December 8, 2015

Food For Thought

Edited By Carl Oliver @carloliwitter

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What better time to talk about #TMC16, than the middle of December? This week, Dylan Kane, Jessica Bogie, and Lisa Henry begin talking about the summer in Twitter Math Camp: History and 2016 Preview. Whether you’re interested in making the trip to Minnesota, or just want to learn more about Twitter Math Camp, Join us tonight at 9 EST here. If you want to speak at TMC or want more information click here.

Last week we Joined Joshua Schmidt for an honest look into his current customized mathematics learning environment that he has developed over the past six years. His goal has been to create an environment that provides authentic choices, independent pacing, and learning at the students’ appropriate level. This work has come with many successes and challenges. He will give insights into his classroom environment and his choice of technologies. Since customized learning takes on a variety of shapes, he wants to provide not only a better understanding of customization but also ideas that you can put into practice in your own classroom. View the recording here

Great Blogging Action

Food For Thought

There’s been a lot of chatter and blogging about the great things that went on at the NCTM Regional Conference in Nashville; if you, like me, were not fortunate enough to attend, you might have been feeling somewhat bereft as you read through events you might have missed. But if you read through Kate Nowak’spresentation, “Plan a Killer Lesson Today”, you may become (as I did ) pretty jazzed by the simplicity and brilliance of her ideas. Kate’s blog, f(t), has some wonderful posts about taking procedural lessons and turning them into puzzles for students to solve, and the slides from her NCTM talk break down and clarify that process. It’s a great resource, and I personally want to thank Kate for sharing her blueprint. Beth Ferguson over at Algebra’s Friend wrote about another way to make the requisite practice of a skill (polynomial long and synthetic division) engaging using a game.

The title “25 Tips to Deal with Digital Distractions” caught my eye when the Teach Thought post popped up in my Feedly list. Great, I thought – they’ll tell me how to deal with the plague of notifications that cause students to stare at their laps during my scintillating lessons. But, as it turns out, the list is just as much for keeping me focused as those I teach. Updated from a post 3 years ago to keep up with technological changes, there are specific useful strategies for minimizing the sidetracking effect of your device when needed.

The Food for Thought Department: When I need to call my class back from their group discussions, I frequently call out, “Mathematicians!” I’ve always told my students that this is what they are for the duration of their stay in my classroom, and I get a charge every time it gets their attention, because for at least a moment, they are taking themselves that seriously. But do I take myself that seriously? Andrew Stadel pondered this question in his post, “Are You a Mathematician?” It’s not only worth a read, but also a laminated print-out.

And finally, Glenn Waddell challenged us high school teachers to better engage our students In “HS Teachers, up your game”. Glenn posits that students may be checking out in high school not because they don’t understand, but because we are not connecting ideas in the higher mathematics they are know studying with things they have already been taught, and adding developmentally appropriate depth to their prior knowledge. The Common Core standards have introduced a lot of rich content in earlier grades; we are beginning to teach high school students who have encountered this content when younger. It’s not just a matter of transitioning our curriculum any more; we’ve got to examine at what level we need to meet our students. Like I said, food for thought.

Cheers –

Wendy Menard

@wmukluk

_____________________

Talking about Numbers

The proliferation of Number Talks in elementary schools across North America is astonishing. As teachers scramble to learn and implement Number Talks, GMD’s Brian Bushart threw down a Number Talk PL gauntlet that shouldn’t go unrecognized.
Whether you’re a savvy veteran of Number Talks or just diving in, you’ll walk away smarter than when you woke up. You could take Brian’s post and immediately turn around and implement it at you own school. Kudos to Brian and thanks for making us all a little smarter.
Inline image 1

Last week Pierre Trancemontagn unveiled another beauty of a crowdsourcing website that supports the power of the #MTBoS and the work of effective Number Talks. Number Talk Images is sure to follow the success of Which One Doesn’t Belong. So check it out, fire up your camera, and spread the love.

Inline image 2

And last but not least, Christy Sutton recently shared Always, Sometimes, Never questions her blog for k-5 folks. K-2 teachers are screaming for more #MTBoS-like resources that support the lower grades and Christy delivered. When you stop by…tell her thanks.

