Dingos Run Walk Dance Box Pose bike and Swim into 2013 - Page 12

[bec]

JG - So happy for you to be pain free!  Is this a long term solution?  Or will the epidural wear off and you'll be back to where you were?  It must be a relief after so long to have a diagnosis, and a treatment, not to mention no pain!

Nic/Geo - I'm also finding this discussion really fascinating.  Mainly from the other side of things as I help to prepare my kids for tests (mostly my oldest who has an incredibly difficult time testing.)  Testing simply isn't a good measure for her knowledge, for the most part.  She freezes, has anxiety around it, and it is very difficult for her to think clearly when in a testing situation.  In the scope of a project, discussion or other work, she does very well.  So, we have been focusing for the last few years on testing strategies, studying strategies, etc.  It is starting to pay off now.  She has been doing very well this year in her tests.  She's still a disaster on standardized tests, but on tests where she can study specific material, she has made huge strides.

RR: Tough tri class tonight.  Started with speedwork in the pool.  Warm up, then 2 sets of 4-50s.  My lane was on the 1:05.  So, if we did our lap in under 1:05, we had a small recovery, if we didn't make it, we sat out for the next lap.  It was super tough.  I made it through the first set of 4, but only got 3 of the last set.  I swallowed some pool water about halfway through the lap and choked a bit on it.  I struggled to finish the lap, and made it with about 3 seconds to spare, but was not able to go for the next one!  Then, we dressed for the bike.  She took us through a tough hill ride, followed by 3 minute endurance sets.  It was hard, but good.  On deck: 7 miles tomorrow!

[Realrellim]

Nic--this isn't much in the way of helpful advice, but I doubt it's that you're not teaching effectively. Is there a chance you could sit down with individual students and talk them through the parts where there were issues, both to hear how they approached it and so you can coach them about how to synthesize materials or whatnot? Geo's suggestions for coaching are brilliant. The education mandates are the real sticking point these days, especially with the new PARCC test coming down the pipes all too soon. Anyhow, the AP students need to rise to the level of the AP test and my experience even with college students has been that students still seem to need a fair amount of coaching about how to take notes and how to prioritize information and how to organize information when studying and taking a test. (I also wonder whether more students are taking AP classes who might have chosen a college-prep level class instead 20 years ago. If so, that would also have an impact on your test scores.)

I've been toying with alternate assessment ideas but haven't found anything great yet. Happily, no one has mandated standardized tests like K-12 has in higher ed (yet).

JayGee--yay for no pain!

RR: 5.5, which was 8x400m on the indoor track.
NRR: I need to sleep more, so I'll stop posting and see what I can do about the sleep portion of the day.

[bec]

For what it's worth, I didn't take AP classes until my senior year of high school.  I also don't think that it prepared me for the tests (which I did poorly on, and didn't have a single practice test in class) nor do I feel that they were college equivalent classes.  College was something of a shock to my system. 

[JayGee]

My AP biology class in high school was actually more difficult than my freshman year intro to biology course in college! I can't remember if I took any AP exams or not, for some reason. If I did, I don't think I did well enough to place out because I took both intro to biology and freshman English (the two AP classes I took in HS) my freshman year.

Nic - I think Geo has given you a great template for test design, at any rate!

bec - I always enjoyed those kind of swim workouts!

lofty - your carrot soup sounds intriguing! Recipe?

RR - well, perhaps I spoke to soon on the "pain free". Apparently, the lidocaine got me through about 24 hours of no pain, but when it wore off, the pain returned. Now to wait for the steroid to kick in fully! At least I know they are targeting the right part of my body (L5/S1 and S1/S2) because the lidocaine to that area virtually eliminated all symptoms. If I can get my disaster area of a kitchen put back together in the next hour, I am planning a walk at the Y. It's too cold to walk outside this morning.

NRR - I know some of you have had daughters do Girls on the Run and just wanted to get some opinions. DD1 is eligible this year and is really interested. I love the idea of her running .

[Geofizz]

Originally Posted by bec 

For what it's worth, I didn't take AP classes until my senior year of high school.  I also don't think that it prepared me for the tests (which I did poorly on, and didn't have a single practice test in class) nor do I feel that they were college equivalent classes.  College was something of a shock to my system. 

It depends on the subject and how it's taught.  I took 5 APs in high school.  4 were courses tagged at AP, and the 5th was because I felt like studying for it on my own and I talked a teacher into meeting with me once a week to prep.  I ended up with just a bit of college credit for the college I attended, though it would have been nearly a year's credit had I gone elsewhere.  I still had great benefits from having taken the classes, mostly by letting me take more interesting classes in college and placing the classes at a better time.

