Sex Questions From 7th Graders

I teach science at a middle school in a major American city. I have a box in my classroom that students put questions in when they're too embarrassed to ask in front of the class. They're almost always about sex. So that's what this is.

Seen on Yahoo, Mashable, Huffington Post, Salon, Jezebel, Buzzfeed, Redeye Chicago, Babble, More. Discussed on XM Radio and FM Radio too.

Oh, Hey There

Hey, everyone. So thanks a ton for all of the nice emails and messages and whatnot. I’m so very glad that you all are still interested in this little project, haha.

I’ll be tending to the site more in the near future. Been pretty busy. In addition to still teaching full-time (still the greatest job, BTW), I’ve been working on my first book, completing my regular writing assignments for LA Weekly, Houston Press, Complex’s Four Pins and so, and trying to be Daddy to three sons and Husband to a wife that is probably the most patient person on the planet.

At any rate, that’s the word. More soon. 

S

Every year I teach my eighth grade class about the moon phases. It’s slightly confusing, I suppose, because of the nomenclature. I mean, TO BE ENTIRELY REDUCTIONIST, the actual process is pretty easy: the moon appears to change shape in the sky over the course of a lunar cycle because it is revolving around the Earth. That’s it. That’s all it is. Even the most listless kids seem to process that fact fairly easily. But when you introduce the names of the phases (New Moon, Waxing Crescent, First Quarter, Waxing Gibbous, Full Moon, Waning Gibbous, Third Quarter, Waning Crescent), that’s when they’re brains go wongo. Which is why I was so pleased when one of my students (K.), an eager, excitable girl with a laugh that, at full volume, rattles Venus, told me she’d come up with a fail-proof way to help her remember how to differentiate the phases. More often than not, the kids get spun around between moons that are waxing (gaining light) and waning (losing light) because (1) the words alike and (2) the images of each are mirror opposites of each other. My initial tactic several years ago was to…  This was excerpted from an essay about teaching and music intersecting that I wrote for LA Weekly. Read the rest here.

Every year I teach my eighth grade class about the moon phases. It’s slightly confusing, I suppose, because of the nomenclature.

I mean, TO BE ENTIRELY REDUCTIONIST, the actual process is pretty easy: the moon appears to change shape in the sky over the course of a lunar cycle because it is revolving around the Earth. That’s it. That’s all it is. Even the most listless kids seem to process that fact fairly easily.

But when you introduce the names of the phases (New Moon, Waxing Crescent, First Quarter, Waxing Gibbous, Full Moon, Waning Gibbous, Third Quarter, Waning Crescent), that’s when they’re brains go wongo. Which is why I was so pleased when one of my students (K.), an eager, excitable girl with a laugh that, at full volume, rattles Venus, told me she’d come up with a fail-proof way to help her remember how to differentiate the phases.

More often than not, the kids get spun around between moons that are waxing (gaining light) and waning (losing light) because (1) the words alike and (2) the images of each are mirror opposites of each other.

My initial tactic several years ago was to… 

This was excerpted from an essay about teaching and music intersecting that I wrote for LA Weekly. Read the rest here.

Look at this first. Here’s another one. (It’s turned sideways.) Notice the hole. I’m beginning to think that a trifold piece of cardboard turned on its side is not the impenetrable anti-cheat force we teachers have assumed it to be.

Look at this first.

Here’s another one. (It’s turned sideways.) Notice the hole. I’m beginning to think that a trifold piece of cardboard turned on its side is not the impenetrable anti-cheat force we teachers have assumed it to be.