9 October, 2014

Coming to the end of school holidays and ready to get back into term 4. This has been the first set of holidays this year where I wasn’t having to sort out Novopay issues and it has been a lot more relaxed. Actually teaching has been a lot more relaxed and fun since the pay issues were sorted. I have an Ultimaker 2 3D printer and some Arduino electronics kits being delivered next week and really looking forward to getting students working with both. I introduced programmable electronics to my Year 10s with the somewhat disingenuous introduction of “I don’t know much about programming or electronics so let’s do some programmable electronics”. I swear I heard them all blink in unison. Excellent. The council-run 3D modelling programme has been shut down so I am going to continue it at Linwood for term 4 and see how it goes. Seems like a great way to keep students learning skills that take a lot of time in the classroom. I figure we can better spend that time working on projects. New courses are set for next year.

I had plans to make some shorts these holidays and incorporate el-wire and an Adafruit Gemma board with RGB LEDs into them but things got waylaid by the backyard. Some massive reworking had to be done to make maintenance more sustainable and, quite frankly, I was having a great time chopping out trees, shovelling soil, laying drains and making paths. I hurt but in a good way. The shorts can be an Xmas holiday project and hopefully by then I will have a clear idea of what I actually want them to look like.

Miss A has been spending a few weeks with her grandparents, giving us a much needed break and giving them a chance to spoil her rotten. My parents borrowed a lamb for the week so she has been down feeding it and generally having a great time. Great that she has two sets of doting grandparents and we are all a bit amazed at how adaptable she is moving from us to them without any real fuss. I have a feeling we have a rather independent young lady on our hands here. Excellent.