." Maybe even conflict resolution training. Anyway, I would be wrong.

We had to role-play.

"If there were aliens flying above the school, how would they recognize the respect you show each other?"

The response:
"They wouldn't, because we would be inside the building and they couldn't hear us." 
"Why do we care what aliens think? We're all adults here and if someone can't handle a little disagreement why would they feel capable of being a teacher?" Which was priceless because the next thing out of her mouth was, "Some teachers feel there is a culture of intimidation here."

That didn't work so well.

We now had to role-play a conflict between a student and a teacher.
"You will be a student who failed a test and are upset that the teacher is keeping you after school and making you miss practice."
"Okay, that's fair. I'm good with that."
"No, you have to be angry."
"But keeping me after school is the right thing to do. I failed and the teacher's trying to help me."
"We're trying to practice conflict resolution. Maybe someone else?"


"All of you stick your stickers on the board next to your choice ... "
"Noooooooooo."

Then, the coup de grace: "One of you will be a girl who wants to use the purple chalkboard. Another a girl who wants to use the pink one. Show me how you'd resolve this conflict." (This gem was said to a burly redneck weighing nearly 350 pounds with a pocketknife hanging from his belt.)
"I don't want to use either board."
"You have to role-play."

This is No Shit. Did I mention that we're a high school?

I hate "professional development."

PD Follies - part five, Mission

Professional Development Follies - part five.

Some time ago, at another school and time, it was decided that we needed to correct our mission. We needed a better one. It was not enough to say "Our mission is to teach."

We are "supposed to be so much more" and so the first hour of the day that supposed to be devoted to some professional development (that inservice from hell) consisted instead of discussing the various important facets of our "mission", arguing over nuances of meaning and whether to mention character and 21st century skills in an increasingly interconnected world.

Did I mention that we were discussing the report from the Mission Statement Development Faculty Subcommittee (no shit, actual name)?

The plan was that when we finished deciding on the perfect length and turn of phrase, the mission statement would be printed, laminated and was to be posted over the door in every classroom. The old mission statement should be thrown away - it being no longer relevant even though it was nicely printed on colored paper, laminated and already posted above each classroom door?

What did we argue about?

One teacher pointed out that we have no schoolchildren here, only "young men and women." This nearly causes angina in the distaff side of the room.  "Why not young women and men?" Right there, you know this isn't starting well.

Our young men and women will have "active and creative minds," and our young women and men will display "a sense of understanding and compassion for others, and the courage to act on their beliefs."

We will provide a "world-class education" with "significant knowledge creation" which is a great ideal until someone (me) notices that no one has actually defined "significant" nor have they defined how we're measuring it. I am ignored in the poetic rush.

"Empowerment" is an important word, too, and apparently "each child is an individual" with a strong sense of belonging to the community. Hopefully, that will stop the bullying and the Halloween pranks. Our environment (it's not a school, mind you) has to be "caring and creative" and we must emphasize the the "whole child," whatever that means.

Of course, it wouldn't be a mission statement in the 21st century if we didn't acknowledge that "all children are creative;" "that all children will succeed," and that we are "all dedicated to higher standards" and a "challenging learning environment" including a mandate to "prepare fully the citizens of the future." "Success for all" is important, and a couple teachers wanted to say that twice in the mission statement, pissing off those who feel that makes it too wordy. ""It's gotta be pithy."


"Crap! We forgot to mention 'building self-esteem' and all of the 'positives relationships' and the 'total development of each child." "Oh, and technology! We need technology in there, too."

"Hold it, this is getting too big."
"Well, I got this one off the Internet. It has 145 words."

Mercifully, this ended after the hour was up and so we got down to the real business of the day. We were "working with" a "conflict resolution specialist" who was going to help us teachers get along. This was scheduled because there was some friction amongst us. We couldn't agree on things and the "tone" of the school was being "denigrated by negative attitudes" of people who didn't instantly agree with anything said.

Ya think?

Government InAction

Had to laugh. The Boston Herald AP wire story:

WASHINGTON — The U.S. government says candy imported from Pakistan called Toxic Waste Nuclear Sludge is not safe to eat. Who would have guessed?

