“Thank You” from LSC-North Harris Counseling Center

A word of thanks from the LSC-North Harris Counseling Center for all who participated in the October, Domestic Abuse Awareness Month activities.

Flag Ceremony Celebrating Our Veterans

Music Scholarships Available!

Scholarships available in Symphonic and Jazz Ensembles, Concert and Jazz Choirs, Steel Drum Band. For more information contact 281.765.7960.

A Success in Learner Centered Strategies

By Dr. Wei Li

Sponsored by the LSC-North Harris Faculty Senate and LSC-Kingwood Achieving the Dream, the two-day workshop on Learner Centered Strategies at Kingwood campus last Thursday and Friday was very well received by all of the participants.

Over 30 full-time and adjunct faculty members from both colleges attended the workshop.  We feel many of the strategies are highly applicable, and we also have plans to follow up and keep in touch as alumni.  I thought our teaching and learning community might enjoy reading success stories like this.

Celebrate National Writing Day – Writing Contest For Students, Staff!

The NH Writing Center is celebrating National Writing Day (Oct 20) with a weeklong project asking students and staff to submit 7 word comments about writing.  Here is a sample I like: “Writing is never finished; it’s just due.”

Participants are asked to submit their 7-word entries in the Learning Center (A200) where we will have sticky notes and pens plus a little candy, to encourage merrymaking!  The project runs Oct. 12-20.  The Writing Center will publish the strongest entries.  I have requested that the LCD info run Oct 12-20 if possible.

The LSC-North Harris Writing Center is celebrating National Writing Day (Oct. 20) with a weeklong project asking students and staff to submit seven-word comments about writing.

Here’s an example: “Writing is never finished; it’s just due.”

Participants are asked to submit their seven-word entries in the Learning Center (A-200) where sticky notes, pens and sweet treets will be on-hand to encourage merrymaking!

The project runs Oct. 12-20.  The Writing Center will publish the strongest entries.

What’s Your Drama! (Ice breaker activity)

Reposted with permission from Professor Lashun Griffin and Dr. Joyce Boatright

Lashun Griffin had the brightest idea for engaging students while still giving late-comers a chance to double-check financial aid paperwork, get their books at the bookstore, or find an empty parking space. Students in her freshman English composition class received a handout with the following:

“Human beings love stories. We put them everywhere—not only in books, films, and plays, but also in songs, news articles, cartoons, and video games. There seems to be a general human curiosity about how other loves, both real and imaginary, take shape and unfold. Some stories provide simple and predictable pleasures according to the conventional plan. But other stories seek to challenge rather than comfort us, by finding new and exciting ways to tell the tale or delving deeper into the mysteries of human nature, or both” (Gioia and Kennedy 5).

What is your story? What led you here? What are your fears and failures? What are your triumphs? What keeps you going? What stops you in your tracks? What conflict are you battling? After stating your name and major, please answer two of the questions listed above. Be ready to answer pertinent follow-up questions.

What makes this such a great idea? She says students were able to unload their drama. It cleared their minds to talk about the trouble in their lives that particular day. They felt l they were seen as people rather than as numbers. They felt connected to others in the room because they shared common challenges and triumphs. And it is an excellent way to introduce the personal narrative, which is a specific assignment in freshman English.

This icebreaker could easily be used in any class where story is a part of the curriculum: developmental writing, freshman English, general speech classes, psychology, sociology, video storyboarding…If you are teaching Second Start classes, you might try this great little idea next week. The rest of us can store the idea in our GIFT bag because we’ll be starting over in four months.

Collaboration: Joyce Boatright

If you would like to collaborate with the blog by contributing with your GIFTs (Great Ideas for Teachers) e-mail Joyce Boatright (LSC-North Harris Faculty and Staff Center Director).

“Writing Stories From Life Experiences”

Joyce Boatright, a long time English instructor and published writer is coming to the Carver Center Wednesday, October 14th, 2009 to speak about writing stories from life experience.  The first hour 1-2pm  Ms. Boatright  will be speaking about  how students can start writing stories from their life experience and how to  encourage aging relatives to do the same.  Many of us WISH we had asked our grandparents now gone about so many things.  Ms. Boatright will be giving them a little writing assignment to get started and during the second hour they can work on it.  We will also use part of the second hour to introduce the many services and materials we have available at the LRC/Library and to introduce our next active learning event–a poetry writing contest with winners to be published in Carver’s own poetry newsletter, “Poet’s Place” just before the end of the semester .