Everyone I knew in college who tested out of the first semester of calculus (required a 5 on the BC) knew the math better than those who took the calculus their first semester college.  Generally an AP class is a whole year and it gets you 1 semester's credit in college.  So yes, college is a shock to the system because it is assumed to go at twice the rate.  AP credits are best used to exempt from prereqs and survey requirements.  Getting through prereqs means that you have significantly more flexibility to explore in the first year.  Often it's hard to explore STEM majors, for instance, when you don't have the calculus prereq.  So you spend that year getting the prereqs in place, and then you don't have the opportunity to figure out if physics or biochemistry is right for you.  Getting excused from survey classes (with or without credit attached) allows you to take the History of 19th century French Cheese Making instead of Survey of Cheese Making from Mesopotamia to present.  This gets you more of the university experience of in-depth study that few high school students get.

Interestingly, from where I sit as an advisor in a STEM major, I see significantly more success in students who come in with AP credits than with post-secondary in high school credits.  There's a big push to take college classes through dual enrollment as a high school student instead of AP classes.  I'm not sure what the cause and effect is, but I have seen lots of flailing and immaturity on the part of the student for those with dual enrollment credit that I tend not to see with those with comparable AP credit.

[Plady]

Morning mamas - I'm not boxing today.  I've been fighting a cold and went on Tuesday in the hopes of nipping it in the bud but ended up just feeling totally wiped out and Dayquil dependent all day yesterday.  Here's hoping that rest is the right choice. 

Nic - You've certainly gotten better advice from others but could it also be a timing thing?  I usually help out at school on spelling test morning and grade the tests.  The week everyone returned from break the class average was 63.  I asked the teacher if I could say something to the class and told them what the average was and that I was shocked and disappointed and I knew they could do better if they just spent a little time with their heads in the game.  The next week the class average was 89.5 (and would have been higher but for one girl who still got 38% on her test). 

JayGee - Bummer, I'm sorry the good stuff wore off, but fingers crossed the steroids kick in with the same results.

Jo - Didn't want you to think I was ignoring the commonsense approach of 'put the effing dogs out'.  That was my first pronouncement to the family.  It lasted for all of one day.  Dh works at home and he hates listening to them scratching and banging and shrieking and whining at the door so he caves in and lets them in.  They do the same thing if we try to contain them in their "bedroom". 

oof, feeling kind of woozy and haven't even started my dose of Dayquil yet.   Maybe a shower will help....

[1jooj]

Aw come on, P, I didn't think you were...and I can really, really empathize with your feelings about the doggies.

So interesting to listen to my Very Smart Friends talk tests and grading and such. You all really are amazing. Plady's "head in the game" talk definitely came to my mind. I know I sort of have to prime my kids before a test, like right before--not on the info to be covered, but getting all the synapses to connect, it seems. Like putting on their thinking caps. But then, they are 11 and 9. 

JayGee, I am totally rooting for you on this. I want to hear about a miracle.

No RR today, but dh and I walked through Ikea. 

[tjsmama]

Originally Posted by 1jooj 

So interesting to listen to my Very Smart Friends talk tests and grading and such. You all really are amazing.

My brain is kind of numb right now, between working 6 out of the last 8 nights and the crud that I'm fighting, so I apologize for not being able to process personals. I did want to say for real's new iphone! I can actually text her now!

It wasn't a terrible stretch at work, but I'm definitely exhausted, certainly not helped by this cold. I actually felt a lot worse last week, but I sound horrible. My voice was pretty much gone when I woke up yesterday, and then got progressively worse at work last night until by 4 am, I just didn't even attempt to answer my phone if it rang...just handed it to whoever was sitting next to me to triage for me. I was hopeful that maybe my voice would be back when I woke up today, but no dice. It's been a fun afternoon of whisper/squeaking, interspersed with lots of "what?" by DS. And then the XIL's are in town, so trying to connect with them on the phone to meet up tonight was great, too. I so cannot wait to sleep at night tonight, for at least 8 hours!

[MelW]

on the AP/dual enrollment conversation. It's less common in Canada, but larger cities have offered IB courses in high school for a while. One local high school offers IB options now, which give varying degrees of university credit.

JayGee, I hope you have some relief again soon!

Plady, feel better soon.

