Greatest hits video

I just saw this greatest hits video and I just had to share it with everyone.

Enjoy!!! Let me know what you think

The best Offense around

Here is a video about the wing-t. It is the best offense around for the high school level. It should be run more at the college level also. It is a highly effective offense.

If you are thinking about implementing an offense than check this one out.

Find more videos on www.findinternettv.com.

Here is another example of how the Jet sweep can be implemented into the offense.

This is the Jet Sally





Here is another play that shows just how much of misdirection there is in the wing-t. It is called the counter x-cross

Find more videos on www.findinternettv.com.

They have outdone themselves

I know people say that you shouldn't try to reveal much about yourself on the Internet. On my wife's blog she will only refer to people by the first letter of their first name.

Well I decided that it was about time I share a little more about myself. I am sharing this with you not because I think people should know about me, I am sharing this because of the wonderful school that I teach at and the strides that I believe we are making in special education.

Through out my past 10 years of teaching I have seen many changes in special education. I know there have been many other teachers that have been around longer than I have and have seen education come full cycle.

When I first started teaching it was common practice to have those kids who are in special education locked away in a room that was formerly a closet or in a room next to the boiler. I was fortunate to teach at a school that had an excellent moderate special education program. They taught kids about life skills, community functioning, and job related skills. This school was said to be leading the state of Iowa as a model for a moderate special education classroom.

Since leaving my home town I have ventured into some pretty horrible classrooms. I will not name schools but they have literally dumped all of the special ed kids into a small room that use to be a storage room. This room was to be a common room to two other rooms. Five teachers were to share these three rooms and teach math, science, social studies, and English. There were approximately 75 kids served in these three rooms. All disabilities levels were thrown together. Needless to say that this was the worst year I ever had teaching. There are many horror stories I could tell but that would take up too much time. The past is in the past.

I am presently teaching at a high school in central Iowa. Now this is a truly remarkable school. For the past thirteen years they have served the needs of special education students in the regular education classroom. We have become the model school for others to follow in the state of Iowa. We have been visited by five other schools since the beginning of this school year.

You may wonder how we meet the needs of our students. A special education teacher is in all core education classrooms at the high school. I am the social studies collaboration teacher. It has become the expectation that I will be in the classroom co-teaching subjects right along with the regular ed teacher. Visitors have even remarked that they cannot tell who is the regular ed teacher and who is the special ed teacher. I will make sure that all accommodations are made for our students and I am also their to make sure that general education students receive help as well.

I also teach a skill building class called NASA. The NASA classes are divided into English and math NASA's. Students receive an elective credit for taking NASA. I teach 9th grade English NASA. In this class I work with the students to build skills to be successful in the general ed setting. I will work on reading comprehension, fluency, writing, paraphrasing, sentence writing, and studying for test. We will also do several fun activities such as using PowerPoint, movie maker, and pod casting.

A new idea that I have brought fourth is having tests read on Ipods. Teachers or student helpers will read a test and it will be recoded and made into a podcast. This podcast will then be put onto an Ipod nano and given to a student who is to have tests read as an accommodation. The student is able to stay in the general ed classroom and take the test or quiz. When they are done they turn in the Ipod with their quiz/test. This helps student from feeling embarrassed from having to leave the classroom when tests are being given. It helps them avoid the special ed stigma that they hate to have.

This is just one of the many great Ideas that has been coming out of our High school. We have a great staff and a very supportive administration. I consider myself lucky to be part of such a great staff.

What makes a great High School Football Coach

I really want to know the anser to this question!!!

What makes a really good or Great high school football coach?

I know you have to surround yourself with a good staff. You have to teach the basics of blocking and tackling.

I know that you have to build a good relationship with the kids.

I know that you have to know about the X's and O's

So what makes one coach standout over another? I really want to know the answer to this question.

I don't want to be an I told you so but....

It all started at lunch time today. I was sitting next to other teachers and was listening to their conversations and would occasionally throw in my opinion on a couple of different matters. The talk then turned to our high school football team. When this subject comes around I zip my lip because I am very opinionated on this subject and would get myself in trouble by saying something against the present program and the head coach.

My fellow teachers were wondering why we cannot be successful when we obviously have athletes at the school. We have won 4 state titles in other sports over the last 3 years. We have athletes on the football team but we don't seam able to produce results.

For the past two years at the high school I have been an assistant coach. I am a former head coach, have been an assistant at other schools with winning traditions. I have voiced my opinion about what needs to be done at the high school for those two years. We need to get back to the basics and show consistency from week to week, let alone year to year. The head coach seams to change everything from year to year. He has not run the same offense for the past 5 years. Sure the last 4 have been zone blocking but he changes up the scheme. One year he renames all of the formations, trying to simplify. The next year he decides to run everything in a single back offense. The next year he decides maybe we need to pass more and does more of a run and gun offense. He also changes back and forth depending on who we are playing for the week. He in very inconsistent.

I have been telling the head coach for the past two years that we need to make sure we are more consistent. We need to get back to the basics. Emphasize blocking and tackling. Emphasises the steps we need to work on our blocking, hand offs, passing, catching, etc. Make sure that we can run a couple of plays very well. make sure we have the perfect play. We than run those couple of plays out of different formations. GET BACK TO THE BASICS - Don't worry about our opponent so much and worry about ourselves first.

What do I get for voicing my opinion when I am asked what we need to do. I am told to coach the 7th grade team and make sure the basics are taught there. That I am needed to revamp the middle school program because it is our future. What does the high school do to remedy it's problem? NOTHING!!!

