Strategy 2- Math, middle grades

Title your post: Strategy 2- Math, middle grades 

Your Name: Mandy Jennings 

Name of Strategy: Scaffolding 

Source (Where did this come from?): Reading Room by Doug Buehl 

Link to the Strategy: http://www.weac.org/News/2005-06/sept05/readingroomoct05.htm

Give a thorough description of the strategy and how it will be implemented. This should be a summary of the strategy according to the original source: This strategy is a 3 step program in which teachers gradually turn over the responsibility for completing an activity to a student. In the first step, the teacher demonstrates how the task is to be done- teacher regulated activity. This is the step that any textbook reading, demonstrations, or handout would be presented. During the second step, the teacher gradually leads the student into doing the task by gradually withdrawing their help from the student- supported activity. In the third step, the teacher releases the student to complete the task on their own- student regulated activity. The general progression from a teacher’s standpoint is “I do, you watch”, “I do, you help”, “You do, I help”, “You do, I watch”. 

Explain what part of the standard course of study is addressed by this activity. This strategy could be used to address any part of the standard course of study. The idea behind this strategy is to help students learn a new skill. They would do this by adding new information to the existing information that they had. Each competency goal within the standard course of student requires that students acquire “new” or “more in-depth” knowledge from the previous year. Students could not possibly be expected to learn all new ideas in isolation from each other. That would be similar to learning a new language by simply studying vocabulary. It is much easier to learn by starting with the basics and then adding new information to what you have learned, incorporating the knowledge into your thought process rather than trying to memorize everything. Students who incorporate knowledge tend to retain it long after the students who memorized for the test have forgotten it.  

Explain why you think this strategy will work. How does the strategy help your students learn? This strategy will work because it will allow the teacher to spend more time in the “step” that the students need help with the most. A teacher may spend more time in the “I do, you help” phase with a student who is having trouble grasping a concept. As the student starts to learn what to do, the teacher could switch to the “you do, I help” stage where they can help the student when needed, but still allow the student to attempt to complete the task on their own. As the student gets more comfortable with the skill, the teacher can withdraw their support. Scaffolding will keep a student in their zone of proximal development most of the time; it will keep them where they are being challenged, but are not out of reach of the comfort of the knowledge that they already possess.

Strategy 1- Math, middle grades

Title your post: Strategy 1- Math, middle grades 

Your Name: Mandy Jennings

Name of Strategy: ABC Brainstorm 

Source (Where did this come from?): Reading Quest 

Link to the Strategy: http://www.readingquest.org/strat/abc.html

Give a thorough description of the strategy and how it will be implemented. This should be a summary of the strategy according to the original source: There are two variations of this strategy that can be used. In the first variation, students write each letter of the alphabet on a line as they would normally number a paper, leaving the rest of the line blank. They will then brainstorm any terms or phrases that may be associated with the subject that they are working on. With the second variation, students would use blocks of letters instead of having an idea for each letter. (ABC, DEF, GHI, etc.) This would cut down on the time needed to complete the activity while still allowing the students ample opportunity to brainstorm.

Explain what part of the standard course of study is addressed by this activity. “Competency goal …- The learner will understand…”, “Competency goal…- The learner will demonstrate…:. I know that this is somewhat of a broad description of what this activity addresses, but it is probably the best answer. Students are expected to understand and demonstrate all of the competency goals within their content area. A student who has truly grasped the information will be able to manipulate it to fit certain criteria. For example, a student who is asked to brainstorm terms associated with simple algebraic expressions should be able to think of terms involved in solving equations- identity, commutative property, associative property, distributive property, order of operations, etc. While they may not be able to think of something for every letter of the alphabet, it would leave a good starting place for class. A well prepared teacher will have already prepared a list before class of terms that they could use to prompt their class. In many cases, this would simply serve as a way to get students thinking about the lesson at hand. However, it could also serve as a sign to the teacher of how much information the students are internalizing. 

Explain why you think this strategy will work. How does the strategy help your students learn? This strategy will work because it will get students thinking about what they already know. It will also help them connect ideas together that may have previously been “filed” as separate ideas. A teacher could easily make a small competition out of this exercise- who can generate the most terms that are connected to the key term. In doing this, they may often be forced to have the student explain how they believe the terms are connecting, leading into a discussion of the terminology behind the math that they are learning. In many cases, it is easy to get students to replicate what the teacher is doing. It is often a little harder to get them to rationalize the steps behind the action or explain why something can be done. Having an strategy like this one could start the conversation on issues surrounding the physical actions that they are doing.

