Beginning of the year review

We know as math teachers this is a vital time in our classroom.  To have an effective school year, we need to know the strengths and weaknesses of our students.  I always begin my school year without calculators.  I know insert the shock face here.  But I need to know how many of the basics are my students missing.  I have seniors that still don't know how to add and subtract integers.  I will be addressing how I hope to use my one-to-one classroom to help these students out in my class in a later blog.  So what do I review with my intermediate Algebra 1 students?

Identifying Real Numbers

I begin the notes with Math = Love's Real number chart.  I like it better than the circles, for some reason my kids get it better this way.  Then we move into the matching activity in class.  I use the one from the State of Virginia, but there is another on TpT in Jean Adams page.  From here we do a sorting worksheet for homework and some of the graphing from the sheet for classwork.  The next day we review and we then take a short quiz.

Adding Integers

Most students struggle with this at the high school when they come to us from the middle school.  I really make this my goal to make these rules stick.  I make plus/minus tiles as a manipulative.  The picture below shows an example of -3 + 5.  By lining up the ones that cancel out, it is easy for students to see the answers.  I also use the "Row, Row, Row Your Boat" song for integers.

Top 5 Things to Look For in Lesson Plan Template (Secondary)

The new year is starting, but my lesson plans are in need of a face lift.  I have decided to compile a list of things as a secondary teacher that I look for in a template.  The one I currently is great when I have the time to fully fill it our, but the detail had become overwhelming.  After you read the list, feel free to share if you think I need to add something to the list.  Here we go...

1.  Columns per course taught

I like to have a template that keeps the same categories for all of my classes.  Since I teach very different subjects, I need to have a clear column for each course.  I think it's nice to see your whole day laid out.  This helps out tons for substitute teachers.

2. Objectives and Standards Easily Found

This one is not for me as a teacher, but for what I consider the dog and pony show.  You know when the administration comes into your classroom.  They want to make sure that the curriculum is aligned to state standards and that your objective clearly puts the lesson into layman's terms for your students.  This is great for those mornings you are running behind, copy and paste that bad boy onto the smartboard, so they can't say you never posted it.

3. The Meat

I used to separate my lesson into the warm-up, lesson, class activity, and closing.  I found that this was too difficult for a substitute to follow.  So by putting it all into the same box with bullets, it makes the lesson a little more structured for the emergency run for a sick child or emergency.  Include a general time for each activity.  That way you and others know about how long to spend on everything.  It keeps long winded people like myself from talking too long about one part of the lesson.

4. Exit Question

I use this to make sure that I have asked at least one summarizing question, especially on days that I did not collect an assessment in class.  This provides the feedback and administration loves to see you come round circle back to that beloved objective.

5. Resources

Classrooms run more efficiently when you already know what materials to set out for the lesson.  I use interactive notebooks in my math class, so this definitely helps to prepare for the foldables, glue, scissors, etc.  But I also include the webpages that I found the materials on.  This way I can find it again the next year, just in case a student used my only copy from my notebook.

Does this align with your list, do you require more?  Do you do your lesson plans by the week or daily?

Summer is coming to an end

I took a bit of a hiatus from blogging to focus on some things that seemed to be spiraling out of my control this summer and decided to focus my time and energy into my time with my kids.  What a great break it was.  The time for reflection on where the upcoming year will lead along with a much needed refreshed version of myself.  What breaks did you take to get yourself mentally ready for another yer? 

This year, I can officially announce that I will be teaching drafting and math!  I am thrilled at the chance to teach and integrate both worlds for STEM based lessons.  Algebra will come with more fun activities to blog about along with a new statistics course next semester.  I look forward to sharing many new resources and giving a glimpse into the world of drafting (with a heavy emphasis on architecture).  I get to push the limits of my drafting kids making them think with mathematical reasoning and an artistic twist.  So let's buckle up and get prepared together for a great new year!

Also, side note.  I have picked up baking cupcakes on the side and man is it a blast.  I may post a few recipes every now and then when my math juices are running low.

It's almost testing time

How do you get ready for the End of course test?  I use online questions and a review book with the most important elements from the EOC. 

Excited about tomorrow

Tomorrow we will be graphing quadratics. First, they will factor to find the x-intercepts. Next, we will be practice finding the vertex. The final round will require students to graph the vertex and 2 points to the left and right of the vertex.   This one may be tricky, but the goal is to simultaneously have students graph out 2 different equations causing the relay to become interesting. I may go back to the fly swatter if it becomes too hectic. Also, I am keeping this short because I have been baking for them post parent teacher conferences. Good night. 

Factoring: The magic method

I typically teach the box method when factoring. You can find the link for the box resource here. But this year, I was introduced to what I call the magic method. First, I would like to state how peeved I am that I did not documents this method when I discovered it in high school. 

Follow this steps on the side and the scary, a does not equal 1, becomes simple again!  It is magic!  (At least that is what I tell my students).  Some still prefer the box, others prefer the gcf method using parentheses, but for most, this method stole the cake.