NRR- Earlier this week a notice came in the mail looking for volunteers to join a citizens' advisory panel to review and re-develop the official community plan. I was contemplating applying, then wondering if I was insane for considering it given all of the other responsibilities in my life. But it was still appealing and compelling. Today I learned that the public review of the old plan is happening this weekend, including a session run by one of the profs from my first choice program. I'm excited to go and now even more excited to participate (not to mention that the application deadline is next week and I hope that a fresh name-face connection will help my application...)

RR- Nothing other than stairs at work.

[Realrellim]

Originally Posted by Geofizz 

Interestingly, from where I sit as an advisor in a STEM major, I see significantly more success in students who come in with AP credits than with post-secondary in high school credits.  There's a big push to take college classes through dual enrollment as a high school student instead of AP classes.  I'm not sure what the cause and effect is, but I have seen lots of flailing and immaturity on the part of the student for those with dual enrollment credit that I tend not to see with those with comparable AP credit.

I'm not surprised. Several of our high schools offer those kind of dual credit programs and they're all partnered with local community colleges. I've heard the high school principals praise the dual credit programs highly, but they also talked about how hard it was to get a job at a community college and I had to restrain myself from snorting. (Don't get me wrong--I understand that there's competition everywhere lately. That said, I still think putting in applications at the local community colleges is considerably easier than applying for a tenure-track job.)

The AP classes I took in high school were comparable to the classes in the honors college at my undergrad university. I only took three AP classes (and tests) and received college credit for all three. It bumped me a semester ahead, getting me out of the first semester of music theory (it had actually taught me enough that it covered most of the second semester of music theory). If I hadn't been enrolled in the honors college, it would have allowed me to skip the first semester of English and history too. The credits were useful anyhow because it meant that I had senior standing by my junior year and we qualified for the first-floor dorm rooms that were reserved for seniors. (Yes, I also took 19 credits/semester that helped too, 'cause as you all know, I have this strange tendency toward overloads and not sleeping as much as I should. Also, everyone had to live on campus until they were 21 but the first floor rooms had their own bathroom and it was really ideal: we didn't have to cook, we were right on campus, and we didn't have to share a bathroom with the whole floor.)

My high school did well though. Everyone had said college was so much harder, but I thought it was a really seamless transition academically. OTOH, DH said he barely had homework in high school and he was the valedictorian and all that (his high school was also about half the size of mine), and college was a shock to his system. My experience had been hours of homework and countless rewrites so college was a grand improvement. For example: junior year we turned in our first English paper and pretty much all of ours were returned with many comments and no grade because we had to rewrite it. Most of us had to rewrite it twice before it was acceptable. Senior year it was the same story in the combined AP English/history class, except that we all pretty much did a minimum of three rewrites. So when we turned in our first paper in the honors college, I fully expected an F, figuring that the bar had been raised again and we'd have to strive to meet it. I was really pleased to get a C+ instead of an F on that first paper. Yes, I had a long ways to go, but I was prepared for it, unlike the majority of my classmates who were humiliated and horrified (including my husband, though he was a couple years ahead of me in the program). I'm the only honors college alum I know who expected that, so my high school experience was probably not the norm.

Sorry no personals, too busy yammering on....

to everyone, and especially to those battling colds, other illness, and injuries.

RR: 3 on the TM.

[JayGee]

Real - I love when a teacher REALLY prepares you for college like that! I had the greatest 4th grade teacher who taught us how to organize all our writing. I followed her template through high school, undergrad and grad school and it never failed! I have even taught her organizational template to DS. Back in 4th grade we thought of her as a mean witch of a teacher who was ridiculously hard on 9 and 10 year olds. Little did we know..... she really did us all a favor by expecting nothing but our best!

MelW - all the stars sure are aligning for you!

tjsmama and Plady - hope you both feel better

jooj - Mmmmmm.... Ikea!

RR - well, I tried to walk yesterday, but the burning pain kicked in pretty quickly in my calf, so I quit after about 20 minutes. Will give it another try today. The good news is that the numbness and tingling are virtually gone!

[Plady]

JayGee - Could you/Did you ever thank that 4th grade teacher?  If you haven't I bet it would just make her day to hear that.

Re: AP/college/expectations: I took AP Biology because I loved the curmudgeon who taught it and I wanted to dissect a cat.  I don't think I bothered to take the test though because I remember breezing through an intro class as a freshman in college.  But somehow, even though I'd grown up in a university town, the basics of college just totally missed me.  I somehow made it into the honor's program (at Catholic University of all places) without knowing what a syllabus was and not looking at the one for my Philosophy class until midterms came around and I finally realized how everyone else knew what we were talking about each day.   I don't know if it's a testament to my resilience or the college's low bar that I made the dean's list that semester.  