Materials- general response

First, let me start by saying that I hope all of you are as excited about this class as I am. No, I am not sucking up- just being honest. At first glance, I thought that this class was going to be a lot of work, and it has been. However, I have had a chance to look through websites that I would not normally have utilized. I am relatively proficient with technology, or so I thought, and can normally find something for about anything that I search for. The problem is that I have not always had the best places to start from. This class has not only provided resources to start from, but also required that I actually look at them.

            Continuing with this idea, I had several things in mind while looking through these websites. Many of them were easy to use, quick to return relevant responses, and contained ready to use material that could be presented in a classroom with relative ease. However, there were other sites that were not quite as helpful. I know that part of this stems from my own approach to looking for information. I do not have a lot of patience when it comes to looking for information. If I do not find something that interests me within the first few minutes of looking at a website, I am off to the next site. As many of you will agree, I simply do not have time to browse through a site that is not user friendly. I do not know, (some of you may be able to confirm this) but I imagine that teachers will react in the same way. Teachers are often pressed for time, spend long hours working outside of the workplace, spend hours with students and simply do not have the time or energy to spend hours looking for extra materials. Keeping that in mind, all of my posts were completed using websites that I found easy to use and informative. I browsed through many of the other sites, but either had trouble with them or just couldn’t find anything that held my attention.  Overall, I was pleased with (and bookmarked) several of the sites that I visited. I will be referring back to several of them when looking for lesson plans in the future.

Materials 5- Math, middle grades

Content Area Materials Overview Worksheet

Your name: Mandy Walker Jennings

Name of Site: The Futures Channel

Link to Resources: http://www.thefutureschannel.com/index.php

Source (Author–if available): Multiple

Identify the teaching topic of the materials–be specific. Identify the population of the students (grade, course): Middle grades Math- Algebra

Give a brief description of how the materials would be used: The material presented on this web page would be used to connect concepts that the students are learning to the real world. All students wonder as they traverse through school if they are ever going to use the knowledge that they are gaining in the real world. This website presents many scenarios in the real world in which the knowledge that students are gaining will be used. Most of these plans are published with a short video explaining the dilemma and worksheets to use to conduct the experiment. While some are more exciting than others (designing a roller coaster versus planning crop rotations), all are relevant to human life. At various points throughout the year, students would be asked to complete exercises that connect what they are currently studying to their real world experiences.

Identify other material that you could use with this material to augment instruction, especially for EC students: Since these experiments are basically ready-made for the classroom, I am not sure that I would add anything to them. However, I would first be selective in which experiments I used. After discovering the ability level of my students, including EC students, I would only select experiments that could be used as a scaffold in the classroom to support student learning. While it may connect to the real world, students are not going to learn from a video where they have not at least started to grasp the content. Second, I would keep in mind that students may be able to serve as a scaffold for each other. I would make sure that students are allowed to conduct these experiments in a group setting, allowing the EC students to depend on other students for help in ideas that they may not be sure of. In general, student would have to be monitored closely during these experiments to ensure that no student is having trouble.

Explain why you would use this material with your students. How will the material help your students learn the topic? The material presented on this site would help students in a variety of ways. Students can learn from a textbook, but there are only so many ways that a student can experience through a textbook. Textbooks encourage memorization and repetition; experiments encourage internalization. In these experiments, teachers can not only encourage internalization of ideas, but are also allowed to connect these experiences with real life situations that may present themselves to these students are some point in the future. A bitter medicine is a little easier to swallow if the benefits are known. The same is true with education. A difficult skill is often easier to learn if you know that you will have an opportunity to use the skill later on.

