The Essay Looms

It is now that I have to create my essay for the Telecommunications lesson plan.  It always takes me a while before I can get the gears rolling on a cool idea that will make my lesson jump out at the kids.  Once the idea starts to flow, I'll be fine.  As it is for now, I'm letting it fester in my head and hopefully it will be ready to jump out onto paper tomorrow,...................since there is no time to waste.

I'm using an awesome simulation program for the lesson, but it already has an authentic problem attached to it.  I find that this lesson plan is a perfect opportunity to implement this particular simulation into my class, but it is really hard to think of an authentic problem on top of an authentic problem.

It is a Crash Scene Investigation site that walks through how to solve a problem if one were an investigator.  I think that it is going to have to be on the lines of training for a crash scene.  Part of my outcome is that an actual investigator is going to come in and speak with them.  Maybe I will spruce it up a bit and have the investigator actually walk through an actual accident.  She/He could answer questions only thought of by the students that would enable them to determine who is at fault, what caused the accident, and what illegalities, if any, were present?  If they were good trainees, then they would be able to follow all of the math and science behind what the presenter is saying.

Wow, this blog thing definitely helps straighten out some thoughts.  Cool.  Thanks blog. :0)

Your biggest fan.
Jason.

Renewed Approach

So as it was, my students weren't going to be able handle project based learning.  With attendance being the main issue, trying to have groups that are consistent is challenging.  I have restructured the way I've approached my lessons.

Over the past quarter, I noticed that the students want to be in charge of their learning.  If I were to go up to the board and try something traditional, you would see heads go down within a minute.  Not that I'm that boring, but that's what probably landed them in my school in the first place.  These students want to be doing something at all times.  Note taking from my lectures is not "doing something" apparently.  I think there is something beneficial to group discussion and I'll come back to that in a moment.

I have put my students on a computer based learning program.  Attached to all the lessons are quizzes to show some sort of mastery.  The kids get the instant feedback that they seek and are constantly doing something.  This is where it gets pretty cool.  I have given them a pace at which they need to follow and complete X amount of lessons in a certain amount of time.  I have also associated GAMES with about 1/2 of the lessons in which they to complete a level in which I have established.  I am now able to walk around the classroom and sit with students and give them one on one tutoring.  If they show they have not mastered the lesson after taking the online quiz, I review with them how to do the particular problems, and then have associated worksheets that they are to complete before they get credit for that lesson.

The best part about this is that the students are now working at their own pace.  Although I have to put a certain pace to the class, (because of SOL's), it allows them to concentrate on their weaknesses and fly through their strengths.

My goals are these:

• Have students who show mastery help out others that may struggle in small groups
• Use the beginning of class to have the students work out in groups a real - life problem that either teaches them something new or uses some of their old skills.  This will be about 15 minutes at the beginning.  Then discuss some of the techniques they could have used from the things they learned.
• Have students BLOG about their new learnings after each section that they complete.
• Connect concepts to the real world
• Review challenges etc.....
• Create projects (like the things we are learning in class) that will bring the majority of the concepts together.

My Head Hurts

JASON THINKING

So, I'm sitting here trying to think of a webquest...................................and sitting....................................and sitting..................................you get the point.  I've never designed one before, but I've used them.  I've also seen a ton of webquests out there for graphing lines for algebra and so I knew I didn't want to do that.  In fact, most people attack that area of the subject when creating online tools.  It's good because that is an important part of the curriculum, but the focus of these lines usually is on the same thing, slope and y intercept.  Whatever, I'm not going to do that anyway.  Well, here I am thinking of something a bit more ambitious.  Unfortunately, this is where my brain always takes me.  I don't want to reinvent the wheel, I always seem to want to invent the wheel.

I'm now thinking of the area of algebra that I want to learn more about, but also want the students to understand.  The area of quadratics.  In taking a test this week on linear systems, I used a webquest that focus on buying a car that would be most efficient.  I had one of the students say to me, "I didn't know this is what these things were for".  It dawned on me that we hadn't covered the word problems or real world scenarios in that particular class because of time restraints.  We only went through process.  I figured at that moment, I would make sure that I apply the concept of real world at the beginning.  It's really not hard to understand the mathematics and what it means, it is hard to actually recreate the algebra behind all of the data collection and graphs.

