Faculty Highlights: Week of December 5

December 9^th, 2011

• Mr. Blew walked his calculus students through the all-important process of reading diligently what the question asked for before trying to solve it.  Students clarified exactly what the term “falling, concave up” meant before tackling the problem. 
• Mrs. Whitaker played a game with her students using the Smartboard that had students roll dice and work in teams to use the numbers they created to generate an equation.  The first team to build a solved equation won the game.  This lesson tapped into boys’ need for competition, visual stimulation, movement, and active learning. 
• Br. Dave, Fr. Marlon, Mr. Hansen, and Mr. Sweany all led a Kairos with fifty seniors this week.  Leading Kairos is a 24 hour a day job and these faculty worked diligently to make sure our students had a good experience. 
•   Mr. Minogue’s Environmental Science students created biomes to visually show the interdependence of various living organisms in the ecosystem.  This class showcased boys’ craving for visual stimulation – these students enjoyed representing predatory relationships on paper.  Mr. Minogue effectively walked around the room assisting students, complimenting them on their creativity and insisting that they remain focused. 
• Mr. Good has a program to prevent students from not completing homework called “ZAP” which stands for “Zeros are not permitted.”  Students that haven’t turned in homework have to report to Mr. Good’s room during their lunch to complete the work. 
• Coach Hoerster’s English I students worked in teams to identify commonly confused word errors that he placed in Mark Twain’s Advice to Youth.  Students worked in teams to circle all of the errors they could find.  Not only did this lesson develop the student’s College Readiness Standard “Recognize and use the Appropriate Word in Frequently Confused Pairs” it also leveraged his students’ desire to work in teams and compete for concrete results.  At one point Coach Hoerster reminded a student “Don’t talk to your enemy; you’re competing.” 
• Mr. Behzadi created an ACT – style writing prompt for his students that requires them to take a position on whether the world is “inherently good” or “inherently evil.”  This writing prompt allows students to grow in their writing College Readiness Standards while working within the Theology curriculum.
• Mrs. Clemens has an “Excellent Examples” bulletin board in her room that shows art work done well so students know exactly what to do for their assignments.  Mrs. Chappetto also maintains a rotating display of student art work in the basement hallway and her classroom.  It is no coincidence that students are eager to perform in these art classrooms – their hard work is put on display.
• Coach Frank was nominated by the Chicago Bears for the Don Shula NFL High School Coach of the Year award.