MelW- Have a good time networking this weekend!

I think I have a handle on this cold.  Fingers crossed.  Hope everyone else is staying healthy and well.

[tjsmama]

At my teeny tiny small town high school, we didn't have the option of AP classes or dual credit classes when I was there. Heck, our only options were college prep classes or not (i.e. general science vs. biology/adv bio/chemistry/physics). I didn't really struggle with the transition to college, but I did drop out of the honors program after freshman year...not because it was difficult, but more because it was time consuming and I didn't really see that big a benefit to putting all that work in just to get "university honors" in addition to my cum laude graduation. Maybe if I had been on more of an academic track, it would have mattered more. That said, I do wonder how I would do in today's environment. I mean, clearly, I did ok then, and even with my second go-round with school, but the whole high school and college experience just seems a ton more stressful now.

My voice has returned, kind of. I'm still croaking, but at least it's audible. I had great plans to go to the Y after I dropped DS at school today, but I think I might need a catch-up-on-sleep day instead. Especially because we are going skiing tomorrow, and maybe Sunday, too = early morning wakeups. Get healthy first, then get in shape, right? Sigh.

[kerc]

oh goodness, lots to say on ap exams and colleges in the schools. I might not comment as much as I could though -- so many topics, so close to home. My husband teaches at the two state colleges in the area, at the community college and "mentors" teachers who do colleges in the schools. Basically he checks in to make sure they are up to snuf and has had to have some hard chats with high school teachers about what's NOT college material. Even at the community college from which he comes. And to top it all off: he grades AP exams every summer.  I think there are benefits for each -- but colleges in the schools don't ask kids to make enough of a commitment to the college experience -- they don't go to the college for the class (putting them outside a comfort zone), they aren't taking the test (and thereby putting themselves out there).  I could talk all day about this.....

Erin started a math acceleration this week. She's moving up to the next grade just for math. She is totally and completely an introvert. By every definition you could possibly use. BUT it makes it so much easier that she's seated (for math) right next to her super close friend. Erin has 2 BF and this girl is one of them. She was in heaven when she was talking about it.  Thank goodness it looks like it is going to work out. Interestingly our Leah (extrovert, but a very shy extrovert) was HATING school. She had no contact with "friends" and was crying a lot at home and at school. Then the school started offering a "math club" -- an afterschool program for kids 2 x a week for kids who show promise in math (recommendation from 1st grade teachers and it is a fluid group). Ever since math club began she's excited to go to school, even asking to ride the bus to sit with one of the girls from the club. Apparently social stuff matters a lot for my girls, even for the darn introvert.

We saw a dermatologist this week at the hospital here in DLH. We had seen her before 2 years ago. We opted in december to see someone in the MSP area because we could get in a week earlier. It ended up being a bad choice. Then we got back into the months long queue for the local person. She took one look at Erin and started using science to help diagnose -- took skin cells on a microscope slide, went down the hall to look at them and then began narrowing down what it might be. DX: fungal infection on her face. Think ringworm. (which is highly contagious usually thank god none of the rest of us got it!). She's on an antifungal med now and we have already seen marked improvement (5 doses in to a 24 dose regimen). Doc sent out cells to be cultured to check for bacterial, fungus, and virus and is hopeful it will clear up (and if it doesn't then she'll see the species of the fungus and be able to go after it more efficiently). Whew.

It has been remarkably cold here (3-4 days where it didn't go above zero F at my house). I'm antsy to get out skiing. But skiing below zero is no fun, even if you can dress yourself warmly. My birthday is next week and dh and I are headed out for dinner at a fancy restaurant with three friends (a couple + 1/2 of a second couple).

Jaygee: I hope the stuff they shot you up with continues to work.

Plady: kick that cold to the curb!

Ok I know this message is low on personals. Hope ya'll are out running a lot. I swam three mornings this week (I talked myself into #3 because I want to order dessert!).

[mommajb]

I'm back and reality isn't all it is cracked up to be.

I find the AP/honors classes talk to be interesting and timely. Ds is taking 4 AP classes this year and wants to take 5-6 exams (Latin, Calc BC, Euro Hist, Stats plus chem and music something or other) including one that dh is grading. I am balking at paying for all of them thinking he could take a couple next year or the year after. Coming from homeschooling many people use them to establish credibility. Others use the dual enrollment or comm college for some classes. Not my preference for highschool students. I have had hours worth of discussions on this point so I'll spare you.
As an aside, we may have found a style/type of college for ds to look at and he has a response to what he wants to be when he grows up. I don't expect him to stick with it but a little direction is nice.

