This Week: #ObserveMe, Visualizations, and Teachers as Super Heroes, errr…Content Builders.







This Week: #ObserveMe, Visualizations, and Teachers as Super Heroes, errr…Content Builders. 



Edited By Sahar Khatri @khatrimath

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Online Professional Development Sessions

Join Gail Burrill tonight for Reasoning from Definitions & Theorems: An Important Calculus Practice. The AP Calculus Course and Exam Description includes the Mathematical Practices for AP Calculus. One of these practices is reasoning with definitions and theorems, calling for students to build arguments, justify conclusions and confirm results, verify assumptions before applying a theorem and produce examples and counter examples. The session will explore what this looks like in calculus and consider what should students encounter in second year algebra and precalculus in order to be prepared for implementing this practice in calculus. RSVP here.

Highlights from last week: 6 Hand Signals that Bring Learning to Life! The research-based practice of making thinking visible with non-verbal signals elevates the level of student participation in elementary classrooms. How can signals be used to even greater purpose in the math classroom to build problem-solving stamina, develop students’ ability to describe patterns and make conjectures, and aid teachers in assessing student learning? We considered the impact of several powerful signals in the present-day elementary math classroom. Missed it? Get the recording here.

Great Blogging Action

#ObserveMe

Constructive feedback is so important for growth, which is why I think the recent #ObserveMe movement has been so great.  It is awesome to see so many teachers all over the place opening their doors to their peers.  Here’s a photo posted by @nate_bowling which pretty much sums things up; it’s been “…better than any evaluation of my career,” according to Nate.

 

Various tweets and blog posts have been written revolving around this topic, but two recent math-related posts stick out to me.  The first is by Jennifer Bell (@jkjohnsonbell) and she had the brilliant idea of focusing her observations on Number Talks.  What a great idea to hone in on just a specific practice for this!  She goes into nice detail on her feedback from the MTBoS, her peers, and math coaches all revolving around Number Talks.

Dylan Kane (@math8_teacher) shared some compelling thoughts the other day about this, as well.  Both of Jennifer and Dylan mentioned something to the idea that peer observation tends to be encouraging, but often lacking of any real feedback that will lead to improvement.  It seems that what Dylan has found most useful has been student feedback that he gets via Google forms.  He has categorized areas in which students are to give specific feedback, and it really looks like it’s working.  The students have been honest and given real things that he can take and use right away.

A big takeaway for me here is that I should be looking for feedback wherever I can get it.  The feedback we get from various types of people (fellow teachers, other math teachers, MTBoS, coaches, or our students themselves) will all give us useful insights from different perspectives which can be put together as a whole in a powerful way to move us forward.

PS – I just thought of another stakeholder here – parents.  Have any of you utilized parents in a positive way to help your teaching?  What would that look like?

~ by Matthew Engle (@pickpocketbme)

Visualizing Standard Deviation

 

Imagine getting into the driver’s seat of any modern day vehicle. Chances are really good, you can adjust the seat’s height, backrest, and its distance from the pedals. Now imagine getting into a vehicle manufactured back in the 1960s or before. Chances are slim those same adjustable features don’t exist. I ask you to picture this scenario because we live in two worlds: a world designed for adjustability (modern day car) and a world designed on averages (vehicles before 1960s).

 

Sam Shah’s wonderful post about Visualizing Standard Deviation took me to a few familiar places:

  • Sam is focused on using visuals to give students a solid conceptual understanding of Standard Deviation and students often deserve visual representations to build conceptual understanding

  • Sam’s post reminded me how many things in our world are still (unfortunately) designed around averages (one of them being education)

  • Sam’s post reminded me of Todd Rose’s great TED talk “The Myth of Average” where Todd explains the reasoning behind adjustable seats and how this might translate to education.

Check out Sam’s post and Todd’s TED talk. Both are winners!

~by Andrew Stadel (@mr_stadel)

Teachers as Content Creators

In an ignite talk at the 2016 NCTM annual Meeting and Exposition, Max Ray-Riek warned of the risks of getting all your lessons from blogs (coherence, alignment, and consistency). But he also highlights why reading about and getting lessons from blogs feels like a successful endeavor for teachers across the country. You get a first hand account of the teacher who not only created the lesson, but how they used it in their classroom.