Written by @gfletchy (Graham Fletcher)

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100 Numbers to Get Students to Talking

Group work has forever been the bane of my existence as a student and it continues into my teaching years. As a student, I was always the one who ended up doing all the work. As a teacher, I see one student who ends of doing most of the work while the others just copy the “smart one”. This past week Sara Vanderwerf (@saravdwerf) shared an activity to get all of her students talking just by finding 100 numbers within a given period. The goal, in Sara’s words, is to teach students “how to work in groups and teach them how to talk to one another”. The following highlights the activity:

Students work in groups to find numbers in consecutive order, highlighting them in different colors.
Students are timed with the goal being to get to the highest number possible.
Time is set aside for multiple rounds so that groups attempt to reach a higher number each round than the previous round.
While students are working, she takes pictures and shares them with her students after the activity, many of whom are so focused they didn’t even realize their photo was being taken!
The day ends with a reflection by students responding to, “What does great group work in math look like?”
The following day students work in groups to practice great group work!

Check out Sara’s blog for details as well as Megan Schmidt’s (@Veganmathbeagle) adaptation of the activity in her latest blog post. And do it!

Global Math Department Needs Your Help!

The Global Math Department is looking for individuals who are interested in planning the Tuesday night webinars hosted on Big Marker. GMD bookers contact potential speakers regarding speaking opportunities, and provide them with details on planning sessions. If you are interested in being more involved with the Global Math Department, contact Heather at heather.m.kohn@gmail.com or Dylan at dkane47@gmail.com.

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December 1, 2015

The First Global Math Department of the Last Month of 2015 is Tonight

Edited By Brian Bushart @bstockus

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Tools for Customization: What Does Customized Learning Look Like?
Join Joshua Schmidt for an honest look into his current customized mathematics learning environment that he has developed over the past six years. His goal has been to create an environment that provides authentic choices, independent pacing, and learning at the students’ appropriate level. This work has come with many successes and challenges. He will give insights into his classroom environment and his choice of technologies. Since customized learning takes on a variety of shapes, he wants to provide not only a better understanding of customization but also ideas that you can put into practice in your own classroom.

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

Don’t worry! You didn’t miss Global Math last week. We took a week off for the Thanksgiving holiday.

Don’t go yet! We have great things to share.

Educating the Heart

One of the wonderful things about being a part of #mtbos is the opportunities to glean ideas and information from others. This time, @lisabej_manitou post of notes and scattered thoughts from a recent brain based teaching and learning conference enlightened me. In Notes and Scattered Thoughts from Learning & the Brain Conference, Lisa shares information about the correlation between stress and learning, building student resilience, tackling anxiety and educating the heart.

Implications for your math instruction

This post reminded me of articles and blog posts I’ve read about social emotional learning. If we meet the needs of our students emotionally, or educate the heart, students will be in a better position to learn. It is a matter of seeing them as real children first, versus a group of emotionless and sometimes nameless faces we much teach a list of standards before an arbitrary deadline. (By the way, if you don’t know the names of the students sitting in your classroom, put yourself in their shoes, how would you feel if someone who is supposed to be investing in your life didn’t know your name.)

Equally important, Lisa’s post discussed building resilience and two key statements stuck out to me.

Build resilience by allowing time for information to stabilize and take root.
Nothing discourages mastery more than an adult who steps in and says: “Let me do that for you.”

How often do we spend two days on a concept and move forward to the next before students have time to digest the new material? They are left in a state of confusion trying to make connections between the multiple concepts which can lead to anxiety. How many times do we show students a procedure or process and in the end, it is only us who has the understanding of the concept? Building resilience screams SMP 1, SMP 2 and SMP 3, which makes yet another argument of why the Standards for Mathematical Practice should be in the forefront of your teaching.

Lisa Bejarano’s post has stoked a fire I’ve had burning inside me for a while. Perfect timing as I’m heading back to school after a week’s break. I’m going in armed with strategies and information which will help me meet the needs of the students I will encounter.

Written by Jenise Sexton (@MrsJeniseSexton)

What’s Your Elevator Pitch to the Federal Government?

Tracy Zager posted a fascinating exchange she had with a potential congressman:

It’s not often that you get a politician genuinely asking “What should we be doing?” So what’s your elevator pitch to the federal government? What should the US Congress (or any country’s legislature) do to improve teaching and learning in our schools?

Join the conversation on Twitter. The thread starts here.