Thank you so much for your support.  Contact Gayla Cloud or Tawana Burke at 281.618.5819

Dr. Joyce Boatright, a long-time English instructor and published writer is coming to the LSC-Carver Center on Wednesday, October 14 to speak about writing stories from life experience.

During the first hour (1 – 2 p.m.)  Ms. Boatright  will speak about  how students can start writing stories from their life experience and how to  encourage aging relatives to do the same.  Many of us WISH we had asked our grandparents, now gone, about so many things.  Ms. Boatright will be giving students who attend a little writing assignment to get started and during the second hour they develop it more.

Part of the second hour will also be used to introduce the many services and materials available at the Learning Resource Center/Library and to introduce the next active learning event, a poetry writing contest, with winners to be published in Carver’s own poetry newsletter, Poet’s Place, just before the end of the semester .

Contact Gayla Cloud or Tawana Burke at 281.618.5819

Retention for Rookies Roundtable

You are invited to participate in Retention for Rookies Roundtable in the private dining room this coming Friday September 4, 2009 at 1:00 p.m.

This will be an informal discussion on the information presented at the last Noel-Levitz’s Recruitment and Retention Conference in San Antonio.

Friday, September 4^th at 1pm in the café.

I look forward in sharing all the great information and hearing your ideas, perspectives, and initiatives regarding student success.

Tentative Agenda

• Dialogue on key points from  Noel-Levitz, Retention for Rookies Session

• Discuss key points and how we can apply them here at LSC-North Harris

Refreshments will be served.

Contact:

Norma Guzman Duran
281.618.1178

No classes on Conference Day, Feb. 19, plenty of activities for employees

By Joyce Boatright

Found Time is the theme for this year’s Conference Day, which is Thursday, Feb. 19.

A majority of departments are using the morning of Conference Day to “catch up” on the projects they have wanted to do “if only they had the time.” For example, the developmental studies department is going to use the time to develop another long-range plan to accommodate the underserved and underprepared; the nursing department is going to become familiar with a new state test that, beginning next fall, nursing students will be required to take and pass. Most departments have scheduled at least part of the morning to work together as a team.

For employees who may only meet as a department for an hour or two—or don’t meet as a department at all—there will be plenty of breakout sessions on topics such as “How to maximize your use of the mediated classroom,” “OTS: Coming Attractions,” “Unveiling the new LSCS web site,” “CPS Training,” “Feng Shui Office Makeover,” “Overcoming Procrastination,” “Using Microsoft Office,” “Working with Stress,” etc., and a number of physical activities in the late morning and afternoon, including yoga, bicycling, salsa, palates and The Big Games (faculty vs. staff in volleyball and basketball).

The student center game room will also be available for faculty and staff to get acquainted with the technologically driven games (especially ones that have captured our students’ interests but have escaped ours).

Conference Day is designed to bring together employees to fraternize and socialize, to grow professionally and personally, and to release stress and let off steam. Planners believe they have created a day that meets these objectives.

Tax Help for LSCS-North Harris Students

By Virginia K. Rigby
Government information librarian

The LSCS-North Harris tax help has been relocated to the Aldine-Greenspoint YMCA. Please let students and friends needing help filling out their tax forms know where help can be located.

Neighborhood Tax Centers at Aldine-Greenspoint YMCA located at:

10960 North Freeway
Houston TX 77037
832.484.9622

Please contact them regarding scheduling tax help.

Poll: Most important thing to know first week of class

House for Lease – Atascocita Forest

House for Lease, Atascocita Forest, 3 bedroom, 2.5 baths, 2 car garage with garage door opener, large deck, new carpet, ceramic tile, new paint, $1,000/mo., $1,000 deposit, 281.615.9092.

Judy Taylor
Dean, Mathematics/Engr/Natural Sciences
Lone Star College – North Harris
Phone:  281.618.5685
E-mail  Judy.Taylor@lonestar.edu

Free Haircuts and Manicures

The cosmetology department students are offering free haircuts and manicures for students, faculty, staff, and the community.