Sparkle, I hear your roar about 10 yo dd. Dd2 will be 10 next month and you may recall some of my bellyaching.
jo, best of luck to your dh. I was so relieved when my dh quit smoking. (RM, he did it w/o telling me the day I gave birth to our 4th child.)

Who asked about GOTR? In many ways it is very similar to scouting only the activities are running and health (physical and emotional) based. It depends very much on the coach and the group of girls. I have asst coached and will say I did not think there was quite enough running and prep for the 5K (because that is what my daughter said). Some girls show up excited to play and run but in my experience many of the girls were unwilling participants signed up by their parents who hoped they would lose weight magically while the parents continued to set the same example and serve the same food at home.

I cannot find time to write on the dingo thread I have no idea how lofty and jo find time to do more.

[Geofizz]

I think I've been using some terms too loosely.

In this area we have programs where students can take their last high school requirements on a university campus enrolled with the general university student body.  They get credit for both the high school requirements and the credits count/transfer to the university degree.  These students start out about as far ahead as those with a comparable number of AP credits, and yet are are significantly worse off in their approach to education and their "how to learn and function in a university" skills than their AP-credit-earning peers.  The skills include starting assignments on time, understanding what a syllabus is for, using office hours, handing in something late instead of skipping an assignment all together if you get sick, alerting the prof ahead of time if you're going to miss class for a job interview, etc.  I call these "soft skills" of success, but are of primary importance if you want a grade over a C. 

I do not understand why the AP class kids are better off than this other group.  I wonder if AP teachers tend to be more like JayGee's 4th grade teacher.  For me it was my pre-algebra/algrebra teacher. 
 

I'm so glad Erin's thriving in the new class.  We experienced a similar social awakening for our introvert that way as well.  Going up the level, then being paired with a friend or a kindred spirit, brings out a whole new person.  We've now got that going for 3 classes, and DD is loving every minute of it (OK, she hates the bus ride because she thinks it's a waste.  I tend to agree with her, but we've taught a zen-like "pick your battles" approach on that).  DD has actually admitted to me that she likes math.  But with all the accelerations, we're facing having to enroll DD into college-level courses at the community college or university level in her last two years of high school.    Things like math club for Leah likely show her that there are other kids like her at school.  Even if she doesn't get to do much of the brain bending work during school, just knowing that there are others out there makes a world of difference for these kids. 

RR:  RP and I started up on C25K to get her back into shape, and then her mom had a stroke Monday.  :(  Well, off to the pool tonight.

[mommajb]

I think it has to do with top students in a highschool taking AP classes and the classes being an environment where excellence is demanded by the instructor and classmates. When you get to a comm college you have students that may not have excelled in highschool who also may not have their studies be the focus of their lives (family, jobs, and other time draws). The instructors may also not be demanding as much because they are aware of these constraints. IME, students who are not fully prepared for a rigorous college experience will attempt to make up the difference at a community college before moving forward. I would not want my highschool student taking what should be a highschool course at the community college. My POV may be off the mark and missing what is really being discussed here.


ETA: Comm college not being a university that offers degrees beyond certificates and associates. Highschool students at a university may lack the social support to get the soft skills because they are younger than most students? I don't know.

[MelW]

Done, done, done! We made it through the work week and various illnesses (more in the childcare providers than us, though both girls and I have been fighting off a cold). It took a total of 10 different caregivers/carpools/schools, but I didn't miss any work. Now for bootcamp and homemade sushi...

I'm really interested in all of the high school options and pros/cons. While it's still several years away I'm always interested to hear about what works for different kids. I've been struggling philosophically with our new school and the values/politics. I'm feeling that the big push for self-empowerment and "power of positive thinking" stuff, combined with the self-congratulatory tone of the administration and many parents conflicts with my values and politics more than I had anticipated. Combined with the general privilege in the school (it's public, but only accessible to those able to drive to the rural campus and to homeschool half-time) I feel vaguely irritated by the lack of self-examination of the school/curriculum politics and the attitude that I'm being negative and destructive in my questioning. There's more to this than I have the energy to to type (and bore you with)right now, but I feel like a generally optimistic person with a very different worldview than a lot of people around me. This week it's resulted in more than my usual share of rants

[loftmama]

following along with fascination

No running to report. But it's still been a good week. Off to Willie Nelson concert...

Oh I'd like to post this interesting article about running forms. Basically, we don't know very much about "proper form."

[loftmama]

Can't edit in mobile so here it is.

Is there one right way to run?