AND NOW my quest begins.  A quadratic problem that would give the students a good idea of what they are doing at the beginning of me actually having them learn the processes.

Thus far, my first problem was to take all of the ideas in my head and focus on something that they would find interesting.  After looking at some of the word problems that others had posted I've settled on traffic accidents.  Students will look at different demographic areas such as age vs. AA members, texting vs. age, cell phone calls vs. age, age vs. accidents.  I think that I will have appropriate links for them to find the information, but I haven't found anything great, but I've found the information.  Now, I'm stuck on the Introduction.  Do I go with a game show theme or do I go with helping out a family member letter?  UGH!!!!! Ultimately, I would like them to be able to write a letter to someone that actually could use this information to help apply laws.  If my students were able to make a change, that would be pretty cool.  Since my little part in class was to look at the collaboration, I thought this was a great idea.  So I have definitely included that as part of the quest.

The hardest part of this is in making sure that if I actually want to use this, I've found myself doing a lot of research on quality websites.  Again, I've found the information, but I would like for them to actually have to use some sort of database or something to have to search for it, not really just read an article and collect the info out of it.

And so it is, my head hurts.

My Dilemma

Well, grades came out, and as arbitrary as they are, they were not good .  I had one on one discussions with all of my students and 90% of them felt that their grade was accurate based on their efforts and the amount of work that they completed.  This leads me to my dilemma.

In my school, the biggest obstacle that we are up against is truancy.  If I had to guess, about half of the students have a P.O. (parole officer) and are being monitored by the court system.  Another good portion of students attend, but are unmotivated, and a small percentage needed a different environment to thrive.  With that said, we went through the quarter, where I put together great lessons that incorporated multiple disciplines and sometimes, multiple topics within the subject of Algebra.  The students were 100% engaged.  Learning through collaboration and creativity.  The thing is, these lessons were great!!...............for the few that showed up regularly.  It was the majority of students who would be absent for 2 or 3 days in a row or absent 1 day here the next ( and then trying to figure out what the hell was going on), and gone the next day.  The thought provoking lessons that were put together, a lot of the time, were a bust because the students would not show some or all of the time allotted.  Before they knew it, we were on to the next topic in class, and my part time students were barely getting off their feet on the previous topics.

This causes me to really doubt the approach of project based learning for my type of student.  I've always wanted to do it and finally, this year, I did.  Now, I'm highly disappointed with the results.  Some students have argued that they are not used to learning this way and they are too conditioned to learn a new way.  Is that true?  Should I not try to give them a glimpse of the future?  I can definitely say that I am one of few in our school that approaches learning through authentic problems.  Unfortunately, swimming against the current is exhausting in such a tough subject.  It's not that the support is not at the school, it just wears you down having to explain to the students, all of the time, why they need these skills when there is next to none preaching these same principles with me.  Again, not because they don't agree, but only because this is not how they practice their subject, so most of this is foreign to the kids.

So, where am I now?  I have gone back into my shell and am using technology to simply redistribute information through technology rather than use it to educate students on how to seek their own knowledge.  They are having more success because all of the lessons are in individual sections (because it's math) and the students can easily see what topic they have missed when they don't come to school, but it's simply not realistic to how they will work outside of school.

NOOOOWWWWW back to the drawing board.  They are learning on a self paced program which I am able to get around the room and individually help them.  They are collaborating on an ongoing notes document in Google Docs for those that miss class.  They are learning through games.  They are getting practice from these things and worksheets, but nothing authentic.  They have the means to communicate with the class or myself if they are out.  They can always see what assignments they have turned in and not turned in and retrieve any documents they may need.  So maybe, I will only have the authenticity be thrown in on a formal assessment.  It may be too demanding for this population to be able to handle projects that take 4 or 5 days to complete?????  I truly believe that the authentic approach is the way to go.  I haven't been asked once this year, "when are we ever going to use this"?  Something must be going right in that sense.  Now it is just time to find a balance.