Free manicures will be on every Thursday from 9:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m. beginning 10/23/08 and ending 11/13/08.

Free haircuts will be on Monday and Wednesday – 9:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m. beginning 11/03/08 and ending 11/26/08.

For more information call ext. 5722

All the Write Moves: Proofreading

A conversation with NH Writing Center Director Pat Szmania“

“Why can’t my students do a better job of proofreading their papers and assignments?” Several faculty members have asked me to write a little more about the errors they find in their students’ writing.

Let’s talk first about clarity, a complicated subject at a community college.  Clarity is a broad topic.  When teachers complain about student writing, they may be reacting to lack of logic, garbled syntax or confusing sentences.  They may be thinking of ESL writers, not yet in full command of the academic English expected in a college class.  Or, they may be irritated by proofreading problems—those slips, errors and typos that annoy the reader and suggest carelessness, even disrespect.  It is this last problem I will focus on this month.

A good proofreading strategy requires commitment, time and practice.  You have written a draft, and you are pleased with the content of your paper.  You feel your focus is clear, and your support is both convincing and engaging.  In other words, you are satisfied with your content, or you have simply run out of time to work on it any longer.  Either way, time to proofread.

Proofreading requires the discipline to focus on sentence and word level issues with laser-like ferocity.  You need to read slowly, read every word exactly as you have written it, and read out loud.  In other words, you want to be sure that you, who know what you intend to say, have actually written that for your reader.  This strategy employs your eye, your brain, and your ear.  Using all three faculties allows most writers to find 80% of their own errors, according to composition theory.  Not bad!

It is also effective to begin reading from the bottom of your paper, sentence by sentence.   Proofing backwards allows you to focus on one sentence at a time, as if you were doing an exercise in that old grammar book you hated in middle school.  As you edit, check for clarity, typos, punctuation, word forms, etc.  As you polish and amend, check off each completed sentence, and move on to the next.

This takes some time, of course.  Writers who really want to become better proofreaders will find, however, that they become faster and more efficient with practice.  You will also find that you begin to notice patterns of error in your own writing.   In my writing, for example, I notice unnecessary words, shifts in person, and the way to spell commitment, which I can never handle without spell-check.

The following link is the NH Writing Center’s handout on proofreading:  A Proofreading Strategy for College Writers.

Your students can find this handout on the NH Writing Center Website in the Help for Writers section under Handouts.  Here is our link: nhwriting.lonestar.edu

If you have comments or suggestion, please contact me: szmania@lonestar.edu

Aftermath of Ike

By Joyce Boatright

With more than two weeks blown from the semester by a Category 2 hurricane with a monster surge, employees have been working hard to support students as well as colleagues in the aftermath of Ike.  Everyone is pulling together, and I am once again reminded why I love working here.

Some co-workers have composed Lists of 10 on the subject, “What I’ve learned in the aftermath of Hurricane Ike.” Here’s Pat Szmania’s list:

1. Generators must have gas to run: who knew?
2. Generators need oil changes every 5 days.
3. Generators are loud.
4. My neighbors are very neighborly.
5. I miss TV like crazy, especially Charlie Rose.
6. Reading in bed in the dark with a flashlight makes me feel like a teenager.
7. Those flashlight batteries must be replaced every 2 days.
8. I can text message in code, plus I know where the punctuation marks are now (under the 1).
9. I have eaten enough bananas, extra-crunchy peanut butter and crackers for a lifetime.
10. I am a much better outdoor-griller than I was 2 weeks ago.  And shrimp burn very fast.

Gwen Chavis sent hers and here they are:

1. I don’t really need everything I have in my closet at home.
2. My in-laws are worth their weight in gold.
3. E-mail is priceless.
4. Together Everybody Achieves More! (TEAM) Cleaning the yard debris from my sister-in-law’s house was so much easier and enjoyable with six of us laboring together.
5. My plants can survive very well without water and without me for a week.
6. Hearing the voice of your loved ones on the phone after a crisis is beautiful.
7. What did we ever do before cell phones?
8. I’ve been off work for two weeks. How come I’m still not ready for class on Monday?
9. Be thankful for what you have; so many people lost so much.
10. People heed the weather man and make preparations when a storm is predicted nearby. They don’t heed the word of God that tells them to make preparations for eternity (coming soon to a location near all).

