Reference no: EM131160457

Jotted Points
- High School was situated in the Many (Louisiana)
- Northwest corner of state about 50 miles from the Shreveport.
- Baton Rouge was a three-hour drive away
- Main industry of area was chicken farms & tourism.
- Education is one of highest paying profession there
- There were 165 students in the school and 15 teaching staff.
- Community was mainly lower socioeconomic area. 36% of children lived in the poverty
- School was over 20 years old but it has been remodeled recently
- It was well kept & looked new
- Rooms were large & well lit
- A new middle-school was under constructions adjacent to high-school
- Most of students were bussed into school & many had long bus rides every day.
- 48 percent of students at the Many High-School were placed below the basics on their science's achievement test
- State-wide percentage was 50%.
- In Natchitoches Parish east of the Many that had tourist industry which had 61% of students placed below the basic
- Many had a high drop-out rate for the students in 8th grad
- For many people 8-th grade was highest level of the educations anyone in their family had achieved
- Next time for student to dropout was when they will turn 17
- State recently changed drop-out age from 16 to 17

Visit to village school was of only 1 day. Since it was only a very short 3-hours drive, we took opportunity to visit high school in the village. School-Community-Many High-School was situated in Many (Louisiana). It was in northwest corner of state, about 60 mile from Shreveport. Baton Rouge was a three-hour drive away. Main industry of area was chicken farms, timbers, & tourism. Education was one of highest paying profession. There was some larger town 20 mile east Natchitoches that was a very popular tourist's attraction. Town was oldest communities in interior of the Louisiana & homes of many old plantations. Product plantations raised gift shops. Tourism trade also catered to hunters & fisherperson. School was integrated. About 50% of schools were Afro-American & Hispanic. Community was around 64% of minority. Hispanic children were from the migrant family who came for work in chicken farm. Most of them had been in area for some times. The community was lower socioeconomic areas, 36% of children lived in poverty. A majority of students were on free lunch. School was over 20 years old but had been remodeled recently. It was well kept & looked new. Rooms were large & well litted. A new middle school was under constructions adjacent to high school. Most of students were bussed into school & many had long bus ride every day. Most of students we talked-with had computer at the homes or access to Internet forms other locations. Home computer had access to Internet over phone. Even though student may had fast modems, phone lines slowed connections down. As there was long distance between the homes, emails were the popular way for communication. In 4th & 8th grades, state issue a criterion referenced test called LEAP 21.

48 percent of students at the Many High School placed below the basic on their science's achievement test. State-wide percentage was 50%. In the Natchitoches Parish, parish east of the Many that had tourist industry, had 61% of student placed below basics. Many had a high drop-out rates for the students in 8th-grade. For many, 8th-grade was highest level of the education anyone in their family had achieved. Next time for the students to drop- out was when they will turn 17. State recently changed drop-out age from 16 to 17. We observed students on computer they were reading very well. There was 4 students in A.P. biology class. The students in the class were taking about the all college prep's courses. They will be college bounds. A few of the other students will also go, but majority of them will not most find work locally or don't work at all. The students don't have many visitors come to the school. They were polite & curious about why I was there. When I started asking questions, they were very shy but they were free with the information. They were used to using computers in school & enjoyed using the Exploring Life. Facilities Teacher's room was large.One side of room was like traditional classrooms with chairs & desk lined in the rows. There was small whiteboard behind teacher's desk & a large green board was running alongside of classroom. Directly behind the student's desks is a large sliding glass door that is the entrance to a greenhouse. This was one of Carolyn's first PowerPoint presentations and she made a couple mistakes but it was pretty good for a first go-round. Each of the students had a computer even so they still paired-up to work with each other. Exception was last period classes who didn't want to pair-up. Most of students used computer alone. Students had to leave their desk to get computers out of rolling carts. They were already accustomed for moving around classroom. There was some noise & confusions as they were moved around. However, teacher was use to this and it didn't seem to bother the kids either. A couple of student had problem while using computers. Kids knew who would have problems and who wouldn't. The more savvy kids kept an eye out for the ones who couldn't and would help them out. When I checked the plug ins I found that the two laptops used the Flash4. I downloaded the Flash 6 & newest version of Netscape. Then they were working fine. If I was not there, they would had to put the two computers aside which they would not have students do exercise. System techs were very knowledgeable about computers. If they knew more about what exploring fife needed to be run properly they would had guessed immediately what was the problem, like I did. I don't know why just two computers had the problem and not all of them. Again we had some students who were downloading current versions & other students who were not. Also, it was quick to load up plug ins with the use of CD than it was to download from Internets. My guess was that they used the CD with some old versions of everything. Some of students did not had reported their computers as they were not working properly. This could be reason that student likes to pair. If one computer doesn't work, the other will.

1) What types of grand tour observations you made?

The grand tour observations we made is that I visited a high school in a village. So we observed the functionality of the school system very closely with the help of one of the teacher of the school. It was a small tour of 3 hours. High School was situated in the Many, Louisiana. It was in the north-west corner of state about 50 miles from the Shreveport. Baton Rouge is a three hour drive away. Main industry of the area was chicken farms, timbers & tourism. Education is one of the highest paying professions. There were 165 students in the school and 15 teaching staff.

2) What types of "mini-tour" observation you made?
I interacted with the teachers and various students of the school and understood the functionality of the school system.

3) What was your role in the observation?
In the observation, I was very much involved in collecting informations and jotting down points for the report.

4) What are some of the overall themes from your observation?
The school infrastructure was not very proper. The school was lacking various new facilities available to other schools. The teachers were also not very updated about new technologies.

5) What are some possible sub-themes?
Answer: Possible sub-themes could be lacking modern infrastructure in schools in villages.

6) If you had to write a research question to do further observation, what would it be?
If I had to write a research question to conduct further observations then it would ask if the education systems in villages are up to par.

7) What would be your dependent/independent variables?

My dependent variable will be marks obtained by students in different subjects and independent variable will be different school parameters like infrastructure, availability of modern technologies, education level of teachers etc.