Materials 4- Math, middle grades

Content Area Materials Overview Worksheet

Your name: Mandy Walker Jennings

Name of Site: NCTM Illuminations

Link to Resources: http://illuminations.nctm.org/

Source (Author–if available): multiple

Identify the teaching topic of the materials–be specific. Identify the population of the students (grade, course): middle grades math- any subject

Give a brief description of how the materials would be used: I must say that I have used this website before and find it to be immensely useful. I was glad to see it on the list of recommended websites to browse. While this website would not be useful to any other content area, the website sponsored by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics is extremely useful to any math teacher. Most of the materials on this website are experiments. They have been rated for grade level, subject, and by standards. I especially think that this material could be useful for a new teacher. These experiments are designed for immediate use. They come with all necessary worksheets and extension activities. The also have the standards outlined at the bottom of each activity. As a teacher decides to use one of these activities, all they will have to do is match the standards at the bottom of the activity with the competency goals of the SCOS in order to justify its usage in the classroom. In a time where accountability is becoming a key factor, new teachers will be thankful for any help that they can get.

Identify other material that you could use with this material to augment instruction, especially for EC students: Experiments such as these would be a wonderful way to help EC students grasp difficult concepts. I found one example of an experiment on this website that would be the perfect example. There is a study called “Barbie Bungee” during which students chart how many rubber bands are necessary to keep Barbie from hitting her head on the floor when she bungee jumps. There is several extension activities listed for this study. One of these could be combined with an explanation for an abstract thought taught in the science classroom- gravity and Newton’s laws. Students could measure the effects of gravity on the doll by measuring how far the doll “rebounds” after the fall.  As students are taught, gravity increases the speed on an object as it approaches Earth, meaning that the Barbie will be traveling faster when she hits the ground if she is dropped from a higher ledge. Because the Barbie will be traveling faster, the rubber bands reaching their stretch limit will cause a stronger reaction, causing the Barbie to rebound higher than the Barbie dropped from a lower ledge. Middle grades classrooms are where students start to make the transition from learning concrete ideas to learning abstract ideas. Many students, not just EC students, have trouble with some of these abstract ideas. Having a way to work through them and being able to think about why certain reactions happen would help students to grasp these difficult concepts.

Explain why you would use this material with your students. How will the material help your students learn the topic? If I needed an idea to use for a math experiment, this website is the first place that I would look. In all of the times that I have been looking for experiments or lesson plans to use for a class activity, I have never failed to find something on this website that I could use. Students will excel in an environment where the are allowed to explore ideas and construct meaning for themselves. While they will still need guidance, these activities would be a chance for students to use their understanding of ideas as well as the knowledge possessed by their classmates in order to construct meanings that can only be grasped within ones own mind. Abstract ideas are something that you have to understand; no one can make them apparent for you and no concrete object can represent them. For addition, you can use counting blocks. You can see the damage caused by a violent storm. However, you can not see the gravity that binds us all to Earth. Nor can you see the air particles that must come together in just the right way in order to form a storm that can cause major damage. While some students will make the transition to abstract knowledge easily, others will not. The material presented on this website can help with this by challenging students to think about why something happened in the experiment that they were conducting.

Materials 3- Math, middle grades

Content Area Materials Overview Worksheet

Your name: Mandy Walker Jennings

Name of Site: Marco Polo

Link to Resources: http://www.marcopolo-education.org/home.aspx

Source (Author–if available): multiple

Identify the teaching topic of the materials–be specific. Identify the population of the students (grade, course): middle grades math- multiple subjects/content areas

Give a brief description of how the materials would be used: There is a vast array of materials available on this website. When first approaching the website, you can log on as an educator, a parent, a student, or you can log onto an after school resources page. I think that this could be a strong tool to use for a classroom. The website also contained a wide variety of resource types including activities, worksheets, and reference materials. This website could be used as a way to connect not only the student to the classroom, but also to involve the parents in the lives of their children. Because of the interactive nature of the website, parents would be able to browse through activities that they could work through with their children. This website could also serve as a home page for any classroom computer so that students could log on and use interactive activities to test their knowledge. As a teacher, there are multiple lesson plans, activities, and resource materials to be used to broaden the classroom.

Identify other material that you could use with this material to augment instruction, especially for EC students: In using this website, teachers would have to be careful about letting some students have free reign. While browsing through the student section, I noticed that some of the instructions were a little tedious and hard to understand; while a “normal” child may be able to read through them without any major problems, an EC student may have a hard time. If this website were to be utilized as a classroom tool, teachers would have to be careful to explain the activity thoroughly and not rely on the instructions to explain the activity. In many cases, this would require that the teacher take time before hand to be aware of how some of the exercises work and be able to explain them.

