Every year carries a distinct flavor, and for whatever reason, these last couple of weeks were certainly nothing to cherish fondly. But now that we are midway through finals week, it should all be downhill from here — just 3 [half] days standing between us and [two weeks of] freedom.

To close out the end of 7 full years in the classroom, here are some “random”1 musings…

Anytime a student brings me a gift or note or card of any kind, I like to take a picture of it2. This is one that a kid brought by this morning:

Doesn’t that look nice?!

There was actually another nice looking3 bundle of homemade cookies that a student brought me this morning… but I realize now that in my haste to EAT them, I forgot to snap a picture of them. Oops. =)

My pet rock:

It used to have an eyeball,4 which went missing in the past week. A few years back, I once had a pet betta fish, but when it tragically passed, I was too distraught to try and take on another living animal… thus I settled for a pet rock. Now that this one has lost its eyeball, perhaps that’s a sign that pets just aren’t for me.

According to a student, this is me. A sloth.

Apparently, being associated with a sloth — characteristically speaking or otherwise — is a GOOD thing. You know you’re getting old when these things cease making sense to you.

I always find it amusing when students refer to themselves as my “favorite”:

Hellooo?!? I’m a teacher. We don’t have favorites. =) 5

And finally, a funny that a student left next to an illustration on a problem about our beloved pig dice:

lol. I have no explanation. =)

1. but not truly RANDOM, in the scientific / statistical sense of the word. Which, by the way, “random” has got to be one of the most mis-used words in the English language… [↩]
2. I actually have a dedicated folder in my Dropbox for these that I have compiled over the years [↩]
3. and nice-tasting! [↩]
4. singular — just ONE eyeball [↩]
5. Yeah okay, that’s a lie. Kinda like when parents lie to their kids and tell them that they don’t have favorites. It’s just one of those things we’re supposed to say. =) [↩]

Here’s a good one on long-term probability and “beating the house”.1

Pictured above are “pig dice”, which land in six different positions. One of the positions features the pig landing on all four (we’ll simply refer to this as “feet”).

Here is the scenario:

In a game of chance, you will choose a number of times to roll a pig die. If you manage to roll “feet” on at least 25% of your rolls, you win a prize!2

Here are your choices:

I. 4 rolls
II. 24 rolls
III. 64 rolls

Which of the 3 preceding choices gives you the BEST chance of winning a prize? (In other words, in which scenario are you MOST likely to roll at least 25% “feet”?)

(At this point, I ask students to pick one… then take a show of hands. Results are usually mixed.)

I happen to have a whole bagful of these little pig dice, so I’ll let each student grab one, and start taking some rolls. Have the students track their proportion of “feet” after each roll, both in a table and on a graph, as so:

We will usually stop at 4 rolls, at which point I will ask students to raise their hand if they are a “winner” (aka, have at least 25% “feet”… which only requires one “feet” at this point). Typically at least half of the class is a winner at this early juncture.

Then we continue rolling…

By the time we stop again at 24 rolls, the number of “winners” has dwindled down to about 3 or 4 students. And of course, that’s the point.

We’re lucky to have even one winner by the time we get to fifty rolls.

If you ask the students to tell you what percentage they seem to be approaching, it’s usually somewhere between 0.05 and 0.15. Empirical data3 suggests that these pig dice land on feet around 10% of the time, give-or-take.

Thus is the Law of Large Numbers: long-term probabilities will reveal true behavior if you let time run its course. 4

Moral of the story: If you want to beat the house, win quick and GET OUT.

1. hint: the house always wins [↩]
2. Hypothetically, I would make this a cookie. But hypothetically, we’re not really supposed to give out cookies. So this is all hypothetical, of course. [↩]
3. obtained through a few years of doing this activity [↩]
4. Or to put it aptly: Gravity always wins. [↩]

You know how whenever the moon is full and the breeze feels funny, how all of the animals in the neighborhood start howling and barking and acting crazy as if they’ve lost their minds?

This week feels like that.1

I learned long ago that — especially since we work with teenagers — you can’t blame yourself for everything. Sometimes it’s just the weather.

Or something in the air.

Or the anticipation of a long vacation just over the horizon.

Or hormones.

Bottom line: Sometimes teenagers just act crazy — and most of the time it has nothing to do with you.2

One more full week to go… and then finals.

Incidentally, as the students and staff came back to work after Turkey weekend, so did the flu bug, apparently.3 Ill timing, with our final wave of major exams AND semester exams, all in the next two weeks.

