Wednesday, June 27, 2012

I leave JULY 31st

As Jennika put in her post, I received my travel itinerary for Korea today. I will be flying out of the Montreal airport on July 31st. Crazy! My feeling are moving from intellectual (I'm going to make enough money to pay off my loans) to visceral (I'm going to be able to pay for warm exotic vacations and eat great food!).

Today, I finished the MCAT course with one of four classes. Three more to go. It will be great to move to a real physics classroom where I can use demos to make the experience richer instead of straight up lectures. I am thankful for my experience as an MCAT teacher. They have forced me to colour code my notes, which helps certain students organize their thoughts. My board work has also improved. Luckily, the MCAT material is close to the AP physics B curriculum so now I have lectures created for most of that class. I will be able to concentrate on making the class more interactive, doing group projects, and creating fun experiments. 

When I start at Bugil Academy, students will be getting into Ideal Gases. I want to try a Predict, Observe, and Explain activity Aldona and I worked on for our Science Pedagogy Class. You take a tea-light and float it on some water. When you cover candle with a beaker, the flame quickly stops and the water level rises in the beaker. It is such a rich experiment involving ideal gases, isobaric processes, heat transfer, and consumption of fuels. I'm also going to need some steal wool. I wonder if you can get that in Korea?

Ciao, JaM's

2 comments:

  1. Exciting times JM! Teaching and loving in Asia (Thailand) was the best year of my life. It's a real life changer. I look forward to following your blog!! Happy travels!! :)


    Lauren

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  2. Ah... POE. Sniff. It's going to be nice to have colour-coded lecture notes some day and be able to focus on labs, group projects and fun. :)

    In the meantime, know that the International Tax Office people are jerks who will say anything to get you to pay as much tax as possible, even if they are incorrect. Know your rights. Trust No One. ;)

    Aldona

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