Maybe I shouldn't have started this blog now, not with everything that's been going on.

Had my first classroom lecture in Trig yesterday after two weeks of demonstrating the graphing of various trigonometric functions in the computer lab. This included the functions of the sums and differences of two angles, which of course translated into a three-dimensional graph.

We resumed with the sum-to-product and product-to-sum identities of trigonometric functions, which I showed them are derived from the earlier identities that we have learned.

I also told them that the next fifty-point quiz will be scheduled for next week, whose coverage is the graphs and the indentities we had just taken up.

One of the more vocal students said that we should have one quiz for the graphing (in the computer lab, hands on).

I asked the rest of the class which of the two they wanted: a quiz about graphing alone on Monday (with another about the new identities taken up the next week or a quiz on both new topics on Thursday. As I had suspected the opted for the second one.

My problem student Brian also showed up, which I found out was because his mother threatened to call his teachers again. And after the class I did talk to her on the phone about her son's behavior since our initial discussion.

She was also asking about his performance in my mechanics class. The thing was, he had not even showed up for any of the tests, because as far as I know, he is not enrolled in my class. We will have to iron it out about his status with the Registrar's Office.

Another parent also called about his son's grades, because they have not been receiving any official copy of their son's performance since the first term. The father doubts the grades the son tells him because he won't send home his course cards to the province either.

I told the student about the call, although when his father told him about it, he was told not to mention to me that he was informed of our conversation.

I had promised the father to follow up about the mailing with the registrar's office, although the student says his dad won't bother following it up anymore.

The quiz we had today in mechanics about friction and energy went well. As usual there were a lot of students griping that it was difficult (even though I had made an effort to make it simpler than the last exam), when in fact they were just concentrating on minor hitches when they had answered most of the questions correctly.

Couple that with the constant doubt the students feel about whether their solutions are correct or not (frequently asking for validation during the exam, which is tantamount to asking for the right answers), their complaints are more a product of their own conditioning than of the subject.

Some students, in fact, asked me to check their papers immediately after the quiz, the first time they've done so this term.

That's some apprehension about the subject.

I drew the line at checking the papers of their classmates in front of them though, particularly the consistent high scorers for their comparison, asking them to respect the other students' privacy.