Written by Kent Haines (@MrAKHaines)

Some GeoGebra Love

I’ve been writing a lot lately about Desmos and the activity builder, and some folks have been under the impression that I have therefore lost my love for GeoGebra. As if! As I sit at this desk, I have a digital pile of gorgeous student-created GeoGebras to give feedback on, so believe me, I’m still a GeoGeholic. This week I’m writing about some great GeoGebra posts I found using #ggbchat. Here’s one by Neil Dickson (@GeoGebrain) about using it to introduce trigonometry. I particularly loved how Neil combined the hi-tech with those old trig tables. Jenny Krzystowczyk’s post (@jennyktechin) is about combining Google drive with GeoGebra to create an isosceles triangle lesson that engaged her students. The post that keeps pinging in my brain, however, is this one by Daniel Pearcy (@DanielPearcy) about the need to talk about good pedagogy when we talk about GGB, or any edtech tool. He includes a link to a series of videos on that subject, based on his own presentation. I’m currently working my way through them, looking forward especially to “GeoGebra Pedagogy Part 5: Student-Centred Tasks”. And I love that he made these videos for people who couldn’t be there in person!

Written by Audrey McLaren (@a_mcsquared)

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November 24, 2015

Happy Thanksgiving!

Edited By Ashli Black @mythagon

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Happy Thanksgiving week to all from the GMD Newsletter teams!

No meeting this week, so why not check out a recording from the archives of one you might have missed?

Last week, Anna Weltman presented Seeing Stars: Using Art to Spark Investigation in Math Class. Check out the recording here.

Things to Check Out

Remote Conferencing: Be Less Jealous!

This year at NCTM Regionals it seemed that #MTBoS was taking over…

regionals q.JPG

However, I was assured that it may just be my twitter lens and that #MTBoS still has a lot of work left to do…

For those of us who couldn’t make it to NCTM: Nashville this year, where the #MTBoS take-over was burgeoning, a new resource was provided by some valiant #MTBoS-ers, like Mike Flynn and Pam Wilson…

Periscope is an app that allows users to live stream video and save it for up to 24 hours. So if you miss a session or aren’t at the conference at all, Periscope can provide an opportunity to engage in a new way. The only thing is the 24 hour window, to which Mike and Pam have sought an answer. Katch will store user’s live-streamed videos seemingly indefinitely.

Nashville Opening Keynote with Andrew Stadel, Graham Fletcher, Laila Nur, Cathy Yenca, and Robert Kaplinsky

Finally, here is an open google doc started by Michael Pershan including his (and many other’s) thoughts about the NCTM conference experience. This maybe yet another way for those not at a certain conference to engage with those were there.

written by Andrew Gael (@bkdidact)

Quack and Count

I remember Graham Fletcher recently shared at Twitter Math Camp how interesting a conversation can be that revolves around students understanding (or misunderstanding) the equal sign. That’s why Marilyn Burns’ post, The Equal Sign: What It Really Means, caught my eye. The post is an excerpt from her fourth edition of About Teaching Mathematics., where she uses the children’s book, Quack and Count by Keith Baker.

My favorite part is Marilyn saying, “The equal sign, however, is a relational symbol, not an operation symbol.”

Read more. It’s a quack read. How do your students understand the equal sign?

written by Andrew Stadel (@mr_stadel)

It seems only appropriate during Thanksgiving week to talk about One Good Thing. If you’ve not seen this site before or if it’s been a while since you checked it out, head on over and scroll through some posts for thoughtful reflections on teaching days, humorous anecdotes from the classrooms, and tales from grading purgatory.
Have a story to share? Head to the About page to contribute!

written by Ashli Black (@mythagon)

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November 17, 2015

Learning from Sea to Shining Sea

Edited By Carl Oliver @carloliwitter

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This week, Anna Weltman will be presenting Seeing Stars: Using Art to Spark Investigation in Math Class. Join Anna, author of “This is Not a Math Book,” to investigate activities from her book focusing on number theory from a geometric perspective. We’ll brainstorm strategies to get kids investigating– posing questions, developing hypotheses, experimenting, and evaluating results– and see how approaching math through art can help. Join us tonight at 9 EST here.

Last week we were lucky to have Glenn Waddell presenting High Fives and Trust: Why Relationships Must Come First. This discussion about the importance of classroom climate led to a great discussion about how to create a great environment for learning. When discussing Rigor, Relevance, and Relationships, the Relationships must come first! To view the recording click here.

