Yay.  I’m so excited to get back on WordPress.  I got really geeked out for 3 entries this summer, and thought (and hoped) for sure that I would become a blogging fool.  Alas, that was not the case, so the fact that we will have to blog at least once a week is very very exciting–in fact this may be just what I need to continue blogging like I should, especially since WordPress is so nice looking.  And I love when I log in, it tells me I’m already cool :)

A bit about me: my name is Luke, and the most exciting tidbit I can share right now is that I am a new father (after years of hearing “Luke, I am your father,” it’s finally my turn, though our son’s name isn’t Luke).  He is the coolest little boy in the world, and my wife and I are completely enraptured by watching him grow up.  Also, I like riding scooters, mostly because they’re cheap and cool–I have a old Vespa that is about the most fun thing in the world.  And though I  have hardly read any books over the summer, I have a long list of things I plan to read (I am inspired and awed by the exponential growth of Kona’s Shelfari!!!) My students have already given me Rant by Chuck Palahniuk and The Host by Stephanie Meyer to read.  Plus, I have been dying to read What is the What, Harry Potter 7, and Bastard out of Carolina.  And someday, I hope to live in the Pacific Northwest so that my parks aren’t surrounded by freeways!  Among all of this, I am working on breathing techniques to help me get through fatherhood, teaching, and grad school ;) .

Where I teach English, we are very excited about low-stakes formative assessment in the classroom, and small-stakes summative assessment.  Basically, we are shying away from grades based primarily on daily homework assignments and a unit test.  We are hoping instead to create smaller, more frequent assessments.  I would love to learn how to create more effective assessments and evaluations of student progress.  Another thing I would love to do is to have my students keep portfolios that I could evaluate at the end of a quarter/semester and assign a grade based more on progress than on my expectations.  Having created my first porfolio ever last spring in Tom’s class, I would love to gain the knowledge required to successfully evaluate a body of student work.  I guess that I am garbage at grades and grading, and am excited to learn about creating effective evaluations that are fair for my students.