principal’sblog

Earlier this week, I was privileged to attend the Greater Birmingham Math Partnership Community Math Night.  The leader of the session stressed the importance of math skills and lead the more than 200 people in a variety of exercises that provided practice of multiplication facts without the pain of drill that many of us experienced.  It made me wish that I had such experiences as a student. 

My memory of learning multiplication aren’t all that nice.  I don’t remember why father and I were in the car so much during my third grade year, but I remember him calling out problem after problem until I cried because I had had enough.  What are your memories of learning your multiplication facts?

I want to thank the staff and students for their flexibility yesterday during the bad weather.  We had to change our schedule very quickly so we could feed all of the students before sending them home for the day.  Awesome job!

I want to know your favorite memory from school.  It can be from this year or from another grade.  Tell me about your memory and why it is something that has stuck with you.

We are having parent meetings this week to look at some options we have for schedules for next year 7th and 8th graders.  We want to be responsive to student, family, and teacher needs and want to provide students with more opportunities to learn at high levels; this is one reason for the earlier post about classes students would be interested in.  I would like to hear what you think about the middle school schedule.  What would be changes that you would make if you had the ability?  If you have heard about the possible changes, what do you think?  We have already talked to the staff about some ideas and they are excited about the possibilities!

High quality teachers are very important in your school experience and to HTMS becoming a GREAT school.  By the time you enter middle school, you have had multiple teachers who were all different from each other.  I am already starting to get applications and phone calls from teachers interested in teaching at HTMS.  As I interview teachers for next school year, what qualities do you think I should look for?

Next week the high school’s career tech department is having an open house to showcase different courses that high school students might take.  What I want to know is what do you want to do when you grow up?  Also, tell me what you think you need to do to reach your goal.

One of our 7^th grade math classes had a discussion today about technology and student’s ability to think.  The teacher asked students if technology was causing people not to have to think.  A student replied, “Do you have to think to use technology?”  What are your thoughts? How is technology changing the way we process information, make decisions, and think?

I read another principal’s blog this morning about some of the ways technology has changed life for non-digital natives.  I would love to hear some of the ways technology has changed in your life time.  How has it changed?  How do you learn new technology?  What do you think is coming?

Here are some of mine–The television in our home when I was a child did not have a remote control–except for me,  as the youngest child, I was the one nominated to get up and change the channel.  I was in elementary school when desk top computers first entered classrooms.  The monitor was not colored or even black and white.  All text was bright green on a green screen.  Floppy disks were about 5 inches squared and really were floppy.  My parents got our first computer in 1983–an Apple IIE.  It did not have a printer and had 128K of memory.  It cost $2,300.  My first mobile phone was a bag phone that only worked in my car.  My parents gave it to me so that I could contact help if something happened when I was driving back and forth to college.  I had to type my high school papers on a word processor–a step beyone a typewriter but not a full-fledged computer either.

I can’t wait to read what you can come up with…Dr. Williams

I recently read an article in Time about what students need in the 21st century. Recommendations about the skills and disciplines needed included technology and exposure to world cultures. The term “portable skills” was a new term to me. Portable skills are critical think, making connections, and the ability to continuously learn. The article also discussed the importance of teaching students how to assess the accuracy of information read on websites. Did you know that in a recent study of 6,200 high school seniors and college freshman only 50 percent could accurately judge the quality of content on websites?
I would be very interested in hearing from you what you think you need to be well educated in the 21st century. I would also like to hear how you learn when you are away from school. Do you see similarities or differences between HOW you learn at school and away from school?

On January 28, 1986, I was a middle school student at home for a teacher work day. I remember my older brother answering the phone and then telling me that my mother had just called to let us know that the Space Shuttle Challenger has exploded just 73 seconds after lift-off. The space shuttle program was still pretty new, and if we had been in school, every television would have been tuned in so we could see the take off. What made this mission different than previous missions was that Krista McAuliffe, a teacher, was one of the seven astronauts killed. A second tragedy occurred the same week thirteen years later when the Space Shuttle Columbia exploded returning to earth on February 1, 2003, killing the seven astronauts aboard.

In 1986, President Regan said of the tragedy, “We will never forget them, nor the last time we saw them this morning, as they prepared for the journey and waved goodbye and ‘slipped the surly bonds of earth to touch the face of God.’” In 2003, President Bush said, “Mankind is led into the darkness beyond our world by the inspiration of discovery and the longing to understand. Our journey into space will go on.” As we remember the fourteen men and women who died during these two adventures, may we hope that we are strong enough to embark on our own journeys.