Suggestions appreciated. :0)

BACK TO THE OLD WITH A SPLASH OF NEW

This week I had both a good lesson and bad lesson, both dealing with the same topic.  This is progress for me, because as soon as I began diving into the lesson the first time, I knew it was a great idea, just poorly planned in terms of time management.  The topic was line of best fit.  In case you don't know, you must look at a trend of any data given, and predict what it is going to happen in the future.  Sounds simple, especially if a graph is in front of you.  But in order to predict with a precision, you should create a formula.  Hence, the algebra.

Well, that's what we did.  But we did it using my salary and my spending based on what my paycheck and bank account said.  The students were definitely in to seeing my spending trends and the lesson was going to be AWESOME!!  Until, I tried to break it down over 31 days for the month and we had to do all of the calculations of where my account stood each day........................boring!!  It was way too slow for me, and I even praised the kids for pushing through it with me.  In the end, we did the lesson, but I had to seriously tweak it before I taught the next class this lesson.  So I dove back to the old Apple stock!!  This is the same lesson except I use points from some company that the kids like.  We graphed points using this data.  Very cool and leads to a lot of good topic discussions.  This basically got the same point across that my other lesson did, in better than half of the time. We find out the function of the data in a linear form and then I have them predict how much the stock would be worth in "X" amount of days using their formula.
I finalized the assignment by having them go and find data on their own.  NFL statistics, crime statistics, stocks............etc., something that they were interested in.  They then were able to mimic the lesson taught.  I had them do everything by hand.  Once I checked their work, they graphed the same thing using a computer program, posted it to their blog along with the function that they were able to find, and then I asked each individual a unique question that they had to answer based on their data and graph.  Here is one of my students postings.

Good points to the lesson:

• Discussion
• Engagement
• Deep understanding of the topic at hand

Bad points to the lesson:

• I'm at the board throwing out probing questions
• I'm writing everything I want them to write down.

I think in the future I'm going to add some sort of tweak to it so that they produce a quick summary and answer a question or give them some sort of goal.  My database lesson is going to be working off the line of best fit.  It is one of my favorite lessons to teach because it summarizes why we use graphs and how we can predict with some sort of accuracy.

Tsunami

So this week I took the students through the events of Sri Lanka in 2004. We watched a few clips of the horror and they asked tons of questions. My students were all around the age 0f 9 or 10 at this time, but they remembered it. We discussed the devastation and what a tsunami was and how they are created.

I then used Google Earth to show them where the earthquake had taken place. Using a "ruler" tool, I was able to connect a line from the coastline of Sri Lanka to the epicenter and measure the distance. I made up another spot of where the wave was after "X" amount of seconds and some times of when this was taking place. I explained to the kids that they are the Homeland Security of the nation of Sri Lanka, and they have to figure out how long the had before the wave hits the coastline. They must evacuate the coastline by a certain time after figuring out the speed of the wave.

After giving them some time, I went ahead and showed them how I would've solved it. A lot of them were very close in solving the problem. They used the tools given to them by previous teachers to solve the problem. I then proceeded to give them some new tools in which we use in algebra formulas. Slope and the Point-Slope Formula in function form was my goal for them that day.

Granted, this kept the students attention and they were all 100% engaged in figuring it out. The entire time that I was giving the lesson, I was thinking, how can I have them do all of this? I think upon reflection, I would give them some coordinates to find on the earth and find the distances on their own. I would show them the tools to use on google earth and they would have to recreate that much. I would provide an XY table for those that I saw subtracting the distance for each second that went by. I also think that I would send them a video of how to create functions from real life problems to see if my brightest students were able to come up with something.

The finale of the day was to have them create their own real life problem given some numbers. I wanted to see if they were able to be creative even though the numbers were just given to them. I did this because we were getting pressed for time. I know in the future that I want them to look up a natural disaster and come up with their own scenario using real data.

