Beginning of 2009

Last week I returned to Ypsilanti High School after their two-week winter break. I had prepared a talk about a project I did last term, but Ms. Tran hadn't planned for me to speak, so instead I helped out with the in-class review problem sets. Since I found out I would be here in the Spring semester, I asked Ms. Tran for a copy of the seating charts so that I could better learn the students' names, so I spent some time studying those and starting to put some names to the faces I've already become familiar with over the last few months. I had varied success working with the students on the problem sets. First hour was very quiet and I only had one person ask me a question, despite my walking around the room and specifically asking everyone if they needed help or had questions. In second and third hour there was a lot more questions and talking in general, so I felt more useful. This seems to be a trend, and I know it is hard to wake first hour up, but I don't quite know how to get them more into the class. Fifth hour was also tough - the same two students that didn't do the work last time also refused to do their work this time and instead chatted the entire time. When I try to address this with them, they simply ignore me, which is very frustrating for me. The other students all at least started the assignment, and many of them asked me for help.

Today I was able to give the talk I had prepared for last week, so I talked about a class I took last term - Global Product Development. I had gone to Korea as a part of this class and had to miss them for two weeks in December, and since many of them asked how my trip was when I returned, I thought it would be appropriate to fill them in. I started out by talking about Korea and asked them what they knew about the country, and then I introduced the course to them, discussing the goal to develop products in a global setting. The objective of the class was to develop products for third-world countries, so we also discussed what that meant, and what the needs of people in these countries are. I then talked about the project that my team did, and showed them a couple of videos of my project and some of my adventures in Seoul. In first hour, Ms. Tran left for most of the talk, and there was a slight distraction when one of the students opened a bag of chips and another student walked across the room to ask for some. I told him that it was very rude of him, but I didn't want to let him interrupt any more than he already had, so I pushed on through it and continued the talk. One of the videos I showed was of a meal I had in which there was live octopus, which I thought was really cool, but it turned out to be a little too distracting for second hour, and all of their questions were about the octopus rather than the class or the project. Third hour went very well, and most of the students were engaged in the discussion and asked relevant questions. I attribute this to both them being more awake and myself being more familiar with the material after already having run through it twice. Fifth hour was surprisingly very respectful and engaged - since this class is the second half of the regular geometry for students who had to retake it, they will not return for the spring semester and therefore this was my last talk with them. I told them that at the beginning, and perhaps because of that they paid attention and had minimal interruptions during my talk, and they asked good questions at the end. It was a great note to end on with them, and I'm happy with how it went. I look forward to starting the new semester with these students in two weeks.