Shocked. Alabama Governor is religious.

"Anybody here today who has not accepted Jesus Christ as their savior, I'm telling you, you're not my brother and you're not my sister, and I want to be your brother," Bentley said Monday, his inauguration day, according to The Birmingham News.

The Anti-Defamation League on Tuesday called Bentley's remarks shocking. "His comments are not only offensive, but also raise serious questions as to whether non-Christians can expect to receive equal treatment during his tenure as governor," said Bill Nigut, the ADL's regional director.

Sorry to burst your bubble, ADL, but you're living in Alabama. What gave you the idea that everyone would be treated equally without fighting for it? Has Alabama EVER been anything but resistant to Muslims, Jews, etc?

Techno-silly

Twain: Non sucky lecture.

Rick Hess's blog was taken over by a guest (Meira Levinson, an assistant professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education) who opined:

As a professor, I am a techno-enthusiast: I'm constantly asking my students to do in-class activities using GoogleDocs or wikis, and I've moved all my lectures on-line on the grounds that it's criminal in 2011 to force a bunch of people to show up in the same room just to hear one person monodirectionally deliver information.

Criminal? Interesting choice of words. Why should it be such an imposition for the students to show up to one place at a scheduled time? The reason they are (usually) required to be there is that lectures are rarely one-directional, unless the lecturer sucks. If I lecture, I am always looking for some kind of feedback if for no other reason than to ascertain whether any of them are awake.

I guess if you're that boring or if you're just reading from, and never veer away from, a script then an attendance requirement should be waived, but that doesn't seem like much of a college to me. It's curious that the college manages to convince people that this online, easy-access, don't care if you do or not, video repeated for the third straight year is worth the tuition:

Full-time Students	Per Academic Year	$35,568.00
Part-time Students	Per Course/Per Term	$ 4,446.00

If it doesn't matter whether or not the students are there, you might as well be running a video. Go ahead and put it online.

Stupid

I think Robert DeNiro is a brilliant actor. This does not necessarily translate over to education.

"For the children, you just hope the movies do well enough so you can keep them in private schools." — Robert DeNiro, on receiving a lifetime achievement award at the Golden Globes.

Screw you, Bobby. I've taught in private schools before. Ain't nothing special. The "difference" is selective admissions and money.

Rules? Who needs those?

Not the kid in question. I just felt you all
needed a visual to fully appreciate how
"rules governing the length of players' hair
violate their son's right to wear his hair
the way he wants."

So the basketball team has some rules. You have to wear a uniform. You can't be paid for playing. You need to be passing your classes. You need to attend at least 10 practices before being allowed to play. Lots of things all made clear up front in the extracurricular policy handbook (something set up and decided on LONG before the season). Oh, and you need a haircut.

This is too much for the kid so he sues on the grounds that girls don't have to have their hair cut to the same length, or as the story puts it so approvingly, "Obviously, the player and his parents decided to fight for his rights rather than acquiesce to the extracurricular policy's claim that a player's hair be above his eyebrows, collars and ears."

Then, they asked a few geniuses for opinions:

"I just think he should be stipulated to tie his hair up or something like that," said Anthony Johnson. "To cut it off, I think that's taking away a person's mind, body and soul sometimes."

Yup, can't fix stupid.

I had to laugh, too, when the story identified the parents as "Patrick and Melissa Hayden" but wouldn't breach confidentiality of the kid, saying "Their 14-year-old son, identified as A.H. in the lawsuit" like that protected his identity.

That'll improve the school

Think they'll pass muster?

Forget about replacing the teachers ... replace the students. Bring in the superstars, the superheroes and the supernerds.Then our scores are sure to go up.  New Trier High School, Fairfax High School -- we're looking at you. Let's trade yours for ours!

Never mind.

Funny idea, though.

Arrgh. One more day.

Who scheduled school to the 23rd? Bah! Humbug, indeed.

from interfacelift.com

It's cold. No Global Warming Again.