Hook for Transformations: Desmos

First, let me warn you that these challenges are super consuming and you will lose an entire class period.  Desmos.com was a happy accidental find on twitter and I am now hooked!  A way to teach transformations and to make students allow room for error.  There were a few that I will admit I gave up on in the middle of trying to find the answer, so I do recommend going through them all and then assigning a few for a class.  This is super fun!  I could see my students discussing what they did to arrive to their answer and hopefully being able to take the adjustments and creating postulates for math.  I love any time my students get sucked into an activity.  This is why I have opened up a donorschoose page for fire tablets this time.  In hopes to bring technology into my classroom for activities like this.  I need to explore some more, but I encourage you to do the same and share your experiences.  Best part...it is free!  So explore away. 

System of Equations: Substitution

I absolutely despise teaching my lower level students the substitution method.  But the state always puts a question on the state test about the elimination and substitution methods.  Does anyone else feel this frustration?  I tend to want to jump straight to the calculator for graphing and using matrices.  But in an attempt at tutoring the other day, I had a moment of genius strike!  It inspired a creation of a worksheet...to be shared at a later date.  Note cards served their purpose in class that day.

I made the student flip the card to the other side every time he crossed the equal sign.  He said it was still a lot of work.  You know because our students are professional whiners at times, but he said it did make more sense after doing several problems like this.  Will he more than likely solve systems using a different method?  Yes, but will he recall this activity with this method?  Yes.  For some more eye candy, I have posted my latest notebook additions below.  The yellow chart came from Holt McDougal's powerpoint.

Geometry basics (and a cute baby)

And I am back. After a baby that was suffering from an ear infection and then turned out to be allergic to amoxicillin, I can truly say I am glad to have time to blog again. So this post will have several goodies, just because it has been a while.

First, I have been searching through sites such as issuu and flipsnap in hopes to find a way to present my work in one cohesive document (and for cheap).  I found one site which I will share my review at the end of the year. This is only because you must upload everything at once, but it is free.  In the meantime, I am using google presentation to post my notebooks online for students who may have missed a day of notes.  It seems to have no limit and now parents/students have access to the notes from class!  Problem of the absent student is solved. 

Math Tech 3 is a geometry based course with a slower pace. So having a matching activity for the terms guarantees that they will make it to the notes, but as one student pointed out "it feels like a game."  To this I respond by shrugging shoulders nod asking, "Who knew, that definitions in class could be fun?"

 This foldable needs tweaking prior to me posting it. After 15 minutes of trying to keep the copier from shifting my pages, I was able to get the front and back aligned. 

As stated earlier, geometry at a slower pace. Don't worry, I will have them doing proofs, just in a disguised manner.

My posts for Algebra 1 will go up tomorrow. I just could not stand going without posting. 

A new semester brings on the fun!

I am so excited!  I love, love, love teaching geometry!  Okay I hope you get the picture.  I am jumping up and down with enthusiasm.  It has been a few years since I have taught this subject, but I am thrilled to try out some things I have hoarded over the years and to share them with all of you!  I am going to upload my first day syllabus for this course.  I realized that new teachers are always looking for a first day letter example.  Mostly because who wants to recreate the wheel?  So I am going to share it here along with another template that I love to use.

Christmas Time Again!

I had a bit of a hiatus from my blogging, but I am ready to move forward full steam ahead.  Christmas is one of my favorite holidays.  I enjoy decorating, baking, gift wrapping, and giving.  This time of the year I try to give back to my community as much as possible.  Tomorrow, we will graph at least 10 linear equations with labels to make Christmas/Holiday cards.  If they don't have anyone to send it to, we will send them to the local veterans for Christmas.  Below are two examples, I really hope they like doing these.  I did not get to designing the Haunted houses with linear equations this year, so this was a great use of linear equations.

 

Spring Break

It has been a while since I have posted, so I have a few goodies that I plan to share in the next few days to catch you up on the activities that were considered successes.  The first one was how I dealt with students who would rather talk about Spring Break plans than do work.  Kids on the day before any long vacation are not at their prime for learning.  Keeping this in mind, I created a review egg hunt.  The problems were scattered around the room/hidden and they had to try and find them to solve.  When they completed the question, I asked them to put it in a new location to keep the hunt a little more exciting. They did well for the review considering domain and range is sometimes a challenging section.  Also, some of the eggs were silly note the back of the red egg in the picture.

Next, I used a graphing activity from math aid.  We were going into a graphing unit next, so I used it to see who could graph and who could.  They turned out to be cute and added color to my walls.

Solving for the variable patchwork quilt

This idea is a twist from my previous school.  We talked about how we could display solving for a variable in a project or a creative manner.  The problem is that kids in 9th grade who just were introduced to variables are now having to solve with only variables.  They don't realize that this will definitely help them in geometry and other future math courses.

First cut tons of paper squares!  I make mine 4.25 inches by 4.25, mostly because it only requires three cuts with an 8.5 by 11 sheet of paper.  The put the math work on the colored sheet of paper and the verbal explanation on the white sheets of paper.  Then, they put the grid together.  The beauty of it is that you can give smaller equations to lower level students and more multi-step equations to higher level students so that the final product comes together in a pretty multi-colored quilt.

