Summary of Goals

One of the requirements of the Invisible Children Teacher Exchange Program is to produce a handbook as a record of the work we did together. It will serve as a reference for each of us in the future. I thought I would include the summary of our goals which appear at the beginning of the handbook. These are the goals that Robert and I determined would be valuable and also achieveable in the six weeks we have together. I want to thank everyone again for their donations which allowed me to be here working with Robert. We will work hard to ensure that your money was well-spent.

I have included a photo of all the teaching pairs from St. Joseph's Layibi College. Back Row: Sylvester, Blake, Edison, John Christopher Middle Row: Alfredo, Katie, Robert, Michelle Front Row: Brit, yours truly, Jennifer, and Raysa.

Summary of Goals

We will plan and present lessons together. Together we will examine lessons, evaluating multiple methods of solving a problem or presenting content. We consider the order of examples, working from simplest to most difficult. We ensure to describe solutions using general principles to improve student confidence in their ability to solve new problems. In presenting content we look for simple demonstrations which could be used, and simple real-life applications of the content.

We will work to produce an electronic copy of the ‘O’ level and ‘A’ Physics Teaching Syllabi. This will provide a document which can be easily updated when new syllabi are published on five year intervals.

For term three we will design a lab period or periods where students will rotate through six stations. Each station will contain enough materials and instructions for two individual groups to collect evidence and complete an analysis. By the end of the allotted periods, students will have completed six different labs. The labs will be selected from the syllabus or from previous exams. We will include additional questions to enhance the connection between the lab analysis and the concepts presented in class. The station approach allows many students to use the limited resources.

We will closely examine the resources available, including the digital science computer software provided by Cyber School Technology Solutions and the Ugandan Ministry of Education. We will discuss how best to make these resources available to students.

We will work to develop the necessary exams for term 2 and term 3. We will use the computer and printer available in the Physics office in order to prepare our own exams for photocopying, relieving some of the work from the office. It will also mean that electronic copies of exams are available for editing later, and encourage greater use of the available resources.

A flash drive has been left with Mr. Oryema. It contains copies of class notes, presentations, assignments, tests, and exams, in portable document format (.pdf) used by Ms. Russell in Canada. Additional resources include an electronic copy of the manual for the graphing calculator belonging to Mr. Oryema as well as copies of the questions, scoring guidelines, commentary, and student responses for Advanced Placement Physics B exams for 2003 through 2009 as produced by the College Board in the USA. The AP exams may be useful as they contain many questions similar in content as well as difficulty level to the Ugandan National Examination Board questions.

We will visit an internet cafe and explore how the internet can be used to find sample questions or additional resources for the teacher. We will create an email account for Mr. Oryema to facilitate continued sharing of resources beyond the dates of the teacher exchange.

We will contribute in a meaningful way to the round table discussions and research initiatives from Invisible Children. We will attend all round table meetings, arriving on time and prepared with the required materials. We will speak candidly when asked to share opinions and ideas. We will develop questions to be used in a survey of students regarding struggles in obtaining and maintaining education, balance of school life and outside responsibilities, plans beyond secondary school, and perceptions of economic value of university level education. We will then input the data into a spread sheet and analyse our findings.