School Rumors

Last night I went through our course watching Priscilla link learning to living and living to learning.  We did it through a mystery that she had set up in which we were to sift through data that the class had derived.  The mystery ended up having us play a bit of detective and solve a problem in which Priscilla made up.  As quick and busy as I feel right now, both in class and in my other duties of life, I'm never sure how much is going to stay in me.  The problem is, I want it all.

Knowing that we had class the previous night I was sitting at my desk getting ready to go through a pretty standard day.  Not because I wanted to, but just out of exhaustion.  I got out my favorite worksheets to work with.  They're my favorite because they have a riddle on them.  If you solve the problems, you can decipher the riddle.  So, I was, for whatever reason, reading the answer to the riddle of the worksheet that I was going to give them.  It said, "Did You Hear About...." with a bunch of blank lines on it.  Answers streamed down the sides with words and problems filled the middle of the page.  The answer was "the boy and the girl who went into the revolving door and started going together".  Instantly, I thought of rumors that are spread in our school.  Once that popped in my head, all hell broke loose.

I started thinking about what we've learned.  Come up with an end product for the students to hand in.  Have an entrance and exit strategy on an authentic question.  How can I incorporate software skills?  How can I make a real world problem from this????!!!!!  I quickly wrote a scenario of rumors being spread in the school.  I figured out that I would have the students recreate the same type of problem as I when we get finished.  That way I can assess them.  I figured I can introduce the lesson as a real problem in the school and used a software program that allowed me to have our Security Specialist read my scenario.  Listen to our security specialist.

I then went ahead and explained that our principal had confiscated the new coded words and also found a key on the ladies bathroom floor.  I handed them slips of papers with the same problems from the worksheet, except they were cut up.  I put the kids in groups to solve a few and put someone in charge to put them in order as groups completed them.  The kids totally bought into it!!!  They really wanted to find out what the rumor was.  They worked as hard as I've ever seen them.  After they solved it, I walked them through how it was created.  Discussed with them the technologies used (word processor, cell phone for podcast & pics, podcasting host site) and how I used them.  Then I let them loose in groups.  Again, they worked happily until the bell and some even came in during lunch to finish their projects.  These are my at risk kids.  Now that I've tasted the authentic problem thing and so have the kids, we both are going to crave more.

My Design Idea

Implementing some of the things that we are learning in class has been quite fun.  I actually do most of my lesson planning while driving in the car.  My project today was to come up with a fun way to implement solving proportions, using a technology, and try to follow the desing process.

ACTS

• So, my authentic problem was for the student to create a big giant or a little giant that was proportional to the people on this planet.  It's not real, but it the concept is there.
• The outcome is that the students have a drawing that their group creates.  On their drawing they are to label the dimensions that would help define how big their giant is.  (foot size, height.....)
• The thinking skills involved are that they need to find the best dimensions that would help describe the size of their giant.  Why did they choose those dimensions?  How did they come to their conclusions?
• I used a math engine called Wolfram Alpha. 

 SSCC

• In the SSCC face that the students are held accountable for they had to use the search engine to get the correct data.  They must type in what it is exactly that they are looking for.
• Once this occurs, the engine produces a massive amount of statistics based on the parameters given.  They need to sort through this data and figure out which is most suitable for their project.
• They are to create a drawing with dimensions that will help display their findings.
• Finally, the student communicates the dimensions of their data through mathematical equations that they've set up as a group.  Showing the work that they are using will in turn verify their results.

 

Live what you learn and learn what you live

This week we indulged ourselves into the principles and the ideas of the Sabertooth Curriculum.  The book had to do with how the education has evolved through the ever changing perils of human society.  What started as a basic idea of extending knowledge to the young so that they were better than the generations before, led to manipulation and greed.  It turns out that instead of education changing with the times, we actually do nothing to change it, we just add more to the curriculum and keep the old ideas.  Businesses and government have made up reasons of why we need the old information even if it is not pertinent to our skills and advances as a society.