Great Blogging Action

Planning Number Talks

Jumping into number talks has been one of the most exciting adventures I have put myself and my students through. Though, if you’re like me and totally new to this whole thing, you probably are constantly asking yourself, am I doing this right? I have been! All the time! I’ve been reading various number talk books, but my biggest resource (as always) comes from the #MTBoS community. I have been lurking a great deal on Kristin Gray’s (@mathminds) blog. She recently shared some plans for a dot image numbertalk that her team had developed for 3rd grade. While the dot images were rich themselves (which are also appropriate for middle school students!), what drew me most to her post was the planning and reflecting piece which can’t be found in any book. Her consideration of the goal, anticipated responses, her further questions, and then modification of the dot images demonstrates the thought process required to plan and modify number strings to meet the specific goal. If you’re implementing number talks or thinking about implementing them, don’t forget to check out her entire post to see the planning process as well as some rich dot images to share with your students!

_____________________

While lucky folk are attending various NCTM Regional events this month, closer to home (my home, that is) I had the wonderful opportunity to attend the first workshop in a 3-part series entitled Hands-On Mathematical Construction taught by George Hart through Math for America. George Hart is identified by Wikipedia as “an American Geometer” (did you know Wikipedia has a list of geometers?); he is actually a research professor in the engineering school at Stony Brook University and a freelance mathematical sculptor/designer. And he’s Vi Hart’s dad.

In this first meeting, which was simulcast to teachers across New York State, we built a truncated icosahedron out of CDs and zip ties. But we participants weren’t just told what to do; we first learned how to draw 2 dimensional representations of these 3 dimensional objects, and transform our drawings into plans for the construction of our group sculpture. George Hart dynamically led us through some of the geometry behind the construction we were making; he is admittedly not a teacher of school-age children, but his ideas and enthusiasm easily opened the door for us to consider how this type of activity might be used in a range of classrooms. He and his team are putting together a detailed lesson plan for use by teachers, and he is open to feed back about implementing this type of project in schools.

I can’t wait for the next session, when we will be doing paper constructions, and plan to spend some time digging through his website. Check it out!

– Wendy Menard

@wmukluk

Hot on Twitter: Fall Conference Season Winds Down

‏@maxmathforum

Read @Veganmathbeagle on online community, face to face conferences, & the awesomeness of the MN #NCTMregionals: http://mathybeagle.com/2015/11/15/regional-reflection-releasing-my-grip/ …

‏@crstn85

#MTBoS Mentor sign up is open ’til Dec 1! We’re expecting an influx of newbies from #NCTMregionals, will you mentor? https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1mGmrdXK1hDM9wkJYokd-WzC9rEhFWkYdWPOoAYh1LLQ/viewform …

This week marks a tremendous moment in the evolution of the MathTwitterBlogosphere. Sadly, I wasn’t a part of the #MTBoS in its infancy years but it stems from some amazing people that we all are continuously proud to call our colleagues. This week, we (the collective #MathTwitterBlogospehere) are keynoting at the NCTM Regional in Nashville. If there were ever a micro-TMC this would be it. Check out the online conference planner because you’re bound to see a friend or two. On Wednesday night Mike Flynn is planning to periscope the opening session.

A special shoutout goes to Robert Kaplinsky for being the brainchild behind this NCTM opportunity. He’s opened the door for us to share with the world what WE all do…each and every day. Robert is one of the most inclusive people out there and if you haven’t met him… start here.

All of us are smarter than one of us. We hope to represent you well.

Written by @gfletchy (Graham Fletcher)

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November 10, 2015

Global Math Department Requests the Highest of Fives and Your Attendance Tonight

Edited By Brian Bushart @bstockus

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High Fives and Trust: Why Relationships Must Come First
Join Glenn Waddell for a discussion about high fives and classroom climate builders. When discussing Rigor, Relevance, and Relationships, the Relationships must come first!

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

Last week at Global Math Michael Pershan presented on being your own source of professional development.

Click here to watch the recording.

But Wait! There’s More!

Just in Time For Midterms

human bingo.JPG

In most systems, student understanding is monitored through the implementation of pretests, midterms or interims, and finals. Some systems apply a bit of pressure upon teachers to meet an arbitrary deadline to have taught a certain set of standards. Others use it to monitor growth of understanding.

Whatever pressures applied within your system, I’m sure you could use some great review activities. This post provides a kinesthetic review requiring students to take ownership of their claims. In the Human Bingo Review Activity, Eric Biederbeck explains how students complete a bingo board by having classmates and the teacher sign off indicating they know the answers to given problems. In order for anyone to win bingo, everyone who signed the problems in the row identified must prove they actually know the correct answer. Perfect for those middle schoolers who like to try and beat the system.