So, in order to heed Max’s sage advice, I will not encourage everyone to throw away their current expensive curriculum mandated by their district. Instead I will just list some teacher creators who are sharing lessons they’ve created and some first hand accounts of how they used them in their classrooms.
 

Carl Oliver and Kristin Gray recently made Desmos activities through teacher.desmos.com. Carl teaches high school and Kristin’s lesson is for kindergarteners. That’s pretty cool, in my opinion! The best part is, both of them asked and received feedback on their lessons from other teachers through twitter.

Graham Fletcher just posted how 3-act tasks are used in the elementary grades. If you’re interested in trying one out here are some from Graham, Kendra Lomax, and me.

Simon Gregg recently wrote about how he uses Cuisenaire Rods. These fantastic manipulatives can be used for a variety of mathematical content as well as a sense-making tool.

Also if you haven’t heard about Open Up Resources, then you don’t follow me on twitter! Many teachers from the #MTBoS have been recruited by Illustrative Mathematics to develop an open education resource curriculum for the middle grades!

Finally, let us know how you are creating or using teacher-created content! See you on the interwebs!
~by Andrew Gael (@bkdidact)

Join #SwDMathChat every 2nd and 4th Thursday of the month. The next chat is on October 27th at 9pm EST on Contemplate then Calculate in SpEd. If you’d like to guest moderate a chat, sign up by clicking the button below!

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This Week: Highlighting Bloggers and a Recent Guardian Article







This Week: Highlighting Bloggers and a Recent Guardian Article



Edited By Sahar Khatri @khatrimath

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Online Professional Development Sessions

Join us tonight for 6 Hand Signals that Bring Learning to Life! The research-based practice of making thinking visible with non-verbal signals elevates the level of student participation in elementary classrooms. How can signals be used to even greater purpose in the math classroom to build problem-solving stamina, develop students’ ability to describe patterns and make conjectures, and aid teachers in assessing student learning? We will consider the impact of several powerful signals in the present-day elementary math classroom. Join us tonight at 9 PM here.

Highlights from last week: Teaching Ideas to Prepare Your Students for the AP Stats Exam
Presented by Amy Hogan (@alittlestats), Doug Tyson (@tyson_doug), and Bob Lochel (@bobloch)

 AP Readers Amy Hogan, Bob Lochel and Doug Tyson reviewed three of the questions from the free response portion of the AP Statistics exam from 2016. Ideas related to avoiding common errors and practical teaching tips were shared. Listen to the recording here.

Great Blogging Action

What I’ve Been Reading

 
Well, I’ve been reading about what Glenn Waddell is reading – a pre-release edition of Malke Rosenfeld’s forthcoming book Math on the Move.  One of the great features of this post is that Glenn clearly describes what Math on the Move is not about, which was very helpful for someone like me, who has not had the opportunity to participate in one of Malke’s workshops.  As a secondary teacher (like Glenn), the whole idea of using movement to teach math is foreign, and perhaps a bit lot scary (all those teenagers roaming freely…), but reading Glenn’s post, and the sample chapter available at Heinemann has whet my appetite for more.  Maybe it will whet yours as well.
 
Some bloggers use their young children as material for writing; the perspective of being both teacher and parent of math students lends a particularly astute insight into the results of our professional actions.  In August, Geoff Krall wrote about the personal pain inflicted on his daughter (and by extension, many children) by a system which sends the message that only some students can be great at math starting as early as kindergarten.  But Geoff doesn’t cast blame only on the system, but reflects on his own participation in the politics of education privilege.  I love this post for its honesty, and for the opportunity it gives me as a teacher to better understand the wide-ranging effects of programming decisions on our students.
 
I love Grace Chen’s blog, educating grace; her thoughtful analysis of race, class, inclusivity (and exclusivity) in their many manifestations in our educational system always leave me with a lot to thing about and research.  In her most recent post, who am I talking to?, Grace reflects about her break from social media – whether her overbooked schedule justifies it during this election season which can be described as, among many other words, heretofore unbelievable.  And she leaves us with a great gift – a curated list of readings on important issues that maybe become while the current media circus reigns.  There’s some quality reading to be done, thanks to Grace.
 
