The Last of The Full Load

This week, like many weeks, was very frustrating for me. Maybe the most frustrating week. The week started out with a visit from my University Supervisor which was not the frustrating part, but rather the best part of my week. Dr. Ewing provided some great points and coaching that I can understand and build off of. I used his advice on cracking down the with my freshman class to build classroom management. I moved some students and wrote up a couple as well. This coming week is a new week and I hope that my impressions held over break, but if not, I will have to reenforce them this week.

Horticulture had a guest speaker in Dr. Kerry Richards who spoke about pesticide safety. She left her materials with me to use on Monday with the students. I am excited to continue the formulations exercise and see what the students know from their background of house hold products. We will be finishing up the IPM and plant propagation unit, but I am worried that they will not have remembered the material from the plant propagation lessons. We will have some time to review, but they are in a college course so I will not spend too much time reviewing.

The students wrote one page summaries about their thoughts on GMOs and the impact they have on agriculture. It was great to see the students take a stand and reason through why or why not they agreed to using GMOs in agriculture. Although I may not have agreed with them on some of their view points, they were able to factually support their feelings toward the subject.

The Barn Owl box unit is possibly my favorite unit. I have freedom to plan it however I desire and execute the project to my preference. This week the students cut out all of the sides and boards. It was GREAT to see them problem solve through the measurements and work together to come up with a solution. The students were working hard during the activity but were happy when they knew they solved the problem.

Food science concluded for me this week. They took their exams for the first unit and afterwards we discussed how diets vary around the world using my experience in South Korea as an example. Many of the students found it interesting how they have such a monoculture in the food industry. It really hit home when I informed them that here at Big Spring, we can eat tacos, pizza, and various other foods when other countries do not have a need for the diversity of foods.