Life has been a little busy. Since I wrote my introduction and made my first post I have graduated with my Associate of Arts Teaching degree, my twins started third grade and are now halfway through and they turned nine years old last week, my youngest started preschool and turned five in December, my husband and I celebrated our thirteenth anniversary in the fall, my mother had her left knee replaced in August, her right knee replaced in November, and her mother--my grandmother--died. So my best intentions to post were set aside to juggle school and the demands of my family. Remember (or hear it for the first time) that I am repairing the damage I did to my GPA nearly two decades ago so keeping my grades up is really important. My cumulative GPA still reeks but I am very proud to say that my professional education GPA is a 4.0 and I have raised my cumulative to nearly a 3.0 which says a lot since the last thirty hours or so of my initial attempt at college were mostly failing grades. It isn't easy to admit the mistakes I have made but I want my own kids to learn from them, and possibly someone else along the way.
There are a few things that have made me very successful since I returned to college. First, I understand that I have ADHD-Primarily Inattentive. Since my own realization about this, and my subsequent diagnosis, I have learned to manage myself really well in regards to school--keeping my house clean and my laundry done are not part of my refined management abilities
. To keep myself organized, especially with online classes, I make a good old fashioned to do list. I list every assignment for every class in order of its due date. Here is this weeks'.
Please forgive the blur, I was too lazy to get up from my study station to find a better lit place in my house to photograph it. The flash just washed it out. So this list belongs in the front of my binder, the very front page but my extra paper is at the back. I am sure you noticed that I like color, it helps to keep me organized, and the graph paper does the same thing. You should have seen the notes I took during lectures (yes I keep at least two if not four colored pens with me in class) before my therapist (for the ADHD) recommended the graph paper. I use this method to take notes when I read. I also had an amazing teacher teacher who introduced me to the SQR4 reading method which helps a lot when studying.
As I accomplish something on my list I mark it off and every few days I rewrite the list...an important part of that is marking the old list off as I do it so I don't miss anything. I managed to miss a quiz a couple of semesters ago because I simply missed a line during the copying step. When I have an big/time consuming assignment due later down the road I make a note at the bottom of the page, usually with a due date, and make sure I give it some attention when I have a bit of spare time. I also carry a giant 3 inch "durable" binder that stands up to a beating. I have it tabbed and have a section for each course. While sometimes it seems bulky it is really nice to know that everything is in one place and I don't have to keep track of five different notebooks plus the nine textbooks I have this semester.
Another really important thing to remember is to take the time to do pristine work. Proof your writing or, even better, have a friend proof it for you. Make sure if you have a friend do it that they actually know how to proofread for grammatical errors. Don't count on grammar or spell check to proof for you. From the first professional education class you take you will begin to work on your own Teaching Portfolio. You will want to do your best work so that you can incorporate it into the portfolio that will get you hired for your first teaching job one day. That said, if you don't own a program that lets you create digital images from those that are open source (free from copyright) on the Internet you might want to invest. While you can do a bit of it in Word or Publisher it is a lot easier to learn and use a program like AdobePhotoshopElements(c). Elements is fairly inexpensive and if you buy a version that is a couple of years old instead of the newest you can definitely make do for a fraction of the price. The benefit of programs like this is the ability to create visually pleasing images to accompany your work. This one is a floor plan of the classroom that I did my field experience internship in. It is much easier to get an idea of the classroom when you include visuals with your writing. I cannot tell you how many times I have received praise from my instructors because I took the time to do this.
You can also make custom backgrounds for PowerPoint presentations, graphics for documents or your blog or website and more. These programs are really easy to learn but if you are in doubt there are a lot of free online tutorials. Oh, great resources for graphics include digital scrapbooking websites that offer freebies. At some point I will pull together a list and post it. Okay, so it is 12:30 a.m. and all three of my kids have been out of school since Friday because of ice and then snow, they are out again tomorrow and my boys are early risers so I had better hit the hay soon. Forgive any typos--it's late. Hopefully I will remember to come back when I am wide awake and proof my own work.
As soon as I have some time I am going to upload some lesson plans that everyone is welcome to use.
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