Another activity which is great for the class that is talkative and needs movement for engagement is discussed in this post. With this adaptable matching game, students solve multiple problems and they must find someone in the class who has the same answer as them.

If these activities do not fit your teaching style, take a moment to watch the GMD professional learning session as outlined in this post. “Review Activities That Don’t Suck” is worth the time of preparing your students for midterms and for finals.

Written by Jenise Sexton (@MrsJeniseSexton)

There’s Got To Be An Easier Way!

Julie Reulbach has a great lesson for introducing logarithms, but her blog post is worth reading regardless of what level of math you teach. Nestled in this simple blog post is a vital pedagogical idea, which is that students need to need a tool before you introduce them to it.

Julie asks her students to determine how many hours it will take for their whole school to be infested with zombies if the number of zombies triples every hour. Of course, the student body isn’t a perfect power of three, so the students are stuck guessing and checking as they get infinitesimally close to the correct number of hours. At one point, one of her students even shouts “There’s got to be an easier way!” as if he is a frustrated housewife in the black-and-white segment of an infomercial. By the time she introduces logarithms, students are primed to understand and value their purpose.

Check out her post, and all her other great lessons, at her blog .

Written by Kent Haines (@MrAKHaines)

Once Upon a Timeline…

Coding, explaining, storytelling, and my continued fascination with the Desmos Activity Builder occupied my mind during the last couple of weeks. Andy Schwen (@mrschwen) gets his students to write code in order to deepen their understanding of math concepts, not unlike the reason I get my own students to create their own geogebras and desmos’s. His post about that is from May, but for some reason, I only saw it this week. This week, Kalid Azad published another gem of a post at his Betterexplained website, this time about making sense of trig identities. Admittedly, it involves math that my students are not familiar with, complex numbers, but it’s still a beautiful visual and verbal work of art. I found another post about the Desmos Activity Builder, this one from Cathy Yenca (@mathycathy). And the storytelling? Well, in my last newsletter contribution, I started a list of blogposts about the activity builder. I wanted to share ideas and reflections on best practices. Since then I decided to keep adding to that list chronologically, because that way I get to watch how the tool and the community are transforming each other symbiotically. I’m keeping that list on this page if you’re interested, or if you’d like to add to it, just tweet me at @a_mcsquared.

Written by Audrey McLaren (@a_mcsquared)

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November 3, 2015

Candy Fun, MTBoS Love, and a Building Community

Edited By Carl Oliver @carloliwitter

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This week, join Michael Pershan to dive into the topic Be Your Own Professional Development:

How do we become better at teaching math? Conventional answers point to quality training and departmental collaboration, but not all teachers have access to these opportunities. What can be done to improve practice on our own initiative? In this session I’ll share stories and thoughts on what can break the cycle of same-old teaching.

Click here to join the conference or rsvp your spot ahead of time!

Last week, Amy Lucenta and Grace Kelemanik presented the session On-Ramps to Mathematical Thinking for Students with Learning Disabilities Through the Standards for Mathematical Practice.

Check out the recording here.

Things to Check Out

#tmwyk, Halloween Edition

I will be writing a blog post soon about why I think Counting Collections is one of the best mathematical instructional routines there is, but for now we can just enjoy math teachers leveraging a holiday that encourages their own kids to engage with math in order to eat candy, lots of candy! Check out more Halloween math fun on the #tmwyk hashtag.

Screen Shot 2015-11-01 at 1.56.09 AM.png Screen Shot 2015-11-01 at 1.59.33 AM.png

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written by Andrew Gael (@bkdidact)

MTBoS Love

Elementary teacher Jamie Duncan says the following about teaching math these days, “It’s what I look forward to most and I have a hard time not doing math all day.”

Jamie didn’t always feel so ecstatic about teaching math. At one point, she classified math as “something to get through.”

Do you know what helped ignite this passion for math? You and the rest of the #MTBoS.

Take three minutes to read her post and check out all the great things her students are doing in math with measurement and more! Another #MTBoS success story!

written by Andrew Stadel (@mr_stadel)

If you’ve not had a chance to check out Desmos’ Activity Builder, now is the time to give it a look. Don’t quite have the time to make your own during the busy school year? Then check out the curation efforts of the Desmos team highlighted in this recent post on some transformation activities. Transformations were one of my favorite things to play with in class so I can’t wait to dive into all of these!

written by Ashli Black (@mythagon)

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October 27, 2015

Fall is learning season for teachers!

