Should we be laughing?

When I saw this video on the national morning news, my first inclination was to laugh.  Sure it's funny, there is a woman who clearly doesn't understand the fact that she was given a trick math question. But the real question is should we be laughing at her?  If this was in a classroom environment, this would create a horrible situation.  It would make the student who didn't understand feel embarrassed and ashamed.  We need to make sure that things like this don't happen, and if it does, the attention needs to be taken off the student.  If the classroom culture has been created to have a comfortable environment, then this may not happen.

I had two more thoughts while watching this video.  The first one was that I need to become a math teacher...fast.  People shouldn't be making these sorts of mistakes once they leave high school.  I want to change that, and show how math can be useful like figuring out how long it will take to drive somewhere if you are going a certain miles per hour.  The other thought was that the husband was incredibly mean, and that I would never put a tape of a loved one doing something foolish on youtube.  

First day of Clinical Practice

I am so excited that I am back in the classroom full time, it just feels so right.  I love the classes that I am teaching (Math Analysis and Geometry) and the kids are great.  I am beginning to feel more and more comfortable in front of the students, and I am starting to set my expectations for them.  The only thing that I can't stop thinking about it how I can make the students' learning experience better, what can I do to improve the procedures or they way things are taught to make information "stick".  My strategy is to just work with the students as to how the teachers have all this time, and gradually bring in different things in the class so I won't throw anyone off.  Right now, the biggest thing that I need to figure out is how to get kids awake quickly in the morning for first period, I know the students are interested in the material, they just can't seem to wake up.  Any suggestions are welcome!

#edchat: Social Media

So I just finished up participating in #edchat, and what an experience.  There was a lot going on and a lot of topics being thrown out.  I found it distracting when people kept retweeting the same comments over and over. I also think it was distracting because there are just too many people on there with so many strong opinions.  It was good to see the pros of allowing social networks in schools, but no one really talked about the potential issues it can cause, and how much you are able to allow and monitor it.  I think that social media has a time and place and can be a good thing in classes, but not all the time and not for every project.  It should be an allowed resource for interest, but definitely in moderation.

Technology in Math Classes

Today, my program went to visit some high schools in Oceanside to observe the use of ipads in the classroom.  Before going I was expecting something with a little chaos.  If a student is given an ipad, aren't they going to want to play games and download apps?  Actually no.  This class knew the drill and understood their purpose in the classroom.  Each student has a task to do and uses the proper resources of the calculator and the use of evernote to take notes and capture pictures and compile their thoughts all in one place. 

The teacher also effectively used moodle to generate tests and practice tests so each student gets a different possible problem in a different way so students have many opportunities to practice on their ipads.  One good thing about this is that some kids just think it is the coolest thing that they are able to do school work on an ipad which creates interest for them to want to do it.  Even if it was the same work as if the ipads are there, it is a new and interesting medium that makes it a little fun.

It also promoted an environment for student to talk to each other especially while working on practice tests since each person had a slightly different problem.  Students couldn't simply give each other the answer but had to explain how they got the answer.

Overall it seems like fun, but a lot of work from the teacher.  I would definitely be interested in incorporating something like this into my own classroom, if given the opportunity. 

Job Fair

This weekend I went to my first official teacher job fair, which was concentrated towards the Catholic Schools in the area. Overall, it felt like Disneyland, but not in the fun way. Mostly because I think I waited longer in line than actually talking to prospective principals and administrators. There were so many people and so few jobs, which made it a little discouraging, especially since there were only 4 High Schools at the fair (as opposed to about 32 elementary schools). Each of the High Schools only had between 1 and 4 jobs open, which means it is competitive. Although I am not 100% about what type of school I want to be working at (private, public, charter or alternative) I am open to anything that will give me experience with teaching. This fair did teach me about how I should act, dress, and what to expect. I realized that I should be confident about my experiences in teaching so far because I do have what potential employers are looking for even though I am fresh out of college. Now I just have to buckle down and get those job applications in, because if there are openings, I am going to do my best at showing that I have what it takes.

an attempt at #mathchat

So this was a failed attempt. As directed, I logged on to twitter at 5pm Pacific to check out what everyone had to say on #mathchat. Well I had a few issues. First of all , right at 5 my computer needed a reboot since it was acting a little funny, so I figured I had enough time to reboot and get back to the chat. Then the doorbell rings. It's my brother coming over since I was supposed to babysit my 6 month old nephew. So he was hungry, which means that I have to get him some food. That battle turned into a crying fit. Well to make a long story short, I didn't get to go back to #mathchat until 6:30 when everything is all over. I guess there is always Monday?

Tau Day or Pi Day?

I have just be exposed to the new revolution of Tau. Apparently people believe that Pi is way to confusing when it comes to the unit circle since a whole circle represents 2pi. So Michael Hartl decided to change this and use the Greek letter Tau to represent half of Pi, so one turn around the unit circle is now 1 Tau. I think this would be a fun video to show my students, especially since one of my classes is learning the unit circle, to show them a new perspective on the subject. Even though this new Tau notation is not at all accepted on standardized tests or in college classes, it is an interesting topic to bring up and shows that math can be creative and logical at the same time.

Disrupting Class

After Reading the book: Disrupting Class: How Disruptive Innovation Will Change the Way the World Learns By Clayton M. Christensen, I thought about the way that technology is embedded into schools.  I know  that my own learning experience with technology reflects Christensen's description, where all my teachers used in high school was presenting with powerpoint, or sending out emails and the use of internet for word processing and research.  With this, I am definitely keeping in mind ways to use more technology in class, especially with math.
Response To the Reading

What if we took away Grades?

This is something that I have wondered a lot about, especially from my own education, that I was all about getting the best grade that I could. This pressure also came from my family to get as many points as possible, and that's how I was able to measure learning for myself. It wasn't until I got to College that I realized how much I learned after I got over the fact that there was no way that I could get straight A's while taking upper division mathematical theory type classes. This is when I concentrated on really learning and understanding, and I got so much more out of classes this way. From this video, I agree with Dan Pink in the sense that so many kids think it is all about the grades and what is not learned. I think we need to begin adjusting our grading system to where we are grading upon understanding rather than completion.

For the Love of Math!

I had so much fun this week at my school site. I have been able to teach more and more parts of class. Today, I was able to teach my students about the sine and cosine graphs. I was able to bring in an example of connecting it a model that I had seen in a conference that discussed the feelings of a girl and a boy in a dating relationship. The more that a girl likes a boy, the more he doesn't like her, and the less that she likes him, the more that he likes her. So it ends up going along a sin/cos curve. While I shared this with students I actually got some to laugh, which feels really good since math doesn’t have to be serious. I also helped teach the geometry class that I am helping with since there was a substitute, so I taught them about why the interior angles of a triangle is 180 degrees. This proof is an old style proof that was generated in ancient Greece, and I think that teaching some of these older ideas are good to teach the reasons why things happen and where they came from. At the end of the day, I found that if you are passionate and love the subject that you teach, the students are willing to listen and understand it better. They see your enthusiasm and that you care about it, so maybe they should too.