A Visit to Nevada Middle and High Schools

On Tuesday following my visit to the Elementary building in Nevada, I was next off to the Nevada Middle School. I was greeted at the office by Nevada EA president Dee Johnson. Dee led me to her classroom to meet her homeroom of Multi-Age 5th and 6th graders. The students were immersed in a discussion around the novel Charlie Skaddle and the many strategies they had used throughout their study. It was most impressive!


I had school lunch with Middle School teachers, then had the chance to meet a second "wave" of staff during the second lunch before I moved on to the High School. Staff was eager to discuss the Teacher Quality legislation that Governor Culver will sign into law on Thursday. What a difference an election makes!


My first classroom visit in the High School was in the Biology class of Mr. Mike Lawler. Mr. Lawler had students involved in a review for an upcoming test. Students were divided into two teams and pairs of students went to the board and awaited his question. The first to write the answer correctly scored a point. He was a master at matching up abilities to make the competition meaningful. Neat game, Mr. Lawler!


I was next off to Foods Class. Here I met up with Family and Consumer Science teacher Mary Redder. Mary was busy scrubbing a stove top as students work browsing through magazines for articles to write a review. Mary's class had spent the majority of their class period baking pies. My, oh my, did it smell great in there! I visited with several groups of students as they shared with me the kinds of pies they baked--pumpkin, meat, strawberry, French Silk, and more! Yum!



My next classroom visit took me into the classroom of Cary Thompson. Mr. Thompson's next class for the day was Marketing. Again I saw strategies that teachers use throughout the district at all levels of instruction. Students in Mr. Thompson's class had developed "3 column notes" the previous day and in today's lesson took that information and evaluated three different documents for who the targeted audience would be. Just an awesome discussion took place. Gee, they get it!


Now here is a another great teacher---Heather Ludwig! I observed Heather's World Lit class as they were involved in a discussion of Greek Mythology. I was so impressed when student went to the board and drew a diagram and led the discussion on Allegory of the Cave by Plato. Wow, awfully bright students and what a great instructional leader in Ms. Ludwig!


Next I was off to observe in 1st year teacher Lindsey Youngman's English 9 class. Lindsey led the discussion of "parenthetical citations" with her class of 27 students. Lindsey had shared with me how her husband is a teacher in Ames and that she intends to stay in Iowa. How lucky we are to have the best and brightest entering the profession!

My final classroom visit at Nevada High School was in Kevin Ericson's room. Kevin is Mid-Iowa UniServ Unit President (and newly elected to repesent Mid-Iowa on the ISEA Executive Board--starting in August 2007). Kevin is Special Education teacher and was working with a small group of students on Reading Comprehension skills.

It was an awesome day in Nevada and I want to thank all the educators for your warm hospitality! You are an incredibly dedicated group of folks who are doing magic every day with the students you work with. Thanks for all you do every day for Iowa's students!