We were out for, count 'em, ELEVEN days in a row thanks to inclement weather. For President's Day weekend, the students were supposed to have a 4 day weekend. Staff was supposed to have an inservice day and parent/teacher conferences on Monday and Tuesday. What we had instead was a huge snow and ice storm on Sunday night. The storm was followed by a blast of unseasonably cold arctic air which stayed in place for over a week. Here in the south, we don't have the resources to remove snow-- it usually just melts the same day. So everyone was just forced to stay inside and wait for it to melt... and we kept waiting... and waiting... and waiting...
Eleven days later, we're back in school. On Friday the 13th, students took their Unit 2 test. I barely made any alterations to the test in the curriculum-- I think I added 2 EOC practice questions, a handful of temp and pressure conversions, and made one of the more difficult problems extra credit. Results were much better than the Unit 1 test. Lots of As and Bs and Cs and only a few Fs in each class (although I still have a boatload of students to make it up who were absent last Friday). I actually had a student tell me today that PVTn problems are her favorite thing she has EVER done in science class. Seriously? Even I think that's a little sad. But hey, I'm happy to finally have some level of engagement in chemistry.
Students have interruptions galore over the next few days, plus there's more snow in the forecast. As a result, I'm greatly abbreviating Unit 3. My goals are for the students to understand phase changes and heating/cooling curves, and I'd like to attempt the energy bar charts and a few heat problems, but only if there is time. Today there was a lot of catch up to do after the long break, so we eased in with the Eureka video on Heat & Temperature and did the Energy & Kinetic Molecular Theory reading/study guide. Tomorrow-- Icy Hot!
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