April 23, 2013

Last night the stranger from Avermedia took over my computer for awhile. Nothing came of it but it was interesting to watch. He was doing all sorts of stuff that I had never seen before. I got an email this morning from him and apparently the thought is it might have something to do with graphics card compatibility. I still have awhile to return it to Amazon so I'll sit on it for awhile to see if the Avermedia people can come up with a solution.

Also last night and throughout the morning, it snowed. Not like it is the end of April or anything. Kind of nuts.

During the first assessment of the day a para came in to get an iPad. This was kind of funny considering it was the sixth graders taking the assessment and they are notoriously bad when it comes to being obnoxious with the iPads. At the time, the teacher didn't say anything but she did catch the para by the door when she was about to return the iPad and took it from her.

Later on the sixth grade teacher went to the resource teacher in charge of the interns and said “one of your little interns came in during the middle of my assessment to get an iPad.” So the resource teacher sent out a very scathing email to all of the interns, tearing them a new one, saying whoever got an iPad this morning knew who they were and who they needed to apologize to, and then forwarded my email to them about not getting iPads during testing.

Sometime after this, the resource teacher was talking to the sixth grade teacher again and asked her to describe what the intern looked like. As they were talking, the para walked by, and the sixth grade teacher pointed her out as being the one who came in. The resource teacher just looked at the sixth grade teacher, who said “That's not an intern, is it?” Nope. I think she may have been the first semester but now she's an intern. Either way, the resource teacher is not in charge of her but she still sent out that email tearing them apart. She came into the lab after lunch to tell me all this and was laughing really hard because of the mix up. She said she hadn't seen any of her interns since the email and they all appeared to be avoiding her. Probably not exactly sure who was in trouble. I did find the whole thing pretty funny and it is a good way to just randomly keep people in line. Granted it's with fear. It is also funny because the sixth graders are generally the ones responsible for interfering with tests so she really has no room to complain. The resource teacher was telling this story to one of the third grade teachers when she was in the lab and that teacher responded that the sixth grade teacher was just a woman scorned and was trying to get back at everyone.

During the second assessment I had another good conversation with the fourth grade teacher. My para friend peeked through the window at one point, with the same kid the para had this morning, but I'm glad she didn't come in for an iPad because the fourth grade teacher doesn't hold back. She will disrupt her class by calling out from across the lab and shaming you for interrupting her test. It is effective and gets to the point, but it is also mildly embarrassing. Anyway, I learned that the fourth grade teacher isn't that into animals. She currently has a hamster because their life span is two years and a guinea pig's is three years. She has a cat, and used to have a second but gave it away after it peed on a cashmere sweater. And she tried to set both of them free on the way here from where she came from because they were being annoying or something on the roadtrip. She set both of their carriers out at a rest stop and opened them but neither of them wanted to get out. She also instructed her son to just kick the goats away at a petting zoo / farm when they were chewing at his shirt. Another visitor was apparently disturbed by this and she was like “What? They're goats. They eat trash.” She is a very interesting person. She can be pretty funny but I'm glad she likes me because she can also be kind of scary.

We had the first MAP assessment of this round today and it went fairly smoothly. It was nice having something to do and I was able to get all the scores entered into my spreadsheet fairly soon after the test. It was second grade taking the MAP test and the teacher was a little annoyed right off the bat because the sixth grade teacher was supposed to tell her when they were done with their assessment so the second graders could come down and start their test. There is always one lingering sixth grader who takes an hour to take a test and then thirty minutes going back over every single answer and solving it again. So when it got down to him and the time rolled past when the second graders were supposed to come to the lab, I gave them a call to see if they were still coming. The sixth grade teacher never called or sent someone to let the second grade teacher know. Not surprising.

Tonight I didn't do a lot. I was going to see if the LGP would work with my Xbox, to make sure it was a compatibility thing with my computer and not a problem with the unit itself, and for a bit I thought my Xbox had crapped out on me. It has been getting noticeably slower later and a lot louder, so I wasn't too surprised. But then I unplugged the LGP from it and plugged my Elgato back in, which worked just fine. That is awesome because I don't really want to spend $300 on a new Xbox when the new one is coming out fairly soon. I generally wait awhile before buying new Xboxes when they come out, waiting for a game I really want that is only on the new console, so I would like to be able to save my money for that, and not buy a brand new old one. I guess it is good news that the LGP didn't work with my Xbox, maybe, because it means it might not just be my computer. Unless the weak link is how the software is interacting with my computer. I don't know. Again, it is more of a headache than it is worth.