The great experiment begins tomorrow

We are all to teach the same lessons at the same time. We will have constant meetings to coordinate this. I will be inundated with meetings since I am what we call cross-categorical: I teach more than one subject. Almost all assessment will be based on tests. Daily work and homework only count at the margins now. Tests can be retaken, so we will constantly be sending students for mandatory tutoring and test retakes. Very limited adaptations are expected to be allowed for special education and bilingual students. All students are expected to be with the program.

Temperatures are expected to be in the eighties next week. I don’t know if they will let me take students outside in those temperatures — the classroom runs hotter than outside — and I don’t intend to ask. My plan is to take them outside until they tell me I cannot. The whining will be fierce regardless.

Eduhonesty: I plan to purchase Dragon software. If this blog continues, I will need a way to get thoughts down fast as I work my way through the swamp.

I regard the new regime as a fascinating experiment. What we were doing did not work. Will this work? I can come up with all kinds of doubts about the new plan but, in the end, we can’t keep running a failing school the way we ran it before.

So let’s give this a try. Reports to follow.

If the heat doesn’t kill me first.