Hodge Podge ...

This is just a collection of thoughts on all kinds of things that have been happening recently ....

My business is doing well. I am very pleased with that. Many of my tutees are being very successful and that is also very rewarding to me! Some of my tutees have to pay for my services themselves ... money out of their pockets, not their parents' ... and those kids work VERY hard. Just paying for a tutor does not guarantee success ... they still have to put the effort in ... and so many of my students do work so hard ... so it is wonderful to see them being successful!!

I am a bit worried about December and January. I only get paid when I actually work ... and the last two weeks of December are going to be Holidays for most people which means they won't be needing tutoring! That means my December income will be cut in half compared to previous months ... just when I'll need the $$ to do Christmas shopping. Tom and I have already decided that Christmas this year will be very lean ... lean but meaningful!!

The first week of January is also Holiday time ... and LISD schools start their classes all over again .... new kids taking Geometry and Alg. II and such .... no one will be failing until about 3 weeks into January .... then I will start getting calls for help .... so January will be a very lean month, too.

I do have several students from area Private Schools ... and they take their Math classes year round .... so I will continue to see them. And I'll still have my Homeschool Kids every Wednesday. Word of mouth is slowly spreading ... I am hoping to gather more homeschoolers ... and more Private School students .... it will take time ... I need to be patient ....

On a different note .... Tom turned on the Dallas Mavericks game two nights ago and they were playing the Utah Jazz in Utah. Normally I wouldn't care .... however .... my ex-student from TCHS got drafted by the Utah Jazz!! Deron Williams was a 1st round draft pick ... picked #3 ... and there he was STARTING for the JAZZ!! It was so awesome to watch him play ... and man did he do a great job!! It is so neat to see one of my old students playing well for an NBA team. It is so wonderful to see a young man ... who proclaimed to me during his Sophomore year of HS that he was going to be a Pro-basketball player .... actually do just that!! WOW!! I am so proud of you, DERON!!

And on another totally different note ... I read in the Dallas Morning News that SMU is going to study the "Science of Education". They are going to try to test different theories of education to find what really does work!! I applaud them!! I would love to be able to add my 2 cents to the mix. I have lots of my own theories which I think are very important to a student's success in the classroom, Kids loved my ideas and were successful under them .... but the other teachers I worked with over the years always hated me and my ideas ... and hated that the kids liked them ... I wish I could prove scientifically that my ideas do work ... and if everyone applied them the state of education would be much improved. Maybe I will look into SMU's study further ... they are here in Dallas ...