1. Well, the latter half of it, anyway. [↩]
2. That’s what I’d like to think, anyway. [↩]
3. My stomach hasn’t been in a good mood all week. [↩]

I am not writing this post just to say that there has been nothing to write about recently.

Except… I kinda am.

These are the dog days of winter: the two or three unfortunate weeks squeezed in between a rock (Thanksgiving) and a hard place (Christmas).1 2

These are the days when — let’s face it — nobody wants to do anything3.

These are the days that blend seamlessly into weeks… and weeks suddenly into months.

All of a sudden, we’re here at the start of week 15.4 There’s still a ways to go, certainly… but it’s going to be melancholy when its all over in six months.

Here are some of the highlights (or “lowlights”) of the past few:

Regarding the first pic on the left: We’ve been rolling pigs lately5 for our probability unit. Silly things, but fun.

The following two fit the spirit of Thanksgiving:

Paul Walker — of “Fast and Furious” fame — passed away this weekend. I was dumbfounded, to say the least, when I heard the news. So sad and unexpected. Rest in peace, Brian O’Conner.

1. Yes, I observe Christmas… but you may refer to it as you please. [↩]
2. And speaking of… for most of my seniors, that “rock” and a “hard place” are going to be “January” and “June”, respectively. -_- [↩]
3. some of us teachers, included [↩]
4. First semester finals is week 17! [↩]
5. I’m sure that sounds incredibly odd… pig DICE. [↩]

More than a handful of times during the past seven years, I’ve had a former student come back to visit from college and tell me that they were now considering a career in teaching. Every time, I want to say the following:

Are you… sure?! I mean… don’t you wanna… maybe… look into something that might get you a ‘real’ job? :)

I also think to myself,

Good Lord, Sweet Jesus, please tell me this had nothing to do with me.”

:) Which of course it never does… except when it does:

I kid, of course. I am not high enough on myself to seriously believe that I’ve actually inspired anyone to become a teacher… but if I have, I swear it was by accident.

But I think I’m only halfway kidding when I say that we, as teachers, sacrifice ourselves to our profession so that, collectively, we can help these kids get a good education… so that they can, in turn, go out into the “real world” and get “real jobs”. 1

(And I want to make sure I clarify the following without burying it in a footnote: OF COURSE I believe that teaching is a “real” job.)

I explained2 this to a student of mine during morning tutorials earlier this month, and they retorted that if every kid went on to get a “real” job, then there would be nobody left to teach the next generation of kids to help them get “real” jobs. :)3

But on a serious note, this often does leave me feeling conflicted.

On one hand, teaching is an incredibly important profession, and we do need more able-and-willing young talent pursuing careers in the field.4

On the other hand, I am also intimately familiar with the the demanding and consuming nature of our profession, and I simply hope that any young person thinking about following in our footsteps would fully understand the levity of that which they are considering.

I truly enjoy my job. I hope that much is evident to anyone who has been around me these past seven. Anyone reading this that may be intrigued with the possibility of becoming a teacher should know that the blessings are immense.5 Yes, our job is a hard one, but [almost] nothing good in life comes easy.

As I have seen written by another fellow teacher: Being a teacher is not just a job — it’s a calling.

1. Of course, some of us are in it for the money. Kidding. For real this time. [↩]
2. Vented, rather. [↩]
3. Kids are amazingly insightful, nay? [↩]
4. I have heard others say that “teaching is the most important profession”. That is one assessment towards which I have conflicted feelings — there are a LOT of important professions in this world — but I hope the following is indisputable: we need good teachers. [↩]
5. Also, all of the kids that have told me that they were pursuing teaching were, in my opinion, capable and cut out for it. [↩]

On my way into work this Monday morning1, a coworker reminded me about how “when we were kids”, we actually got Veteran’s Day off.

I added that “when I was a kid” we got three consecutive Mondays off in February.2 Nowadays we get one inservice day, which is code for “teachers come to work but there are no students”, which is — in my opinion — decidedly worse than having normal classes.

Incidentally, I’ve had the mobile data on my iPhone turned OFF for the past 8 days, which makes me feel like I’m stuck in the “good ole days”.3

1. Always a great moment, right? Monday morning? However, I can honestly say that for as long as I have been in the profession, more often than not, I actually look forward to Monday morning. Today just wasn’t one of them, though. [↩]
2. Oh, the good old days. [↩]
3. Or maybe just 2009… which given the recent rapid acceleration of technological innovation, is ancient times. [↩]