Why my new phone is an LG G4

I love HTC phones.

I adored my Thunderbolt until Verizon rolled out an Android update that rendered its hardware obsolete. Everything was working; post-update, most apps were taking a minute or more to open. I think this was somewhere in the Android 2.x era.

I replaced the Thunderbolt with Verizon's rendition of the One M8, the Droid DNA, and I loved that phone just as much as the Thunderbolt.

The DNA lasted long enough for me to get out of contract with Verizon, but the battery died shortly thereafter. Not wanting to go back on contract, I decided to just buy a new OEM battery and void the warranty on installation.

This is what I ended up with:

So yeah...didn't go so well. There's a lot of things on the inside of the phone you're not supposed to rip, and I pretty much ripped all of them. I'm pretty savvy with computer hardware, but phone hardware is too small and fragile. I could probably get it back together, but I think I permanently destroyed some motherboard connections, and I'm sure I ruined the speaker connection.

So I opted to get a new phone.

My three choices were the Motorola Nexus 6, HTC One M9, and the LG G4. I'm not an Apple fan, and Samsung's own Android rendition is a bit over-the-top for me, so no iPhone 6 or Galaxy/Note.

I was leaning toward the Nexus 6 - it's the hippest and has the leanest OS. It's also big just for the sake of being big, which is too big.

The M9 was the next choice. I really like HTC's Android rendition, HTC sense. The M9 was essentially my DNA's big brother, slightly better in every way.

But since I have some creative plans for my phone's camera, reports of the lackluster camera on M9 turned me away. No replaceable battery either. To be fair, the Verizon sales rep was in the storage room getting my M9 when I told a different rep to ask him to get the G4 instead. I was that close.

So, the G4. It's bigger than the HTC by a lot, but still not as big as the Nexus 6. 5.5 inches really seems to be the sweet spot in phone size. The screen's resolution is more than HD. The camera is great.

But most importantly, it has expandable memory and a replaceable battery.

Planning to keep it for a long time.

-JCT

#SaveFCPS Part 2 - Teachers Make Too Much Money

Teachers make too much money?

While I would certainly disagree, there are plenty who think teachers make too much money. Teacher salaries are the largest part of the FCPS budget, after all. The largest part of the projected shortfall for the 16-17 budget is teacher compensation - get rid of the compensation increases, and the problem is solved, right?

Nope.

It doesn't matter if FCPS teachers make too much or not enough. What matters is that FCPS teachers make less than surrounding school districts:

Lower Teacher Pay in Fairfax County Causing Good Teachers to Leave

Teachers will and should leave FCPS to work in higher-paying districts. I know several that have already resigned from the county and accepted higher-paying positions elsewhere.

From Dr. Garza:

We have fallen so far behind in teacher salaries that we are no longer competitive and are losing talented staff to neighboring school districts. Our teachers are the reason FCPS students excel and achieve. Losing our most experienced teachers will have a significant effect on student performance and will ultimately affect the reputation of FCPS.

While the only measure of an FCPS teacher's salary that matters is one that compares FCPS compensation to surrounding districts, here are two common misconceptions about teacher pay just for fun:

1. Teachers get summers off

Actually, teachers are unemployed for ten weeks. Teachers are not paid for the summer.

2. School dismisses at 3:00 PM = Teachers stop working at 3:00 PM

In an elementary school teacher's day, about a hundred minutes are spent without children. Three of those roughly 8 hours are spent in planning meetings, leaving five hours per week for grading four subjects, planning for four to five subjects, creating tests, creating rubrics, creating projects, counting money (for field trips, t-shirts, musical instruments, pictures, missing library books, before and after school clubs, etc.) and emailing parents. At the elementary setting, planning for four subjects could mean as many 10 lessons or more per day. How does that add up? One reading lesson for the whole group, two to three small group reading lessons; a whole group writing lesson; one to two small group writing lessons; a whole group social studies and/or science lesson; a whole group math lesson; and two to three small group math lessons. Teaching is also one of few professions (that I'm aware of, at least) in which one must write down what the plan is (often in more than one place), then write down what one is doing while executing the plan, and then write what one did. Something like "I'm going to do A. I am doing A. I did A."

Five hours isn't enough time for all that. Teachers get these things done during non-contract hours. Having to take work home is true in most jobs, of course; but many assume it is not true for teaching.

Teachers making too much money is not a valid reason for short changing the school district $130 million.

JCT

#SaveFCPS Part 1 - The Shortfall isn't that Much

Well, it's been four months. Uh, sorry?

The topic bringing me back to my blog, away from a bunch of works in progress, is the Fairfax County Public School budget crisis.

For the 15-16 school year, FCPS faces a shortfall of a little more than seven million dollars. While that might not seem like much, here are some things the school system could buy with 7 million dollars:

35,000 Chromebooks

14,000 iPads

280,000 books for school libraries (and that at my absurdly overestimated price of $25 per book)

56 million pencils (probably not the best use...)

At least 70 new teachers

That 7 million dollars isn't that much money is an argument I've seen pop up on social media here and there is the last week or so. Compared to the nearly 3 billion dollar budget of the school district, no it's not that much. It's a rounding error.

But it's a rounding error that can buy all that stuff up there.

And if it's statistically insignificant for the school system to receive, then it's also statistically insignificant for the County Board of Supervisors to give.