Compound inequalities

So sorry for my absence I have been switching schools. But I had an epiphany this week while we were working on inequalities with absolute value. First, I teach them the one that is a slanted L is <ess than and the backward L is greater than. It seems to stick better than the gator eats the greater. 

Then we came to absolute value inequalities. When is it and/or?  All the problems in the textbook have the x on the left and some of my kids can't plug in answers to see which ones work so then it hit me. GreatOR than and less thAND. It worked!  Even my lowest levels were able to answer and graph a mid level absolute value equation. I have been wanting to have the time to post it because I couldn't just keep it to myself. 

Overwhelmed!

So I don't know what I was thinking other than I really wanted this degree, but what in the world told me to go for it now has me questioning my better judgment.  I just started my Master's in Education with a specialization in mathematics curriculum.  I would love to do what I blog about on a daily basis for others not just my class.  Between our beautiful and crazy children, the never ending demand of the classroom, and my attempts to continuously morph into a better teacher...my head is spinning.  I did not want to leave my blog untouched because I always have something that I have stumbled upon that is fabulous that I can't go without posting about.  So here is my new project of the future, mostly because I love math games and combined with a card game is even better!  I know that some of you have played Taboo before and today while surfing the lovely world of pinterest I ran across this blog...roots of the square.  You must check out these cards...awesome!  I can't wait to get these prepped for my class since I only teach half of algebra, but the excitement should help encourage me to squeeze this into my ever hectic schedule.  Please keep my sanity in your thoughts.

Compound Inequalities

My students only worked on compound inequalities that shaded between the two points if it was a "and" inequality and outside the two points if it was an "or" inequality, but I felt that it was misleading.  My kids had recently mastered no solution and all real numbers in the previous section, so why should it not carry through to compound inequalities.  I felt like I had misled them if I didn't show them other compound results.

First, we started off with a review sheet, I had noticed that some kids were struggling.  Thank goodness all my classes had an even number today otherwise my plan may have had more kinks.  There were four sections on the worksheet I had in class.  The first part was just interpreting the graphs.  The kids chose their best friend as their partners as usual.  Before moving to the next section, they had to find another partner.  Typically my low level students don't work with a higher level  math student in fear that someone may find out that they can't solve the equation.  This forced my levels to mix by the third and fourth round.  Haha, math teacher won out.  The kids worked the hardest they have worked in a while.  I praised them and then threw in the monkey wrench...

I started with the statement "Raise your hand if your grandmother is older than 50 years old."  Then, I said "continue to raise your hand if your grandmother is older than 50 and younger than 10."  I had a few "what?!" faces, but the hands quickly went down as I began to explain a no solution equation.

For all real numbers, I asked them to raise their hands if they were older than 14.  Then, I said raise your hand if you are older than 15 or younger than 17.  They all raised their hands.  This was an example for all real numbers, I begin to see ah-ha faces.

We'll see after their homework tonight if they grasped the two concepts.

Hello Kitty graph and a new website

New teacher blog to check out.  Mrs. Hoppe has awesome activities for students to work on from algebra tiles to review games to projects on graphing.  She has awesome ideas that I hope to infuse into my class this year.  You can link to her blog here.

My kids will be graphing soon so after their test yesterday on inequalities, they worked on a graphing activity from Mrs. Hoppe's website.  It turns out to be Hello Kitty so it is super cute, but they also showed me if they could graph or not.

Puzzle builder

I had forgotten about this program until searching on pinterest for algebra 1 activities.  This was a great activity you can use for any topic and any subject.  I plan on changing it a bit because some of my lower level students may have needed part of the puzzle to be solved for them.  Basically, you choose the number of questions you want to be solved based on the puzzle.  Then, you type the question and solution into the input category.  It produces a table of the questions and answers, along with a key for the puzzle.  Awesome activity.  I was able to walk around the classroom more today, than on others.  Tarsia is the name of the program and it is a free download!

Inequalities: Flipping the sign

So my kids love the interactive notebook and were pouting that I didn't have some cool new foldable for this most recent unit.  The first reason being that one step and multi-step equations are practically the same methods for solving inequalities.  But I knew that I wanted to find something awesome to drive home when to flip the inequality sign.  After searching Google for at least three days, I found it!

Changing Image Tutorial  They include images for a tutorial on how to put it together and include a template.

I am slightly afraid my children with ADHD will be lost for the rest of the day as they make the sign flip, but at the same time they should be brainwashed by the time is all said and done.

This took a bit longer than anticipated, but the kids really enjoyed the final product.

Differentiated Quizzes

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Guided take one

Early I had addressed my problem with my lower level students on their quiz and a few of my top fliers as well.  So I feel like my second time around was much better.  I even used this method on the test.  I broke the problems down to find the misconceptions.  I sometimes have to scale back because I want my students to solve the most difficult of problems and they just don't have the capability because they don't understand how to solve a part of the equation.  All of my students seemed to benefit from the more broken down quiz.  I will come back and post links to the quizzes later in case you would like a copy

The new updated versions:

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Broken down