Explain why you would use this material with your students. How will the material help your students learn the topic? I would use this material with my students as a way to allow the students to test their own knowledge as well as allowing them to challenge themselves if they think they are ready for it. This website is designed with grade levels in mind. However, there is nothing to stop a student from attempting to go beyond their own grade level. A student who finished their work early may be allowed to “play games” on the computer, using this website as a home base to start from. Another student who may be struggling with an idea may be encouraged to explore that idea through interactive activities on this website. At times, I would draw lesson plans from some of the activities presented on the web page. As with any other interactive activity, this web site would serve as a way to get students out of a textbook and into an environment where the can internalize knowledge and challenge themselves to push to the next level.

Materials 2- Math, middle grades

Content Area Materials Overview Worksheet

Your name: Mandy Walker Jennings

Name of Site: PBS Teachers

Link to Resources: http://www.pbs.org/teachers/

Source (Author–if available): multiple

Identify the teaching topic of the materials–be specific. Identify the population of the students (grade, course): middle grades math- Data analysis and probability

Give a brief description of how the materials would be used: Most of the materials presented in this page would be used in classroom activities in which the student would asked to recall knowledge that they had previously learned. There is a multitude of ready to use activities on this page that can be sorted by grade level and by topic. After choosing your grade level, the topics are automatically updated to categories that are either similar or are exact matches to concepts in the SCOS. I searched grades 6-8 looking for material related to Data analysis and probability. The search returned 50 lesson plans, 7 offline activities/projects, 3 online activities/projects, and 1 video. With each entry, this website lists the grade level, subject, topic (s), and resource type. One specific lesson plan that I looked at addressed professional baseball. The activity allowed students to serve as “consultants” for a professional baseball team, computing figures for ticket prices, player salaries, and other revenue in order to create a balanced budget. This lesson falls under the ideas of applied mathematics and data analysis/probability. This lesson also list possibilities to expand.

Identify other material that you could use with this material to augment instruction, especially for EC students: There are a variety of ways that the material presented on this website could be altered and or augmented to fit the needs of all students. Many of the lessons on this website mention modifications that teachers can use. I will use the specific example listed to illustrate. Students could design pie charts to show where money is being spent. This would provide a visual supplement to help cover different learning styles. One idea mentioned in this lesson is for students to plan (adjust ticket prices, increase attendance, cut back on expenditures, etc) for a dome to be built. A sixth grade teacher could combine this lesson with a geology lesson for earth quakes. A student could design a stadium (with a dome) for the Los Angeles Dodgers. Since California is located on the fault zone, students would have to consider the possibility of an earth quake and plan for stability and safety within the dome and must account for the extra expenditures to do so. Students could build a model of their dome. This would allow students to use creativity and would create a hands-on approach that is needed for many EC students.

Explain why you would use this material with your students. How will the material help your students learn the topic? The material found on this website could be very helpful to a teacher. Most students going through school will be subjected at some point to a teacher who only teaches what the textbook writes. Those classes are often dull and monotonous. Very rarely do those teachers challenge their students. Most students respond very well to a teacher who can combine technical instruction with activities that will help them internalize the ideas behind a lesson. Even the most creative people run out of ideas. It is good to know that there are websites like this that give teachers ideas that they can use or modify to fit their purposes. Materials such as these allow students to do something other than look at a textbook. Many of these will also allow students to move around, which will help to release pent up energy so that they will be able to concentrate more on other subjects. Performing activities in classrooms will have many advantages.

Baseball: Stadium Consultants Activity

Example of video- Abbott and Costello

This video is very similar to the Ma & Pa Kettle video shown in class. It presents the same type of problem. This is a video that I may use to do a free write as mentioned in materials 1.

 

Materials 1- Math, middle grades

Your name: Mandy Walker Jennings

Name of Site: Youtube

Link to Resources: http://www.youtube.com/

Source (Author–if available): N/A- multiple

Identify the teaching topic of the materials–be specific. Identify the population of the students (grade, course):  Middle grades Math- after conducting and viewing several searches based on “math”, I searched for several specialized ideas in math and was most intrigued by the entries for geometry.

