Diary of a Math Genius

At the close of the 2nd Quarter I grade my students' diaries and here are some of the wonderful results:



The one below is a flip chart to help students recognize the difference in math properties:


Here is the other side of the flip chart for the Identity Property. They were to draw a picture to help them remember what it meant.

These are notes on changing improper fractions to mixed numbers:

Pictures are worth a thousand words.

They do say a picture is worth a thousand words. I fully believe thoughts and emotions are always better expressed visually. Through body language, art, photography, etc. Check out what I found:

In case you can't read the bottom it says: "You were supposed to find the hypotenuse."

YIKES!

New class, same teacher, less motivation. I completely forgot I was even in a class this weekend. I find that being a full time teacher and a full time student contributes to my part time brain function. I am having a lot of trouble staying focused on any of my tasks this year as I am always learning, whether it be hands-on or reading a really ridiculous, superflous textbook, or discussing with peers. This does not even touch on environmental/social factors within the reach of my living day to day. My brain is in need of an emergency off switch!

Reflecting...

At the close of this class I see the skills and knowledge that I have acquired and I am given renewed energy in revamping my classroom to support a more technologically saavy group of future citizens.

This course has opened my eyes to the versatility of technology. Students are capable of so much withing the forum of computers, more so than they would be utilizing traditional educational equipment such as textbooks and notepads. I have become very interested in the logistics involved with wikis and blogs and how they work in the classroom. I have seen from fellow teachers the advantages of recordings, group collaborating on the internet, and various other techniques of technology.

I believe the best way to acquire further knowledge is by experimenting with these skills we have learned about in our classes. I also believe that in order to stay current in this field of knowledge, we as teachers must constantly peruse new techniques and programs. This would be especially easy in the form of conferences and symposiums.

I hope to successfully incorporate a long-term blog system in my classroom (and possibly the school) to promote a positive learning envirnment where students may voice concerns, stressors, and constructive advice to one another under guided supervision. I also hope to incoporate a wiki to put our existing "math journals" on the internet which may also serve as a study guide. Both of these projects will take quite a bit of time to set up and edit via trial and error.

The blog will be quickest to incorporate and will involve the guidance counselor and administration. I will use my homeroom class as the jumping off point where I can develop rubrics, discuss responsiblities and etiquette, as well as judge the effectiveness of the assignments.

The wikis will need careful planning as is always required for a collaborative effort. These, too, will require rubrics, thoughtful dissection of duties, and example work.

Overall, the initial care and effort required for these projects will be outweighed by the potential for true interactive learning.

Thankful

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays. I love Christmas, but there is something about Thanksgiving that is so much more. Its more family driven than gift-driven. I'm not one of those individuals that thinks that every holiday is consumer driven, but it does get hectic from time to time. I love Thanksgiving because its about contributing to a dinner with a dish, a conversation topic, a laugh, just your personality at the table, its all a great celebration of appreciating those people who are real and true around you.

Even though Thanksgiving was smaller this year, it helped to appreciate those people who were missing. I missed the Wickersham side of Kate's family, mainly because they are so different from us, and the combination keeps Thanksgiving...spicy. I missed my MD family...I miss my MD family a lot. If I could be in two places at once I definitely would. I'm still working on that teleportation thing :)

Happy Thanksgiving to the Family I have and the Family I adopted in to my life, you are stuck with me now HAHAHA! I hope everyone had a wonderful, thoughtful, and thankful weekend. I did.

Photo: My family is the best family! Mia and her Puppa.

"Partnership for the 21st Century Skills"

Analyzing the following website proved troublesome: www.21stcenturyskills.org

You can tell right away that this website is designed by someone in the business world. It kind of made me laugh, actually. For teachers, websites need to have neon signs, blinking graphics, or video to get any attention to to the lack of time we can contribute to research during the day. My first thought was "This website is definitely designed for someone sitting at their desks in a quiet room typing emails."

This being said, the idea behind this program is very exciting. I'm not sure exactly how much collaboration is happening between business personnel and teachers. I don't see a list of contributors, but why haven't we thought of this before? We have Vo-Tech schools that connect vocations to schools, why not connect all schools to the work world?

My worry is that, as with many educational policies, this technology push will begin with little input from a large, diverse portion of teachers. We know more than any other groups of professionals the diverse population we will be dealing with and what accommodations/restrictions need to be put in place with such a policy. What do we expect of students who have limited English Proficiency? What about students with IEPs (Gifted and Special Education)?

I am glad that PA is not taking on this initiative just yet. It shows good judgement to wait and see what the underlying objectives are (which does exist when talking about combining business with education).

Diary of a Math Genius

I wanted to show everyone how well my students are working in their "Math Diaries" that we recieved from donorschoose.org. Check out some of these wonderful samples!