Trying New Activities

This past week we had a block schedule to accommodate Science MCA testing.  The block schedule allowed me to try new things in my classroom and during our Saber Pause (academic advisory) time that I don't always have time for.

In my classroom we did activities in Algebra that got students out of their seats and talking about math.  First each student was given a post-it with a different polynomial on it.  They needed to classify their polynomial and then put it on one of the 8 papers around the room that was titled with  various polynomial classifications.  Students rotated through stations in groups of 4 and made corrections to polynomials identified incorrectly.  They then put the polynomials in standard form and grouped them by their leading coefficients.

The next activity had students moving through stations that were pods of desks to review for their upcoming test.  When they only have 2-3 minutes to work on a problem, and they see the timer counting down, they work together better to figure out how to solve the problem and come up with an answer they agree on.  It is a great activity.

Lastly, I assigned students to create a problem from a specific section that we had covered.  They then passed the problem to the person behind them, and students had to solve other students' problems.  They passed the paper again and another student checked the solution for accuracy. The activity had students creating, solving, and checking problems - they were all actively involved in problem solving!

The block schedule allowed for a lot of movement and for students to reinforce material to mastery, it was fantastic!

Intervention Committee

I have been part of a committee at the Junior High that is working on “Response to Intervention”.  It has been eye opening for me.  Realizing what we do when students struggle, and then later fail.  It became clear that we do not have enough strategic interventions in place for when students are struggling.  It is frequently too late in the quarter when we identify students that are struggling and failing, and even if they are identified, we don’t have standard processes in place to help them out.  Some of these students legitimately struggle, other are choosing to not to learn.  Both of these groups of students need intervention.  The focus of the committee is how we identify these students, and then what strategic and systematic approach will we have so all students will have access to the same interventions.

Homework Completion

Homework completing by students is a continuing struggle for me.  I do feel that homework is essential for math.  Watching a teacher model examples, working in groups, and trying problems on your own in class are great.  The true test for understanding material is when you have to do it on your own, that is where homework comes into play.  When a student works independently on a math problem, they identify what they understand and what they don’t completely understand.

I started out the year not checking or grading homework because it was practice, and I didn’t think students should be graded on practice.  But then fewer and fewer students were doing their homework.  The day that 3 out of 32 students had done their homework, I knew I had to change how I handled homework.  At the start of 2^nd quarter, I started to put homework in the grade book worth zero points, and state whether it was as turned in or missing.  That improved homework completing a little, but not enough.  At the start of 3^rd quarter I started randomly checking and grading homework, making it worth points in the grade book.  This brought homework completion up to about 80%, and test scores improved for those students completing their homework.

Next year I plan to start collecting and grading homework daily, do emphasize how important it is to practice what we do in class outside of class.  When homework scores are in the grade book, parents have a clear understanding of what their student is doing and understanding so there are no surprises.  This means more work for me … and more late nights.  But I want students to on top of the material we are learning, and practicing via homework is the best strategy I have right now.

Co-Teaching

Next year I will be co-teaching a Pre-Algebra class at the Junior High.  I have never co-taught a class, and have never taught a class that was this much below grade level.  I have typically taught math to students at grade-level, not accelerated, but not significantly below grade level either.  I will be doing a lot of curriculum planning this summer.  This is a new class, and will require strategies to engage and teach students that really struggle with math.  I am going to have to get really creative.

I am very excited about the teacher I am co-teaching with.  She is a Special Education teacher that I have known for a couple of years and have a lot of respect for.  I think I will able to learn new techniques and strategies from her to take back to my classes that I teach alone.  I have colleagues that have had rough experiences co-teaching, but I think that the person I will be working with is going to make this a great experience.  I am really looking forward to co-teaching.  