So when I was asked during lunch by my fellow teachers and later by parents and by rookie coaches "why is it that you move the ball and have success at the 7th grade level when the varsity struggles" I just close my mouth and zip my lip because I am a member of the football program. I am an assistant coach. I do not bad mouth the program

But.... I told you so.... (The Varsity is presently 1-5)

(I want to be a head varsity football coach again)

The best Kept secret on the east side

On the 1st and 3rd Sundays of the month my wife and I are youth leaders. We kind of got volunteered to do this this year, since my wife has been part of the youth group the past couple of years and because I am a teacher. Our pastor has been the youth group leader for the past several years. He decided that he need to step back and have someone else run the program. He chose us.

at first I wasn't sure what to think. I thought the pastor was going to still be there and we were going to lead from what his plans are. Nope we had to come up with the entire plan. My wife took it on herself to come up with the plan. She chose to follow the God Rocks theme. (If you haven't seen the Gods Rock video they are great) She did a great job setting everything up.

We discuss and interpret a bible verse with the kids. There are a good handful of kids and they range in ages of 4 years old (my son) to juniors/seniors in high school. The kids seem to really like the format that has been created. There are also two other adults who attend youth group with their kids. They are there as kind of support if we need them.

This past Sunday my wife and son were unable to make it to youth group. They were visiting relatives in Arkansas. I was left solely in charge. I started the class by reviewing what the kids thought they saw as a need for the community. They came up with feeding the hungry, raking leaves, painting houses. That sort of stuff. Well after hearing the lecture, oops I mean the sermon from the pastor that day and counting the 31 people in church that day I decided that we really needed to look at our own congregation and try to revitalize it.

See our church has slowly been dwindling. The congregation has been getting old and dying off. They are also the elders of the church and do not want to do things to try and attract new blood to the church. The pastor has been trying to do things but feels like he has been banging his head against the wall. The same people are the ones that do everything for the church. It will die off if something is not done. I have been sitting off and on in church for the past 6 years and have finally decided that something needs to be done. Many of the older members want to keep with a traditional service. The younger members who are starting to out number the elders want a more contemporary service. More upbeat music, visual aids, and instruments. The human voice can be a wonderful instrument but when it sings the same droning songs it can be horrid.

What a better way to try and do a community outreach than to start within and trying to help our own church community. Our church is situated on the East side of Des Moines, Iowa. The church has been there for over a hundred years. The Chapel inside is just beautiful and the church needs to survive. If not for the peoples sake than it needs to survive because it has touched so many peoples lives. It can't just die off.

For many years the East side of Des Moines has gotten a bad rap. People believe that there is a lot of crime and poverty on the east side. In actuality if you read the paper there are more crimes on the south and north sides of Des moines than on the east side. As far as drugs goes the richer areas of Des Moines can afford them. Sure the east side is poor. But they will give the shirts off their back to help each other out.

Any way as a youth group, with a little guidance from me, we decided that we needed to blanket the east side of Des Moines with leaflets. It seams that the East side hardly even knows that the church exists any more. The leaflets will be placed in peoples mailboxes. On the leaflets it will say "The best kept secret on the east side" Next to this it will also have 3 pictures and say faith, community, friendship. On the back side it will say the secret is out and list the attributes of the church. Next Sunday the youth will go out with adult supervision and begin putting the leaflets in mailboxes. If we can just spark an interest and get people to just walk through the door we can get them to stay.

Once we start getting more people in the door we can possibly increase services by having an early traditional service at like 8am and the contemporary service at 10 am. But first we need to work on attendance.

Hopefully this little bit will help. It couldn't hurt. If we put forth an effort and put things in the hands of god, who knows what can happen.

Wish us luck.. better yet come check out Grant Park Christian Church on the east side of Des Moines.

Birthday wish to the one who completes me

I just wanted to take the opportunity to wish my wonderful wife a happy birthday. Happy Birthday Honey, you are my best friend

I love you

Mississippi River Museum and Aquarium

the morning of September 29th we visited a little museum on the Mississippi River. they have an abundance of things to explore and activities to do. here is a little snippet of our time there.


inside the museum and up on the second floor they have a barge simulator. the kids had a blast driving a barge and even more fun wrecking it!

in the first floor aquarium area they have a water lab. here they have animal pelts to pet and nasty looking spiders. they also have an area where an attendant will lift out different water dwellers so that you may touch them and this attendant can answer almost any question posed (at least the lady we had could). my little man's favorite part, though, was looking through the many microscopes at butterfly and moth wings, fleas and ants, and different fish scales.

they have a very nice model showcasing the way rivers flow. the kids just push different buttons to watch the water go. they can compare the way a river flows naturally with the way a river flows through an unnatural straight path or a fortified river through a farm community.

outside, on the river, you can explore one of Iowa's haunted places. the steamboat, William H Black, was once a working dredge boat on the Mississippi and is now a tourist attraction for the museum and a Bed and Breakfast. we didn't see any ghosts, but we did get to play down in the boats belly and explore the inner workings of the steamboat.

the pictures and descriptions i have provided are only the smallest sample of the wonderful things we got to see and do at this museum. it was one of the best museums i have visited in awhile. i highly recommend it if you are traveling through the Dubuque, Iowa area. it is a wonderful and informative place for children and adults.

Origionally posted on the blog Life Dreamed (my wife's)