According to Andrew Watts, Cancun COP16 attendees fall for the old “dihydrogen monoxide” petition as well as signing up to cripple the U.S. Economy

Oh dear, some of these folks aren’t the brightest CFL’s in the room. Readers may remember this famous Penn and Teller video from 2006 where they get well meaning (but non thinking) people to sign up to ban “dihydrogen monoxide” (DHMO), which is an “evil” chemical found in our lakes, rivers, oceans, and even our food!

Ha, ha. Since some people at the conference fell for the old joke, global warming is therefore totally false. As is everything else they said, believed, wrote or thought. And since there's cold weather in Cancun, Global Warming is further debunked.

Jesus, people. Grow a brain.

Critical Thinking is not for Everyone.

The latest act in the worldwide WikiLeaks comedy: on Friday, the White House told federal employees and contractors that they're not allowed to read classified federal documents posted to WikiLeaks unless they have the proper security clearance.

It's posted for all the world to see, but if I work in Gov't, then I must adhere to the security limitations so the only people who won't read it are in Gov't.

Stunning.

Update from the drive home:

And then I thought about it a bit. Those with clearance randomly undergo security screenings and occasionally polygraph testing.  One question usually deals with "Have you seen, read or otherwise had knowledge of classified documents for which you did not have the proper security clearances?"  If I had seen something on Wikileaks, the honest answer would have to be "Yes."  That would lead to a whole lot of unpleasantness.

This advice might just save a few jobs.

Just because YOU don't know what it is ...

doesn't mean it's aliens. Just because your feeble brain is stuck on something and can't come up with a reasonable answer, doesn't mean there isn't one.

So here's the moron who's convinced that he sees a cellphone using time-traveler in an outtake from a Charlie Chaplin film.


When faced with two or more conclusions, the simplest one is usually the truth. In this case, the simplest explanation is that this is an alien. No wait, it's a secret plot by time travelers. No wait, she's holding her hand over her ear because it's cold out. No wait, it's DVD distortion. No wait, it's a cellphone. No wait, it's photoshop.

Look, if we can make the entire friggin' Lord of the Ring Trilogy of Monsters, why is "time travel" the first thing this so-called intelligent filmmaker can come up with?

Okay, let's run with a time traveler: Why would someone with the technology to do time travel be wandering around Hollywood with a cellphone that has to be held against the ear and is going to buzz or ringtone at really inopportune times (like that wouldn't be noticed?)? Why not a subdermal subvocalization mic w/ bluetooth connected to a satellite phone to the geosynchronously orbiting time travel pod and the bevy of space-studs dressed in leather thongs? Because that would be ridiculous?

All that technology that I just mentioned is currently available. Even the studs dressed in leather thongs. Cellphones in the form the Irishman witnessed have only been around for 5-6 years. Previously, they were differently shaped and would have required a cellphone tower every three miles. Phones are even now beginning to look different from "this" one - smartphone, bluetooth, etc.

Why would technology from the current, and narrow, 5-6 year window be the one seen? Because this is a self-delusionary fool who has a little imagination and sees what he wants to see.

Or this is a stunt by the Irishman - maybe he wants to get himself a little exposure as an idiot, thinking he'll somehow get more "award-winning" film jobs.

Or this is a stunt by the DVD compiler, trying to sell copies of a boxed set to gullible idiots or people who want to "prove that Irishman wrong," i.e., gullible idiots.

Or this is a misinterpretation of 6 seconds of footage culled from millions of hours of Hollywood video. At this rate, even monkeys can randomly type a line or two of Shakespeare.

Six Word Saturday.

Ricochet contributes to Six Word Saturday:

Brat is not a learning disability.

Priceless.

The One has been found.
No discernible problems.
Except he's a brat.

PsuedoContext

Dan Meyer gives an example from "The Real World":

Santa Cruz Sentinel, today:
The City Council will consider a proposal today to establish a citywide pay-by-cell phone system that would allow motorists to start, finish and extend time for meters or fee-based parking spots. [..] Consumers would pay a fee of 35 cents per transaction, or 25 cents for frequent users if they are willing also to pay a monthly access fee of $1.75.

"Is pseudocontext a failure of imagination or is it a symptom of laziness? Because this sort of thing just isn't hard to find."