Edited By Carl Oliver @carloliwitter

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Last week, NCTM President-Elect Matt Larson(!) presented An Update on Initiatives from the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. This is an exciting time for NCTM and to be a member of NCTM! The Council is taking on a number of new initiatives to enhance its support of quality teaching and learning. This session will provide a brief overview of these initiatives and discuss ways you can become involved in NCTM.

The recording will be posted here.

This week, Amy Lucenta and Grace Kelemanik present:
On-Ramps to Mathematical Thinking for Students with Learning Disabilities Through the Standards for Mathematical Practice.
The standards for mathematical practice describe avenues of thinking that seem daunting for all students, particularly students with learning disabilities. However, as it turns out, the SMPs actually offer access and opportunity to students with learning disabilities. Join us to explore the avenues of thinking and learn strategies to develop them in all students.

Great Blogging Action

It’s Political

I sort of fell down on the job this cycle, and am scrambling for my contribution to the newsletter. I went to my WordPress reader; even though I receive many of these posts by email, I hoped to find a recurrent and relevant theme to guide my blog-reading recommendation. I was not disappointed – the MTBoS is truly the gift that keeps on giving. Several posts addressing educational issues and policy caught my eye.

The first post that caught my eye, and one you should definitely read is Matt Vaudrey’s Taxes and Nobility in Education. Matt addresses the pro-con Teachers Pay Teachers debate, and carefully considers both sides, noting that Teachers Pay Teachers vendors are hard-working and creative people, such as yourselves, dear readers. What side does the incomparable Mr. Vaudrey land on? Go read.

I recently began following the blog Saving School Math by Howard Phillips, and he linked to a September article in The Atlantic, entitled The Coddling of the American Mind. This lengthy and provocative article analyzes – in depth, as the The Atlantic usually does – the deleterious effect of ultra-sensitivity to microaggressions may be having on American college campuses. I gave this article a quick read first time through, and it raised many questions in my own mind, such as how this might be playing out in my own school and classroom, and why, if we are becoming so sensitive and trying to create uber safe spaces, is gun violence in schools horrifyingly on the rise. I’m sure you will have questions of your own; this article provides A LOT to think about.

If you are looking for more big classroom issues to think about, try Picture Yourself as a Stereotypical Male over at the MIT Admissions website (this was another hyperlink from Howard Phillips’s blog), or a discussion about introducing race into classroom conversations over atCrawling Out of the Classroom. This last blog is not a math teacher’s blog, but the thoughtful exploration of how a teacher overcomes her own fear of confronting the issue with her students may resonate for you on some levels; it did for me.

The last post I want to mention is not specifically issue-oriented, but relevant, I think – Mathy McMatherson has been writing about the goings-on in his classroom this year, with a focus on his accommodations for ELL students, and their interesting results. Daniel Schneider (no, his real name is not Mathy) has a great opportunity this year to completely tailor his instruction to the needs of these students, and all of us who teach English Language Learners can benefit from his generosity and insight.

Cheers – Wendy Menard @wmukluk

_____________________

Creating a “twitter” Storm in your Classroom
I love what twitter, specifically MTBoS, has done for my teaching practice. Everyone in my department has heard me countless of times talk about it. Each week my lessons and teaching has been inspired by someone within the MTBoS or larger twitter community. I’ve considered having students getting involved, but since I work with students under 13, having them sign up is not an option. I’ve thought up creating a class account, but I have struggled to work out the logistics that doesn’t involve students posting post-its on my mailbox which I then have to type up. Annie Forest (@mrsforest)shares how she set up a class account which requires setting up a google form! Why didn’t I ever think of that! This seems like a great way to have students reflect on the class in addition to being a great way to engage students in order to make them invested. Annie suggests in order for this to be authentic its important to share tweets that show that math is a struggle for some students or that there are some students who don’t like it. Make sure to check out her blog to start your own twitter storm in your classroom!

Hot on Twitter: Fall Conference Season!!!

