socialstudieswithasmile.com Blog

Archive for September, 2010

Friday, 9/24

As I’m sure you’ve noticed this week, it has been harder and harder to find the time to add a blog post on a daily basis. I remain committed to the blog. It is something that I actually enjoy taking part of. We are still getting into the swing of things with a morning routine including a 6 1/2 month old. Have no fear, we’re not going anywhere.

Are the Reds jinxed?
They’ve already produced their National League Central Champions t-shirts. I know they don’t just magically appear but I wish they wouldn’t talk about it until it actually takes place. Interestingly enough, the Reds store will be open for 24 hours immediately after the Reds victory (whenever it happens) and the t-shirts will be on sale on the internet minutes after the final out. I’m sure you can figure out one of the people who will be buying (whenever it happens).

Open House was enjoyable. Mr. Joseph and I present together and I think we get better and better each year. It seemed that the parents were entertained and were pleased with what they heard from us regarding our expectations. This is going to be a great year. Plus it gives me an opportunity to come in and say, “I met your mommy” over and over.

I’m starting to add new practice tests to the Practice Quiz page. Our first full test will take place on Native Americans in early October. The actual date will be announced shortly.

Saturday is Worldwide Day of Play. Michelle Obama will give a special message encouraging families to turn off their televisions and computers and go out to play. In fact, Nickelodeon and all the Nick stations will go completely dark for 3 hours (noon to 3 pm) to encourage kids to go outside. Sounds like a good idea in my book. We don’t go outside enough and enjoy the fresh air. Count me in. Plus we’re supposed to have great weather.

posted by Mr. Dowling in School,The Reds,Uncategorized,baseball and have Comments (3)

Wednesday, 9/22

Are we really nearly through September already? I feel like we just started.
Tomorrow is Open House. I’m looking forward to meeting your parents.
Remember to bring you 5×8 index cards to class tomorrow. You’re going to need them for the next few days.

Speaking of the next few days, it could be in the next few days that the Reds finally clinch a playoff spot. Not since 1995 has this happened. Unfortunately, the Reds will be in San Diego this weekend, meaning it could be a LOOOOOOOOOOONG night. Before the year began, I predicted 87 wins out of the Reds. The currently stand at 86 with about 10-12 games to play. Even I didn’t expect the Reds to win this much.

posted by Mr. Dowling in School,The Reds,Uncategorized,baseball and have Comments (3)

Tuesday, 9/21

The announcements this morning (and yesterday) were incorrect.  Homework Club did not start today and it will not start this Thursday either.

Homework Club begins Tuesday, 9/28 (one week from today).

A teacher shared with the staff a website that might be of interest to you: Quizlet.com I haven’t been on the site for more than a minute so I can’t endorse it. Check it out, see if it is worth it. Post how you feel about it.

Reminder: Bring your 5×8 index cards to class on Thursday.


Need I say more?

posted by Mr. Dowling in School,The Reds,Uncategorized,baseball and have Comment (1)

Caption Craziness

It’s back again. Ethan has especially been enjoying the Caption Craziness lately. Let’s see what we can come up with this time.

posted by Mr. Dowling in Caption Craziness,Uncategorized and have Comments (23)

The Weekend of 9/18

Bowling Scores for the Week: 144, 157, 185…3 losses for my team. After two weeks it doesn’t look like my team will be repeating as champions. But it’s a long season.

This weekend is the Port Washington Baseball fundraiser at Guggenheim. It sounds like it will be a lot of fun. Check it out if you have nothing to do. From what I understand, Mrs. Convey will be participating in the softball game. I’d buy a ticket to see that.

The Reds magic number is now down to 8. That means the Reds could clinch a playoff berth by as early as this week. I’d love for it to be sooner rather than later for a few reasons: I want them to rest some of their veteran players, I want them to figure out their starting rotation for the playoffs, I want the playoffs rotation to align perfectly so that Bronson Arroyo is pitching game one, I don’t want what happened to the Mets a few years ago to happen to the Reds.
The Reds are up by 8 with 13 games left to play. If you recall, in 2007 the Mets were up by 7 games with about 17 remaining and the Phillies caught them.

I’m still in baseball mode, but I’ll also be keeping my eye on the Dolphins and Vikings today at 1.

posted by Mr. Dowling in School,The Reds,Uncategorized,baseball and have Comments (11)

Good Luck…

…to my students taking their first quiz (hopefully an easy one)

…to the Reds in their day game against Arizona

I will be adding our class collage to the wall today.  It came out pretty nice.  I’m thinking of making this an annual tradition.  Then if you ever come back to visit we can look at what you looked like in 7th grade.

I’ve also added our School Year’s Resolutions to the wall from Core Extension.  If you aren’t in Core Extension here’s your question of the day: Is there anything you have resolved to change this year in relation to school?  Any new goals?