Cheers,
Written by Wendy Menard (@wmukluk)

Showing Math some Love

There was an interesting blog post from the other side of the Atlantic from me that caught my attention. Last week there was an article by an anonymous teacher about a number of issues facing the UK’s math curriculum. This was a Secret Teacher article from the UK newspaper The Guardian that invites teachers to “[lift] the lid on teaching… [and write] about the trials, tribulations and frustrations”. Blogger Miss Blilly wanted to respond to the negative tone of this article by highlighting the positive and encouraging other teachers to do the same using the hashtags #loveteaching & #NotSoSecretTeacher. Scottish blogger Julie Moran followed that with a #loveteaching post of her own and mentions other #MTBoS initiatives that spread positivity including the One Good Thing blogand the hashtag #mathsrockedtoday. If you’re interested in spreading positivity and connecting with with teachers in the UK you should check out either of those articles.

If you’re interested in branching out to other bloggers, you may want to check out the blog post from this newsletter’s own Wendy Menard! In this post Wendy discusses her own blogging history, as well as the blogs of a number of her friends, colleagues, and people who have inspired her. If you want to learn more about how one teacher fills up her feed reader, head over to Wendy’s blog and check out the post Enrich and Enhance Your Professionalism through Blogging.

Written by Carl Oliver (@carloliwitter)

Great Blogging Action Spotlight: Simon Gregg

It’s always great to watch fellow teachers explore and work with the primary grades. In particular, it’s interesting to see how teachers of the intermediate grades interact and learn with younger students whenever they get the chance.  
 
This year our friend Simon Gregg has taken the leap from teaching 10 year olds to teaching 5 year olds.  What’s awesome in watching his journey is that Simon’s brought his Cuisenaire Rods with him and the exploration that’s taking place shouldn’t go unrecognized. I’m just thankful he’s continued to share his experience.
 
Sure it’s early in the year but Simon will keep on sharing and we’ll all be better because of it.  
 
Written by @gfletchy (Graham Fletcher)
 

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This Week at Global Math Department







This Week at Global Math Department



Edited By Brian Bushart @bstockus

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Teaching Ideas to Prepare Your Students for the AP Stats Exam
Presented by Amy Hogan (@alittlestats), Doug Tyson (@tyson_doug), and Bob Lochel (@bobloch)

AP Readers Amy Hogan, Bob Lochel and Doug Tyson will review three of the questions from the free response portion of the AP Statistics exam from 2016. Ideas related to avoiding common errors and practical teaching tips will be shared.

To join the meeting when it starts at 9pm Eastern (or RSVP if it’s before 9pm), click here.

Last week at Global Math, Linda Dacey showed us how to unleash the power of math games and puzzles in grades K-5. Click here to watch.

It Came From the #MTBoS

I have really smart friends.

(Photo credit to Dan Meyer @ddmeyer http://threeacts.mrmeyer.com/tacocart/)

This week, my good friend Jennifer Silverman (@jensilvermath) shared this article by Tom Vander Ark (@tvanderark) about Open Up Resources, a non-profit company that is building and collecting  “high quality open standards-aligned math curriculum.” Jennifer happens to be one of the people (along with Kate Nowak @k8nowak of Illustrative Math) involved in the design of these materials, which can only mean that it will involve THE most gorgeous GeoGebra activities, and it will be amazing.

Another good friend, Mary Bourassa (@marybourassa) blogged about her tweaking of a Desmos activity that had threaded its way from Andrew Stadel to Nathan Kraft, to her. I especially love reading posts about designing and implementing these activities. I find looking at the activity alone doesn’t always give me a big picture – what the goal is, how the kids reacted, and ideas for improvements. Also, I noticed that Mary made sure to “close”, which is something that came up at this summer’s TMC during Tracy Johnston Zager’s (@TracyZager) keynote. #ISeeWhatYouDidThere Mary!

Written by Audrey McLaren (@a_mcsquared)

Geometry Shouldn’t Be “Plug and Chug”

The numerous posts I’ve seen recently about geometry concepts reminded me of a conversation I had with a teacher last year. The teacher expressed he didn’t need to teach his students the concepts of volume and area, they only needed to know how to “plug” numbers into the given formula and calculate.  There are few things teachers say about instructional practices which appall me, but that day, I was appalled. Why rob students of understanding when you can challenge their thinking with activities like these?

