Back in the Saddle

This week was my first week back. I'm not sure what I expected for my first day, but I was very nervous. In many ways it was like the first day of school--especially since I had not met with the 9th graders. I think that this was a good day to come back and that I am good to have high expectations. I can see that I will have to constantly reinforce my high expectations in order to get students to grow. My first day back also coincided with the 4.5 week assessments. I had the freshmen complete the assessment. It was my hope that I could convince them to take it seriously. Reflecting on their scores, I'm not sure if they did or not. Mind you, I've only known them a couple of days. The proficiency rating currently sits at 28%. This is obviously not where we want to be, but I have to recognize this is where they are. Because we are essentially 4.5 weeks behind, I have to be deliberate with our lessons and course goals. The students obviously need structure. They can not be left to work on big projects like my AP students. For my 9th grades, I need to be very explicit in my instruction. I also need to show them technology that they may be unfamiliar with, in part because they are new to the high school. This week we've used the following technology:

1. Blogger
2. Google Documents (including copying a document and sharing documents)
3. Research tool in Google Documents
4. Easybib Add-On

Tomorrow students will use google presentation. I'm pleased with how quickly they have taken to using some of these tools, but I can definitely see a huge gap in the classroom. In my AP classes, I show all of the students a tool and for the most part they are good to go. In my 9th grade class, I have students who are still confused about finding the URL to copy and paste. This means that it will be important for me to be constantly monitoring and reinforcing what tools we've used and how to use them for whatever our specific purpose is.