‏@mjfenton

Frightening and powerful suggestion from @SuMACzanne (via @MFAnnie) to reflect on our questioning. #NCTMregionals

Last weekend the Atlantic City NCTM regional, and the Northwest Math Conference marked one of a number of interesting conferences for math educators. Go check out the hashtag #nwmc15 to learn about what happened with last weekend at the NWMC, and look out for upcoming NCTM regionals in Minneapolis (11/11-13) and Nashville (11/18-20) who should be using the same hashtag as Atlantic City, #nctmregionals. Most importantly, if you’re going to these or any other event offering opportunities for growth and great conversation, please put it on twitter, on your blog or where ever you can share your learning with others.

‏@mr_stadel

Hey #nwmc15, the resources from my sessions. http://estimation180.com/nwmc15 Solving Eq’s with a number line coming soon!

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October 20, 2015

Coming to you live from Global Math Department…it’s NCTM!

Coming to you live from Global Math Department…it's NCTM!

Edited By Brian Bushart @bstockus

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Online Professional Development Sessions

This is an exciting time for NCTM and to be a member of NCTM! The Council is taking on a number of new initiatives to enhance its support of quality teaching and learning. This session will provide a brief overview of these initiatives and discuss ways you can become involved in NCTM.

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

Last week at Global Math Matt Baker presented on Socratic Seminars in the Math Classroom.

Click here to watch the recording.

If You Build It, The Math Will Come

Moving Forward with Desmos Activity Builder

It’s about three months now since the launch, at Twitter Math Camp, of the wonderful Desmos Activity Builder (which I will hereafter call DAB). I’ve been using it, while keenly watching for tweets or blog posts from others who are using it. I’m at the point where I need to read about things like: tips for making activities, how things actually played out in class, best during-class practices, following up etc., etc. I guess I should blog about that myself, but in the meantime, here are a few posts by people who already have. (Click the author’s name to be taken to their respective post.)

Colleen Young (@ColleenYoung) detailed the basics of using the DAB to create and deploy activities:

Julie Reulbach (@jreulbach) described how her linear systems activity worked in class, specifically how it allowed for different levels of review amongst her students:

Mary Bourassa (@MaryBourassa) shared her sequence of quadratic activities, which I know I’m going to model my Absolute Value lab after (especially the pretty tables!)

Meg Craig (@mathymeg07) showed us her and Sheri Walker’s (@sheriwalker72) transformations activity, plus some fabulous time-saver work-arounds until The Truly Awesome Desmos Team creates a copy-slide feature:

Kate Nowak (@k8nowak) cranked things up a notch by adding a teacher-notes component to her activity (hmmm another item on the to-do list of the The Truly Awesome Desmos Team?):

Lisa Winer (@lisaq314) talksedabout using DAB as a formative assessment tool:

Shelley Carranza (@stcarranza) reflected and made excellent suggestions after experiencing the DAB in several teachers’ classes:

As usual, the #mtbos, which includes The Truly Awesome Desmos Team, does not disappoint. It keeps us all moving forward together.

Written by Audrey McLaren (@a_mcsquared)

The Power of Patterns

When I was in grade school, the aspect of algebra I hated most was algebraic sequences. I never understood how to determine the next step within the pattern and really got confused when I needed to identify the rule. So when I see blog posts or presentations in regards to visual and algebraic patterns, I am intrigued by how they may help me improve my understanding.

Had my teachers used visual patterns every week in the way @PumphreysMath discussed in his most recent post, I’m sure I would not feel so intimidated by such patterns. In “Why you should use VisualPatterns.org, every week” Pumphrey shares how he guides students’ thinking with a self-made cheat sheet. He has found there are added benefits of using visualpatterns.org such as the connections students are able to make to other concepts such as solving equations, factoring and finding slope.

Written by Jenise Sexton (@MrsJeniseSexton)

Do You Super Group?

Dylan Kane at Five Twelve Thirteen has a nice post about visible random grouping. He shares his method for quickly assigning students to random groups using a program called Super Grouper. In the comments, Lisa Winer links to her own post about the topic, where the lists the many researched benefits of visible random grouping. Namely:

Students become more agreeable to work in any group they are placed in
There is an elimination of social barriers
Mobility of knowledge between students increases
Reliance on the teacher for answers decreases
Engagement on classroom tasks increase
Students become more enthusiastic about math class

She also links to her own preferred tool, Flippity.