Time Management

Time management has been really difficult for me this year.  I am a mother of 3 children.  I have a 9-year old boy, a 11-year old boy, and a 13-year old girl.  I have a husband that travels, which means I am a single mother a lot of the time.  My children are very involved in athletics, which means I am the typical “American Minivan Carpool Mom”.  There is not an evening that we have less than 2 activities, and some evenings we have 5 events to get to.  In there we have to fit in dinner, homework, practicing piano, and studying.  Every night I check my kids’ math homework to make sure they are understanding the concepts being taught in the classroom.  If there are errors, I have them go back and find and fix the errors.  After all of my mother, wife, house, shopping, carpooling, and bedtime responsibilities are done every night, I sit down to do my grading and planning.  I do my school work from  8:00pm to 11:30pm, which puts my typical bedtime between 11:30pm and 12:00am.  By Friday night I am exhausted.  I have to figure out a way find a more reasonable bedtime.  My goal next year is to find a better time management plan.  This is my 3^rd year of doing this, and I will be burned out very soon at this rate.

Literacy Observation

In March our Literacy Expert visited the Junior High.  For this visit, two staff from each department worked together to develop a lesson that incorporated a literacy strategy.  Both teachers would teach the same lesson with an audience watching.  The audience included the department members that taught the same subject, the building Literacy Coach, and the Literacy Expert consultant.  Prior to the observation, we conferenced, sent information to our building Literacy Coach, and  provided items that we wanted the observers to watch for. 

For the observation, we were wrapping up a unit on working with exponents.  We had created a concept map / graphic organizer that included all the operations that could be done on exponents.  Students described the operation, gave examples with variables, and then gave examples and non-examples with numbers.  It was a great exercise for the students to pull everything together that we had done in this chapter and have it on one page.

After the observation, we conferenced and talked about how the lesson went.  As a whole, I think it was very successful.  Students were engaged, talking to each other, and problem solving.  I will definitely use the concept map again next year when we teach this unit.  I think I might use the concept map through the unit and add to it as we go, instead of using it to summarize at the end.

To summarize, a stressful activity, but useful when it was completed.  The students were not very excited about having 5 extra adults in the room watching everything they did, but they did great!

Literacy and Problem Solving

The next staff development day, there was more focus on literacy.  Once again, staff rotated through stations where teachers presented various literacy strategies.  At this event I was asked to host a station that focused on problem solving, something I have been working on in my classroom.  I did a fifteen minute mini-presentation 6 or 8 times (I lost track).  Whenever I am asked to do something like this, I am excited about the opportunity and always say yes.  Then, as the time of the event approaches, my nerves and insecurity start to eat at me and I regret having agreed to giving the mini-presentations. 

For my Problem Solving mini-presentation, I had staff work through a problem where they needed to use proportions (but they did not know they needed to use proportions when posed with the problem).  They were given an actual-size photograph of Shaq’s hand.  This was something I had come across in Sports Illustrated Kids when I was student teaching.  Staff was then asked to approximate the length of Shaq’s foot.  They had rulers, calculators, Algebra textbooks, pencils, and paper.  Some staff were able to work through it quickly, and others were able to figure it out with help from their colleagues (just like in the classroom).  Then I talked through how I put students in group, how I assigned tasks to each group member, what students could do when they were totally stuck, etc.  When it was done, it was a successful experience.

Literacy Focus

Literacy is a focus for us at the Junior High.  I have learned that literacy is not just teaching reading and writing, but incorporating strategies to deepen student learning, understanding, and problem solving.  During teacher workshop the week before the students arrived last fall, there were several teachers that volunteered to present “literacy strategies” to staff as they rotated through stations.  I picked up a couple of ideas that I could incorporate into my math classroom.  I now do a pre-read with students at the beginning at every chapter in our math textbook.  I have students have their textbook open as we learn new sections and reference where vocabulary, theorems, examples, and important information is in the book.  There are some days that I just give an assignment and have students work in partners or groups and figure out the material on their own.  I have tried to have students really use their textbook as a resource, and not have to depend so much on asking me every time they have a question or are unsure of something.