@wheeler_laura shared her 4-part lesson on similar triangles in this post allowing inquiry and review of students’ prior knowledge of triangles. Technology was woven into the lesson as well. By the time students arrived at the procedural fluency component, they had an understanding of why they were multiplying to find the unknown sides.

Dane Ehlert causes you to pause and think about how you’re helping students make sense of triangle theorems with this post and this post.  

And during a time when people are using the catch phrase “Don’t be basic” @lisabej_manitou provides what she calls quality basic stuff.  Her students taken a concrete look at quadrilaterals and make connections from background knowledge to current and future knowledge. And although it seems basic to her, the purpose of bringing out students’ misconceptions and understandings is huge.

New goal, help that 7th grade teacher see his connection to the geometry understanding students will need in 10th grade.

Written by Jenise Sexton (@MrsJeniseSexton)

Maze Runner

I tell my colleagues all the time that all I have to do is hop on Twitter for 10 minutes, and I’m liable to have emailed myself 2 or 3 or 15 links to great resources I want to check out. On a recent visit to Twitter, I came across another fantastic Steve Wyborney (@SteveWyborney) creation.

The man who loves to create and share unique resources just dropped the Maze Hundred Chart – an interactive Powerpoint where all the numbers on the hundred chart are hidden. You (or your students!) have the power to create “mazes” on the chart and use the relationships within the chart to name the numbers that aren’t showing. He even wrote a follow up post called “Strategies for Using the Maze Hundred Chart” to give you some ideas of how to use this clever tool.

If you’re new to Steve Wyborney, be sure to check out his math imposter sets, cube connectors, and massive space to notice resources. You’ll be happy you did!

Written by Brian Bushart (@bstockus)

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This Week: Take Care of Yourself and Lots of Creativity!!!







This Week: Take Care of Yourself and Lots of Creativity!!!



Edited By Sahar Khatri @khatrimath

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Online Professional Development Sessions

Many teachers would agree that math games and puzzles are engaging, but how can we increase their potential to deepen conceptual understanding, as well as fluency? As we explore games and puzzles, we will consider how simple changes to basic games structures, questions, assessment, and management strategies can transform the use of familiar games and puzzles in our classrooms. Join us tonight at 9 PM (EST) and Unleash the Power of Math Games and Puzzles, K-5. RSVP here.

Highlights from last week: Children have an over-reliance on counting, they lack number sense, and the manipulatives we use in the early grades actually hinder students’ abilities to progress to more advanced addition strategies. This session discussed why these three ideas keep kids from being fluent with their addition facts AND what we can do in the classroom to help.Check out the recording by clicking  here.

Great Blogging Action

4 Ways to Leave School at School

Image result for balance work and life

Do you have this problem like I do where you know so many things that you’d like to be doing that would be amazing for student learning?  We need to remember sometimes that it’s important to strive for the ideal and realize that though we may never reach it we can always be growing towards it.  Otherwise if we aren’t careful we’ll burn out.

Zach Cresswell reminds us of the importance of having a life outside of school in his recent post 4 Ways to Leave School at School.  He gives great suggestions for some easy things that we can all be doing to allow us the recovery time we all need.  That’s not to say that those of us crazy people who spend our spare time reading things like the GMD Newsletter can’t do that, though!  That’s fun, not work, right?

He gives practical suggestions for:

  • Before you leave work

  • On the way home

  • Embracing the moment

  • Understanding that you can’t fix everything

~ by Matthew Engle (@pickpocketbme)

The 1-2-3-4-5 Punch
 

“I think I have the best of both worlds here can pack a powerful 1-2-3-4-5 punch!”

Jon Orr used student-centered Pentomino activities that deliver critical thinking, manipulation with numbers, algebraic thinking, and lots of creativity. No matter how you slice it, this post will take your algebraic expressions and equations unit to a whole new level or two or three… Go check it out!

 

Hands-On tiles

Whiteboards

Explain Everything

Desmos

Desmos

~by Andrew Stadel (@mr_stadel)

Join #SwDMathChat every 2nd and 4th Thursday of the month. The next chat is on October 13th at 9pm EST on the relationship between GenEd and SpEd teachers. If you’d like to guest moderate a chat, sign up by clicking the button below!

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