May in review

It seems appropriate to review how 'finals' went for my 4th semester.

The beginning of May included a lot of careful prioritizing: skipping class to work on my Stats final project and skimming articles to write the Inspection paper. It also included some incredible feedback from a research group, which, once again, told me that I'd folded 4 papers into 1. Oops.

I completed the Stats project, and, after a few dumbledoo errors-- including inadvertently switching the groups/coded values for ELLs and non-ELLs--I realized I actually had a decent handle on the wide world of linear and logistic regression. I have a particular affinity for confidence intervals :)

Next on tap was the inspection project, and I dedicated myself to using some policy documents from California Reading First. I enjoyed writing the paper and really wanted to write and do more with the ideas and the content. So, three cheers for using organizational learning theory to understand reading policy and teachers' work.

On May 14th, I was oh so fortunate to meet my healthy and adorable newborn nephew. It was neat to be so close to family during this milestone. I've already volunteered to help develop his phonemic awareness and penmanship skills, though I will probably be on diaper-duty first!!

Finally, I revised the social skill paper. It made me realize that I still have much, much more to learn about institutional theory. It also reminded me that the MOST important part of research in the social sciences is exploring a fascinating phenomenon. It reminded me to think more about what is SO important and interesting about reading instruction. Perhaps I'll post on that next....

I know summer will have its fair share of celebrations and will fly by, but I am trying to set concrete goals for myself and set myself up for a productive autumn-semester.

Hit it

Elwood: It's 106 miles to Chicago, we got a full tank of gas, half a pack of cigarettes, it's dark, and we're wearing sunglasses.
Jake: Hit it. --Blues Brothers

Well, in my case, it's 9 days till summer break, we got a laptop, coffee and coke zero, it's dark, and I'm ready to write.

Obviously, it's time to draft away and edit away---right now!

Where's the there

The end of the spring semester is so, so close. I can smell it!

It's easy to think about how much more I can read and write and learn over the summer. It's also easy to daydream about the glories of free time to clean, cook, and catch up with friends. I'm also tempted to think about other big life events that are coming up. And, finally, I frequently find myself thinking about milestones that are coming up soon--but not that soon. Ah, the gratifications of graduate school: pre-qualifying papers. They're not so instant!

The bottom line is that the finish line for this semester will not be as explicitly rewarding as last spring (first year orals), but I need to keep my own goals and mile posts in mind. Till then--should focus on coding, reading, and writing.