Tomorrow and Monday we will be introducing PEN.  Please think about your log in and password from last year.  You will need it when we go to the Computer Lab.  SJU and Harvard will learn first on Friday followed by BC and Hofstra on Monday.  This is a valuable resource that I hope all of you will use.

Off to school I go…Remember, there is Extra Help this morning.

posted by Mr. Dowling in School,Uncategorized and have Comments (13)

Ever Wonder Why This Is Called Socialstudieswithasmile.com???

…because MrDowling.com was taken. It is as simple as that. When I first started teaching, I began to call my classroom the Smile Center. I’d begin class saying something like this, “Welcome to Social Studies With A Smile…Live from the Smile Center!” 2 years later I began a website and the rest is history.

It is a long domain name. But there’s one that is longer. Check out www.thelongestlistofthelongeststuffatthelongestdomainnameatlonglast.com. There’s actually some interesting stuff there.

Reminders

  • There’s Extra Help tomorrow morning (7:30)
  • There’s a quiz tomorrow.
  • You will need your physical regions notes sheet and a pen and pencil.  I will be collecting the notes sheet and it will be graded.
  • If you need another copy of the notes sheet you can find it here.
  • Study!  Get off to a great start this year.
posted by Mr. Dowling in School,Uncategorized and have Comments (7)

Primary Day

Today I’ll be voting in the primary elections. Primary elections take place for each political party to determine who among the candidates for a particular party is most likely to win an election. The person that wins the primary is likely to get the party’s nomination to participate in the November election.
This year’s election is noteworthy for one major reason. For the first time in a long time, New York state is using new voting machines. Basically, to vote you will need to fill in a ballot (similar to a scantron slip for a test) and then feed it into a machine. You will then be able to check your votes using the machine. Sounds complicated. I’m hoping each voting site has multiple machines to scan votes into otherwise there will be long lines.
I’ll let you know how it went later today. If you know your parents are voting, ask them what they thought of the new machines and share it here.

How Many Burritos Could You Eat?
Joey “Jaws” Chestnut of hotdog eating contest fame just won a burrito eating contest by eating 47 burritos in 10 minutes. Hopefully the prize for winning was a tub of rolaids because he’s going to need it. (Actually the prize was $1500…not bad for 10 minutes of work.)

Comics
We’ve discussed comics at length here on more than one occasion. If you miss comics, especially old time comics, they can be found through Newsday’s Comics website. There is a dropdown menu with numerous comic options. Enjoy.

Update on Voting

I think the system is going to cause more trouble than it is worth.  I’m not 100% sure but I think I voted for something that I didn’t want to.  The election workers provide little to no help.  They aren’t from a generation known for their computer skills.  They had difficulty reading (not because they can’t but rather because they can’t see).

Each person that votes gets a paper ballot to fill in and then scan through a machine.  In a time when we are focused on going green, why would we go backwards and add MORE paper to the voting system?

There are going to be a lot of voters that will be worried about voting going forward.  I read up on the process…if you don’t it could be nerve racking.

One good thing, there didn’t appear to be any lines and I voted at 5 pm.

posted by Mr. Dowling in Current Events,Food,Uncategorized and have Comments (10)

Question of the Day

Today’s question is more of an opportunity to give me advice.

I remember when I went to school that all teachers would give out textbooks on the first day of school. I specifically remember going to 9th grade without a book bag (I was trying to be cool) and coming home with a stack of books that I fumbled several times (not very cool).
Over time it seems that teachers were aware of the massive load that students would get on the first day and then delayed the distribution of textbooks until later. Now it seems everyone gives out books on the 3rd day of school.
My question is: Should I reconsider my practice and give out textbooks on the first day of school?

I was a little disappointed in the amount of missing pictures for today’s assignment.  If you aren’t completing the easy assignments should I be worried about the difficult ones?  They all count, so make sure you complete all of your assignments.  Hopefully this one homework won’t have an impact on  you moving forward.  There will be homework assignments next week.

The good news is that everyone handed in the class expectations sheet.  Nice work on that.

Also, I was pleased with the behavior of Green 7 during the Fire Drill.

posted by Mr. Dowling in School,Uncategorized and have Comments (5)

Sunday, 9/12

Bowling Scores for the Week: 145, 150, 163. My average last year was a 163 so I have some work to do next week.

Devestating Loss for the Reds today. Leading 1-0 going into the 9th, Cordero gave up 3 runs. The Reds managed to load the bases in the bottom of the 9th only to see Chris Heisey strike out looking. I’ll give Heisey a free play on this one only because he tied Saturday’s game with a double allowing Votto to hit his walkoff homerun in the 10th and because he’s DJ’s favorite baseball player.

Football is back in session. Anyone have a favorite team? Dolphins here (although I’m not a big fan).

posted by Mr. Dowling in Bowling,DJ,The Reds,Uncategorized,baseball and have Comments (16)