Saturday, September 14, 2013

Geometry Interactive Notebok - The First Unit

I have been working hard on my interactive notebook for my Geometry classes.  I wanted to share what I have so far.

On the inside cover, I used the idea from Everybody is a Genius to have learner profiles.  (I made my own and adapted it to get rid of the personality color.  I might give it a try next year, but this year I don't have the time.)  I gave my students these learning style and multiple intelligences surveys the first few days of school.  I taught my students how to glue the learner profile as a pocket.  I passed back the surveys, and had students fold them and put them in the pocket.

I had students number pages 1 and 2.  Right now we are skipping page 1 because I plan on using page 1 as an index for Geometry symbols.  I'm going to use page 2 for my important information - my extra help periods, my email address, how to access our online textbook, and how to enroll in remind101.  I'm going to have students keep the rubric in the back cover.  For this year, I am simply using a checklist. 

I had students glue two pages together to make a pocket on page 3.  I plan on making a pocket page for every new unit.  Page 4 is the unit table of contents.  I got the idea from Math = Love.  (I made my own so that I could also include the date.)  I like this SO much better than a huge table of contents at the beginning of the notebook.

Page 5 and 6 are vocabulary Frayer model foldables.  I am using the template from Math = Love.  I wanted to keep all vocabulary for the entire unit with the unit pages.  Mainly because I didn't want to have a huge glossary at the end of the notebook.  It just seems like a huge hassle for so many different reasons.

Pages 3 through 6 are going to be repeated for every unit we cover.   

Page 7 is dedicated to Inductive and Deductive reasoning.  On this page, I have their journal entry from our day on Inductive reasoning and a foldable comparing Inductive and Deductive reasoning - our formative assessment from our day on Deductive reasoning.  (I made my foldable too wide, and now I have to fold it in half to fit it inside the notebook.)  They will also do a do now identifying the hypothesis and conclusion of a conditional statement.

Page 8 is for our day on rewriting conditional statements.  I found and loved the table used by Journal Wizard.  (Side note:  I saw that she did the same thing with Inductive and Deductive reasoning.  It made me so happy to see that someone else did the same thing.  It makes me feel like I'm doing this right.)  I'm giving my students a sheet with three of these tables, and three conditional statements to rewrite.  If the conditional statement is false, then they have to give a counter-example.  Students will cut the tables out and paste them into their notebook so that they fit on one page.  I ask questions to help students discover that the conditional statement and contrapositive are logically equivalent.  I will also make sure to tell them about tautologies.

I'm so excited and proud about what I have for this unit that I'm kind of sad this is being cut from the curriculum next year.  I really don't understand why this isn't part of common core, unless it's covered prior to high school Geometry.  (I need to do more research about what is and isn't covered in the primary grades.)

So here is what I've learned this week about teaching interactive notebooks:
  • Kids will find any reason to complain.
  • High school kids are not above cutting and pasting.  In fact, they enjoy it.
  • Directions must be precise.
  • I have to remind them to update their table of contents.
  • Not all words will fit the Frayer model perfectly, and when they don't, students will think they are doing something wrong.
  • Definitions and facts/characteristics should be done in class.  Many times examples and nonexamples can be done for homework.  (I'm starting this approach this week.  We'll see how it goes.)
  • I must stop class a few minutes before the bell rings whether we're done or not to avoid having to clean up the mess by myself.  (It doesn't help that my clock is suddenly, and inexplicably off by a few minutes.)
Overall the first week was great.  I hope to have an even better second week.  



No comments:

Post a Comment

Thank you!

Thank you for being patient as I got my new blog set up.  I am slowly releasing updated versions of old posts while I add new content.  Plea...