Written by Kent Haines (@MrAKHaines)

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October 13, 2015

This week at the Global Math Department

Edited By Ashli Black @mythagon

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Online Professional Development Sessions

Tonight Matt Baker presents on Socratic seminars. The session will focus on introducing the idea of Socratic Seminars in the math class through examples that his school has used in the past and review structures and norms that have been successful at his school across disciplines. There will also be discussion of some of the challenges in transferring this structure from a humanities course to a math course.

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

Last week at Global Math Nancy Butler Wolf presented on Strategies for Success: Bringing Mathematical Modeling into Your Classroom.

Click here to watch the recording.

Great Blogging Action

What is #SwDMathChat?

You may be asking what does this hashtag stand for, well I have answers for you!

It stands for Students with Disabilities Math Chat. It is the twitter chat for teachers, parents, and advocates for students with disabilities. Everyone is welcome, even if you are not a “special ed teacher.” The next #SwDMathChat will be October 22nd at 9pm Eastern.

The next question you may be asking is, “Didn’t we already have a special ed math chat called something like spedmath?” Again, I am here with answers!

Yes, last year the twitter math chat for special education was called #spedmath, but as advocates for students with disabilities using this negative nomenclature was not the vibe we wanted to set, especially in the disability rights movement. So in order to align with the accepted vocabulary of the disability rights movement, we have moved to the more person or identity first hashtag, #SwDMathChat.

Here is a handy cheat sheet for keeping your own terminology more person or identity first!

written by Andrew Gael, @bkdidact

This is Hard

This “helping students think” can be hard. If you have ever encouraged your students think without telling them how to think and what to think, then you can easily relate with Cathy Yenca’s post You Don’t Teach.

Cathy has a growth mindset and is optimistic that her students will eventually understand why she’s building capacity in them. Read her post and get even more support from Kyle Pearce.

written by andrew stadel, @mr_stadel

The Myth of the Super Teacher

In 2012 at the University of Pennsylvania the Education Writers Association held a special session on Tomorrow’s Teacher: Paths to Prestige and Effectiveness. All of the talks are posted up on Vimeo and are in the 10-15 minutes range. May I suggest starting with Deborah Loewenberg Ball’s talk, Great Teachers Aren’t Born, They’re Taught?

written by ashli black, @mythagon

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October 6, 2015

Modeling, Number Talks, and more

Edited By Carl Oliver @carloliwitter

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Online Professional Development Sessions

Last week, Bob Janes presented Mathematics and Music. There are a surprising number of strong connections between mathematics and music highlighted by Bob which can be adapted to fit classrooms from middle school through secondary education.

Check out the recording here.

This week (Tuesday, September 15, 9 PM EDT) join Nancy Butler Wolf for Strategies for Success: Bringing Mathematical Modeling into Your Classroom. This session will address questions such as:

What is Modeling?
How does modeling differ from traditional word problems?
Common questions and concerns from teachers about incorporating modeling?
How to find and create great modeling tasks?
What are the benefits of modeling?

Join us here to reserve your seat and attend the session.

Great Blogging Action

Last week Kristin Gray shared a simple idea that redefines the term bell-to-bell instruction. Many of us agree that there’s not enough time in the day “to get it all done” however Kristin and group of teachers at her school introduced “Chat-n-Chew”. The idea is simple, put 15 ideas together in a looping ppt, with a 30 second transition between slides, and let it play over lunch.
“It was so fun to walk around and see students pointing at the screen and offering what they thought the answer would be and explaining why!” What’s great about this idea is that it can be implemented in every school and not just for math.

Although it’s too late to officially sign up now, Kristin is also hosting a Twitter Book Study for the book Making Number Talks Matter. The conversation will be trending under #mNTmTCH. Feel free to crash the party and add your thoughts. More on this below…

Written by @gfletchy (Graham Fletcher)

_____________________

Hot on Twitter:

‏@davidwees

Seen on the chalkboard of a classroom I visited this week. #mtbos

Today marks the second day of the Making Number Talks Matter book study. This initiative has been planned and spearheaded by Kristin Gray (@mathminds) and has interested participants from around the world. Making Number Talks Matter, the book, by Cathy Humphreys and Ruth Parker, focuses on the important practice of number talks which are is useful across all educational levels. To participate in this book study, visit the descriptional google doc or follow along with the conversation on twitter using the hashtag #mNTmTch. The conversation also extends to facebook and the teaching channel. Here was monday’s first prompt:

@mathminds is also interested in improving your NCTM conference experience: If you want to fill out a quick google survey about your experience with NCTM annual and regional conferences click here.

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