But the shortfall for the 15-16 school year is not even the real issue.

The real issue is the projected $130 million shortfall for the 16-17 school year.

That's a lot of pencils.

More to come.

JCT

Preview: What's in the Works?

In my last post, I mentioned a project I'm currently working on that's not Ninja Mouse. Well here it is:

That's right, the next project is about boats.

But not just any boats - big metal boats with giant guns.

But not just any big metal boats with giant guns - the first big metal boats with giant guns.

I'm creating these images through a workflow similar to that of Ninja Mouse: 3D models, rendering, and then photoshopping.

The text is nearing completion, which means the whole thing should be done in I have no idea. 

-JCT

What's next for Ninja Mouse?

Another question I get asked a lot is, "When's the sequel to Ninja Mouse coming out?"

Let it be officially known here first: there is going to be a sequel to Ninja Mouse, and I am working on it now.

But there are a few caveats.

One of them is that the next title I release will probably not be the sequel to Ninja Mouse. Instead, it will be completely unrelated. I'll be dropping a preview of it soon, but for now, I'm only willing to say that it is completely unrelated to Ninja Mouse. The slowly growing fan base of Ninja Mouse may not like to hear that, but I have to get this other project out.

Another caveat is that the sequel to Ninja Mouse is going to be in black and white. I'll explain why in more detail in a future post about the publishing scene in general, but essentially it has to do with distribution. I know the color was one of the best parts about Ninja Mouse: Haiku, but I'm pretty sure (nay, confident) that I can pull off a pretty sweet aesthetic in black and white too. Just trust me.

Anyway, hopefully the next sentence will make up for the previous two caveats:

The sequel to Ninja Mouse is going to be a full-fledged graphic novel, somewhere between 150 and 200 pages. It will be a story, and an epic one at that. What's even better is that the story is mostly done. It will have dialogue and conflict and character arcs and all that other good stuff you need for a good story. It will stick to all the themes and elements of the original, and the overall tone will mostly be in tact. It's just going to be a little bit more epic-y.

So trust me on two things: it's gonna be a while, but it's coming; and, it's gonna be sweet.

-JCT

How I use Class Dojo

Class Dojo is an amazing tool that I've been using in my classroom for several years. You can find out more about it here, but basically it's a positive behavior reinforcement system and parent-teacher communication tool. According to their Twitter profile, Class Dojo is "the positive feedback platform connecting teachers, parents and students" and it "helps kids develop the behaviors and skills they need for success." There are a lot of ways to use the app. With several important behaviors already added in by default, it's pretty much ready to use once you enter the names of your students.

What About Things that aren't Behavior?

With a little creativity, you can use the app to track things beside behavior. Something I've had the most success with, and that parents really seem to love, is tracking homework completion with Class Dojo. I've created a behavior for each category of homework - reading, math, spelling, social studies, science (even returning signed forms) - and students earn points when they complete it. I check their homework, then they walk up to the Smart Board and give themselves their own homework points. I highly recommend using Class Dojo with a Smart Board and giving students the opportunity to award themselves points, which helps them take ownership of the system and invest in it. 

Negative Points?

Although I've used negative points in the past, I've abandoned that practice and have no intention of using them again. I've noticed slightly better results without negative points (read: better overall class behavior), and, for example, I've noticed that awarding an "on task" point to an on-task student gets off-task students back on task better than taking away points for being off task. As far as homework is concerned, parents know that their students are completing their homework because they see the points in their child's weekly report. If they don't see a homework point on a given day, that means an assignment was missed.

What do you with the points?

In our class, each point is worth $0.01. At the end of each quarter, I total the points our class earned and then spend that much money on books for our class library. This is usually somewhere around a hundred dollars, and it's a fast way to grow our library. The student with the most points for the quarter then gets to choose one of the new books and keep it. This is another reason I've abandoned the use of negative points - it would lessen the amount of books I can add to our library.

If you're not using Class Dojo, give it some thought. I've only had positive experiences with it, and students and parents love it. If you're already using it, consider tracking something besides behavior. It's a great tool and great way to communicate with parents.

What will teachers and librarian do with donated copies of Ninja Mouse?

Or, why would anyone request more than one copy?

Teachers and librarians might need several copies of the same book for any of several reasons. The first, and perhaps most obvious, is that schools and classrooms have more than one student. It's possible that more than one student wants to read a book at the same time. This is possible with multiple copies.

Second, and perhaps just as obvious, books get damaged. Even books that are well-cared for get damaged. A teacher or librarian might need more than one copy to replace an original down the road. I have a method for protecting the books that I buy for own classroom that involves cardboard and packing tape, but it takes about 15 minutes to wrap a book in this way. To wrap 500 books (which is a low estimate of books I've purchased for my classroom) would take 125 hours. Multiple copies help with a book's longevity.

The biggest reason a teacher might need several copies of the same book, however, is guided reading. Guided reading is exactly what it sounds like - teachers work in a small group of students on a particular reading skill (identifying the main idea, for example) using a common text. It's necessary for each student to have their own copy of the text for guided reading. Although it wasn't created with this in mind, Ninja Mouse is particularly applicable to guided reading because of it's short length and relatively challenging vocabulary.

So, trust that donated copies of Ninja Mouse will be used thoroughly.

Cheers.

JCT