I've had two GREAT extra sessions with my students these past couple of days. They're getting to the really curious parts of Biology where they're understanding the concepts and they're understanding them well enough to ask logical questions, bending and twisting the rules to see how far they'll get. I talked about twins and the genetic code today, and I got questions about Siamese twins, two sperm possibly fertilizing the same egg, why nucleotides are grouped in 3s and not in 4s (efficiency), etc. For the first time, I feel like they not only understand it, but they can and want to take it further. Maybe I should build on this pioneering spirit and give a challenge question every week or so in some centralized location - or maybe just ride the wave and have them keep asking me good questions.
In one of the quiz reviews I gave today, it occurred to me how few questions I really give them and how much it helped me as a student to have tons of questions to try out. But I also remember not having these study sessions to go to in high school - not that people would have gone.
I've given some serious thought lately to pursuing a Master's in Education and using that to teach in all sorts of different places in the world. I'm not sure whether that's just a pipedream or on the other hand, too short-sighted and something I eventually wouldn't be satisfied with, but the way things in the States are going, I'm not sure I want to spend too much time there, doing much of anything besides being politically and socially active. Maybe I could study in Europe. Yeah, pipe dreams.
But I want to try so much, and now I want to do it in so many places, that it seems a shame to pigeonhole myself. I've still got a few months to figure it out.
Peace
John
