Week 8 Reflection

First of all, four day weeks are awesome! It was great to have Monday this week to prepare and catch up on things! My host teacher was gone 2 days but things still ran pretty smoothly. I definitely realized how much I value his opinion and rely on it to back up my decisions.
One of these decisions was after grading the 3rd anatomy and physiology exam early in the week. Many students struggled with one particular section on joints. I thought about it and realized that the instructions may not have been as clear as possible. I decided that it would be fair to give them a minute to look over the material and then re-take that portion of the exam. Instead of passing back all of their tests, I simply read the questions aloud. They had to write down the correct answers on a sheet of notebook paper and turn it in to me to be graded. Adding up to 6 points to their scores really helped a lot of students.
I was pleased to see that several students showed improvement on this exam. A few mentioned that they "actually studied" this time. One student in particular scored a 40% on the last exam and a 94% on this one. Wow, what a difference actually trying can make! He was so proud of himelf and his improvement that he also got a perfect score on the Friday term quiz! I hope that this encouragement continues! 2-3 other students who came to me for extra help also improved on this test. We are now starting the anatomy of the skeletal system and I hope that I can keep up the positive momentum of the class as we move along!
It is almost the end of the 9 weeks so i'm wondering whether I should offer extra credit. I feel like many of them did not work hard enough for the "regular credit" so why should they have a chane to make that up now? I plan on weighing the options and, if I do offer extra credit, it is going to challenge them and require them to really apply the topics that we have learned so far.
Another exciting thing about this week- we may be getting a forensics text book! I received the teacher's edition and it looks like a great resource. I was really pleased to see that many of the topics and activities in the book are the same as what I have covered so far. It is reassuring that I am covering the necessary topics. It can be good and bad that we don't have a set curriculum or CSO's for this class. I am really excited to read about the ideas in this book and to begin using some of the information for this class. I'm sure there'll be much more to say about the book as I begin using it.
I can't believe this is the end of the 9 weeks already. I have really enjoyed this experience so far and I'm sure it will be over much sooner than I would like! I feel like I am learning so much and i'[m not quite ready for that to end right now. I keep reminding myself to take advantage of this because I will use what I learn now for a long time to come! Well, that's all for now. Let's goooo Mountaineers!