Give a brief description of how the materials would be used: There are several ways that these videos could be used. There were several videos similar to the Ma & Pa Kettle video that we viewed in class. I had thought about using videos such as those as part of a class room warm up. The students could be asked to write a short paragraph explaining the problem presented in the video. Not only would it “warm” their minds up for class, but would also provide them with a chance for a small writing exercise. When I searched for geometry, there were several videos related to Sacred Geometry that is a form of transformations. Sacred Geometry is what Mandalas are based off of. I had thought about showing one of those videos and then allowing the class to design their own Mandalas. (Mandalas are geometrical patterns- often circular in shape and design.)

Identify other material that you could use with this material to augment instruction, especially for EC students: As with any class, the degree of modification needed for an EC student could vary widely. In the two specific cases mentioned, adaptations could be made for students of all levels. In the case of a class writing activity, any student who needed it could have a few extra minutes to write. An EC student who has fallen far behind may need additional resources. For example, counting blocks could be given to the student. In the example of 25 divided by 5, the student could take 25 blocks and divide them into 5 piles to augment their understanding of the task at hand. In the case of the Mandalas, I believe this activity is one that could be specifically designed to allow an EC student to excel. Since any design given to the Mandala would be considered personal, there would be no wrong answer. Students could use protractors, rulers, markers, chalk, or any other creative avenue that they wish to pursue. (Within reason) Having the hands on activity would help not only EC students, but all students, grasp the difficult concepts on transformations and order.

Explain why you would use this material with your students. How will the material help your students learn the topic? With the first example provided, the material would not so much be used to help the student learn, but rather to refresh their memory of important ideas and to allow them a little time to write. For refreshing memory, the Ma & Pa Kettle example is a perfect one. Many adults watching that video will be able to tell you why the logic is wrong, but may not necessarily be able to tell you that value placement is the actual term for it. Being able to recall specific terms would aid in building and maintaining the students’ mathematical literacy. Also, having a “free-write” could serve to stimulate the students ability to write. Their free writes would be checked for grammar, punctuation, and for general terms. While I don’t think I would give a numerical grade, I would give responses when I think that a student should have provided more information or needs to correct something. For the Mandalas, having a creative outlet would not only allow students to bring a little bit of themselves into the classroom, it would also help them to grasp the difficult concepts behind transformations such as translations, dilations, and reflections. Students would be able to design their own images using large and small circles while sliding them across points within their figure to create a geometrically balanced picture. Being able to use the terms creatively should help the students to internalize the ideas.  

 

NCCTM_Mandy Walker Jennings

In looking for a professional organization, I decided to look for one that would be close to home in my field of mathematics. I searched for and found the website for the North Carolina Council of Teachers of Mathematics. (NCCTM- http://secure.ncctm.org/index.cfm) I have attended a conference for the western region of the NCCTM organization and found that it was a really interesting experience. We walked out of the conference with an armload of information (papers and tools) to be used in our future classrooms.

 

The website for this organization was extensive. It container information for grants that teachers can apply for, a conference schedule, links to other mathematics organizations, information for math contests, and the current scores for math exams. I was actually surprised; the math results for 2008 were already posted. They seem to take this information very seriously and want to make the public aware of current achievements. However, it was what I did not find that really surprised me. I did not see a resources page. Most of the websites that I have visited concerning education will have some sort of a resource page. They have activities, worksheets, and ideas that other teachers have suggested have worked in their classroom. It is the resources page that many teachers need, especially a new teacher who is still building their arsenal of teaching tools. While the workshop that I attended was great, the website wasn’t.

 

Considering this information, it would be interesting to see what information is contained in the journal published by the NCCTM- The Centroid. While I could tell that the NCCTM published a journal from their website, I could not even see a sample of what it looks like. In order to get to the web page for The Centroid, you have to be a member of NCCTM. Membership is not unreasonable- $20/year and $50/3 years with a student membership of $10/year- but it is not something that I would sign up for just to see what the journal looks like. I must say, I attended the conference last year without a membership. I am not sure if that was a fluke on the part of the person that signed me up, but I didn’t know and they didn’t ask. I guess there is a possibility that the conference was free for students. (? – there was no mention of fees for conferences on the website) I would not rate this website as very well. It really didn’t have that much information that I would have considered helpful.