For example.  In the book, they hold on to the teaching of Sabertooth scaring, horse clubbing, and fish grabbing because there is a historical, "magic" reason for us to know it.  Some say it is because it builds the other skills to be able to do the more advanced things, but truly we have no purpose for it.  So what does society do in the book?  They add bear trapping, fish netting, and horse roping to the curriculum.  It ends up that these courses are required in the highest of learning later on and if you were to question why, you were nearly killed.  People grew up where all of this knowledge was needed.  Because of entrepeunerialship and specialized industries that didn't need a ton of people to get the job done, many had no work and were unemployed.  This led to society just randomly moving around without purpose.  The book ended with an outside society getting ready to take over through war.  It simply came down to the idea that no one cared because they had no purpose for their education.

I know I see a lot of parallels with the system today.  All the way up to the top of the government.  "Let's get our education" everyone says.  No one says why.  You need this subject and that and you need all of them, but you'll know why later.   Some of the stuff you'll never use, but you'll figure that out when you have a purpose or a job.  A society without a purpose, but to "get smarter".

In class we focused on 6 different types of story lines for society.

• DECLINING (Sabertooth Curriculum Base)
• CIRCULAR 
• SPIRAL (which I thought was society in the book)
• PENDULAR (seems I am stuck in this with my teaching.  Do I teach the whole of the curriculum or do I dive deeper into the subject matter?  A question no one has the answer to.)
• PROGRESS
• CHALLENGE & RESPONSE (Norton Favorite)

We produced a rap that summarized the main ideas of the book.  This really helped us collaborate the idea of the book and synthesize what it was about without feeling like we were on the spot with a yes or no response.

Some favorites that I pulled from the discussion were:

1.  that the author (Pediwell), thought that the U.S. was in danger because people weren't educated enough to defend themselves nor did they care.
2. An educated person "knows what their community is doing & has the will and the energy to do it"
3. Live what you Learn & Learn what you Live
4. My favorite:  Don't TEACH................EDUCATE.

1. ACTS

• Authentic Problem (has to be a real idea)
• Clear Outcome
• Thinking Skills Needed (if you want them to compare, make sure they understand compare)
• Software Skills

1. SSCC

• Search - the correct info
• Sort - the info
• Create something
• Communicate about your info

Class concluded with us searching for information in a computer program.  We were read a story that helped engage us into the lesson.  Once our information was discovered, we wrote a letter back to the person who supposedly wrote us a letter inquiring some answers through our research.  This particular activity was fun because it involved multiple skills of research, analyzing what we were looking at, and then articulating our answers in the form of a letter rather than a formal summary.

Wednesday Night First Night Fever

On the very first of night of my very first master's class in the very first hour, I was faced with my biggest nemesis.............Names. I re-learned that I can't remember names right away and it is just my personal flaw.

Besides that stress, I was able to take in quite a bit from the introduction to the coursework that is going to be involved over the next 5 semesters. I quickly learned that this course is going to help me a lot within the classroom. We began by explaining the need for connecting the use of the tool of technology with the lesson that we have planned. Not just to enhance the lesson, but to have the students connect to the lesson with a sort of emotion rather than being told the facts. The term 'affordance' popped out a number of times and it wasn't a term I was familiar with. It basically was saying that I didn't have to use the latest and greatest technology. My goal should be to have my objective and goal for that lesson like usual. However, to approach the subject using the tool that was going to produce quality work with the time constraints of the day.
Another good re-learn for me that we had touched on during this session was the approaches we were currently using in our practice in the classroom. I personally used some of these tools, but had forgotten that they were actual tools. They included, chunking, pneumonics, rhythm, visualization, and repetition. It really helped to hear these words again for the fact of getting so lost into taking the content to new levels with each new generation of children that I tend to never take time to reflect on the roots of where these teaching tools came from.
All of these ideas, strategies, and tools are going to be perfect for enhancing my teaching. To know that we are not just working on technology, but that we are working on quality teaching practice makes me feel even better about the course work that lies ahead. I can't wait to take these things into the classroom and make them part of my teachings and passing some of my personal best practices on to other teachers.