I think it would be interesting for you to come up with your own and post it here. (Just hit Comments under the headline and respond with your list.)

All the Write Moves

A conversation about student writing from the NH Writing Center

Pat Szmania, Director

During our orientation lunch in August, I spoke with several faculty members from different disciplines about their distance learning classes and the spotlight this platform places on student writing. We began by lamenting the writing skills of our students: the email lingo; the lack of clarity; the errors. But, one history teacher noted, he really wants to hear from his students on the first day of class–to know who they are, what their lives are like, and how they feel about history. What a shame, said another, that student aspirations are so high when their writing is so awful. All the same, repeated the history teacher, “I am really interested in who they are.” It’s a dilemma. We know our students would be better writers if we required them to do more writing, but it is grueling to grade writing that often falls so short.
I have talked to teachers who no longer make the same kind of assignments they once did because their students are not capable of college level writing. “I used to assign research papers, but I so often had to grade them D or F that I felt it wasn’t worth making assignments that cause students’ grades to sink even lower.” “I used to assign research papers, but many of them turned out to be plagiarized. It is just not worth my effort.” As a writing teacher and director of the NH writing tutor program, I see a lot of our students’ writing, and I wince like the rest of you at punctuation chaos and “poodles of blood” at the scene of the accident.

Instructors in the disciplines do not need to grade like red pencil English teachers, but they can help students by requiring them to write. The assignments can be something you don’t mind reading, they can be short, and they can be graded with an all-purpose rubric that meets your expectations. I am encouraged and inspired by the assignments I see teachers experimenting with, particularly in their on-line classes where writing is central to passing the course. Here are a few strategies NH teachers are using:

If you plan to give points for discussion board comments, identify the criteria you will use to evaluate them.

Put your expectations into a clear grading rubric that works for you.

Post an exemplary student sample for your class to examine. (Write a sample yourself if you haven’t seen what you expect.) Have students discuss what they can deduce from the sample to be your grading criteria. Discussing the sample takes time, but once your class has done it, students are focused on your expectations.

Give students the rubric you will use. Tell them they will be writing over the term, tell them their grade is based on their contribution, and tell them you expect them to get better with practice.

Here is a rubric I use in an Honors English class where students write weekly one-page summary/response papers:

Engl 2389 Summary Evaluation Rubric
Criteria	Weak	Acceptable	Strong
Clear Main Idea
Strong Supporting Details
Meaningful Personal Response or Reflection
Clarity/Proofreading
Format/Neatness
Comment: Score: ____ (10 pts possible)

Current composition theory offers useful insights into helping students become better writers without creating unmanageable burdens for teachers. Having students write several short papers instead of one long one helps underprepared writers get better with practice. Requiring writers to summarize information or write short essay answers (250, 50 or even 25 words!) forces them to synthesize and evaluate more fluently. Requiring students to proofread their writing means consistently deducting points for lack of clarity/correctness. Don’t try to grade like an English teacher; if you find the writing confusing or unclear, simply hold your writers accountable by deducting some or all of their clarity points. They can become better proofreaders over time if you hold them to your standard.

In short, distance learning classes are sparking innovative teaching that directly confronts the need for college students to write at college level. Please contact me if you have comments, questions, techniques, or writing assignments to share with colleagues. I will pass them along via E-Voice.

Are you interested in joining a group of teachers working together to design and assess writing assignments for their own classes? Watch for this workshop announcement soon.
szmania@lonestar.edu

Internet Explorer add-ons are here!

By Juan Primo

Add-ons are programs that enhance the way your browser works.

If there is anything that you would your browser to do or track, chances are somebody has already created that for you.

Find As You Type
Instead of using CTRL+F to search on Internet Explorer, type the search word in the Find window and click Next. Find As You Type is an add-on that lets you find the searched words as you are typing them. Matches are highlighted on the page. If you type a combination of letters that does not exist on the page, you get audio feedback and the find window turns red.

To download Find As You Type, go to the ookii.org website. Download the installation file to your computer, unzip and then run the setup.exe file.

Restart Internet explorer > go to Tools > Toolbars > make sure Find as you type is selected.

Where do we go from here?
This is just one of hundreds of add-ons available to improve your browsing experience, to find out more, visit the official Add-ons for Internet Explorer site and happy hunting.