I think it's pretty lame of him to toss out this false dichotomy like that. (My browser settings and his comment system don't seem to be on speaking terms, so I'll mention this here.)  And I notice that he's been teaching for how long and only now noticed this gem? (I know that's unfair, but so is the original question.  I withdraw my snarky comment.)

No, the real problem here is one of timing, of not having this pop up in your newspaper on the day you need it, at the time you're doing the lesson planning. It's got little to do with a lack of imagination.  In fact, a lack of imagination is probably the best trait for someone doing lesson plans.  Teaching takes imagination -- why waste this limited resource on something as foolish as lesson plans?  What God in whichever Heaven you stare at when you can't see a ceiling decreed that you must know what the kids will be doing during the 13th minute of your class period? What if you needed to repeat something or -- swoon -- got off on a really good tangent?

Besides, not everyone spends every waking moment solely focused on teaching and mathematics. Sometimes, I just read.

It does take a certain frame of mind to watch for these things ... an old teacher friend of mine used to clip articles ... this is similar.  I never could get the hang of it with newspaper, but I do find it easier on the Internet. Now that I have been using the thumbdrive method of file transport, I have amassed a large library of these types of things, neatly sorted into the classes and folders so I can find them later when I get around to it. (Yeah, right)

Having said that, this "Real-World" problem is no more or less engaging to students than the cellphone plan that charges by the month or by the 100 minute-block or the psuedocontextual dreck in the book.

[So I had a five-minute bit of Photoshop fun at Dan's expense. Don't think nothing of it.]

On a scale of 1 to 10, these are funny.

So, there's this magic dust called "Math Teacher Magic Scale Factor" ... it makes things really big. Sometimes too big.

Stupid, just Stupid.

Business Insider has a Chart-of-the-Day that I subscribe to.  It's usually bland and stupid, some line chart or pie chart, but occasionally the editors commit some total bonehead move and choose the wrong type of graph or mess up somehow. Equally rarely, they produce a wonderful one, with some really cool data.  I use it to let my students see that their choices and mistakes are not uncommon but that you risk looking silly if you misuse Excel.

The page has links to other business-related stuff, which is why I brought it up.  Here is an amazing picture-story combination.  Any thoughts?

Ads on Permission Slips

Joanne Jacobs has a quick hit on selling ads on permission slips.

Ads for local businesses will appear on permission slips, class calendars and school notices sent home with elementary students in Peabody, Massachusetts, reports the Boston Globe. Ads for cigarettes and liquor will be banned.

The calendars are no big surprise. Schools have been selling ads on sports calendars for what, decades? The sports stadium is littered with ads and the cafeteria probably a bunch more. The permission slips and report cards are new, but only report cards seem to me a worthwhile location. Permission slips are sent home, quickly skimmed and signed (rarely read) and then go back to the teacher. Report cards have more permanence and might be posted somewhere and often viewed.

One of the things that amused me about the story was the idea that cigarettes and liquor ads will be banned (I guess they're too evil) but the ads targeted to elementary kids will be "age-appropriate," ... "local pizza and ice cream shops." Certain vices are verboten but it's okay to fatten them up? They're in the clear because they'll allow "dance and karate schools"? And then there's this gem of an idea ... "maybe from a florist or a college." That's funny. When I think about 3rd graders, the first thought is not usually a desire to buy from florists or a need to worry about college.

Secondly, they should be upfront and admit it's all about a little extra money the principal can waste on frivolity.

"Peabody schools laid off six teachers, two guidance counselors and other staff this year. Fees for riding the bus and playing sports were raised."

This is a drop in the bucket. Maybe enough to re-furnish the principal's office. To mention staffing numbers and fees in the same article as (wildly overestimated) $24,000 in advertising seems only calculated to reduce the inevitable backlash.

What backlash?  I'm sure that some parent will complain.  Maybe the Pizza Shack owner who has to forever display his daughter's straight-A report card with the Tony's Pizza ad on it.  I would complain if I found out that the school went through the hassle of selling the ads but had to buy specially printed report cards (using up the "profits" because every report mailing was different) and then spent hours of time trying to get the report cards to print out properly.  I would also want to earmark the money.  Putting into the Principal's Slush Fund isn't my idea of proper management.