Tuesday, August 19, 2014

Rethinking Bell-to-Bell Teaching


I think every teacher is taught to work bell to bell every class period.  They always use staggering numbers.  If you conclude one minute early every day, you lose 180 minutes of teaching time.  If you conclude two minutes early every day, you lose 360 minutes of teaching time.  And it goes on. 

The thing no one ever mentions though is that unless your students are completely engaged at the end of class (And when are they ever? Especially in math.), you are losing this time anyway.  I'm usually optimistic, but I think it's more prudent to be realistic on this one.  Let's face it, the last few minutes of class, students are staring at the clock, packing up, and winding down on their work whether you're teaching or not.  (At least this is what I find with my student population.  Maybe it is different in your school.  I just know that I've seen this behavior in the four different school districts I've worked in.)

That is why this year, I am not planing to teach until the bell that dismisses class.  I routinely have students getting up two minutes before the bell rings to put their supplies away while I'm still teaching.  I do not stop them because the slim chance that they are listening to what I'm saying while putting supplies away is better than the alternative of students leaving with supplies strewn about.  What I am going to do is make sure that at the end of class, students are working on practice problems.  This way I'm not being cut off when students are packing up to leave.  If students need more time to finish, they have it.  If I need time to discuss something with a student, I have it.  I will be able to have students put supplies away, and I won't have to worry about students being on time for their next class.  (They won't have to worry either.)  I will also have the opportunity to make sure that all of my calculators have been returned before my students leave the room.  (This is my primary reason for rethinking bell-to-bell teaching.)

Last year, on the days that I did finish early, I found it more valuable to spend my time correcting and passing back exit tickets (I love it when I can give students immediate, written feedback on what we learned for the day before they do their homework.), making sure all supplies are returned to their proper place, and most importantly connecting with my students.

Tuesday, August 12, 2014

New Assignment Board


Last year I shared how I organized my homework board.  Before summer vacation began, I re-aligned the tape on the board.  Some of it was peeling off and I was never totally happy with how it came out originally.  This time I measured everything. ;)  I also added more space for announcements.



The big change was on my second marker board.  Previously I just hung signs for objectives for my two classes.  (My Contemporary Math class does not get homework.)  I added spaces for common core learning standards.  I also added a space for announcements for my Contemporary Math class. 

Monday, August 11, 2014

New Item for Sale in My TPT Store!

I'm super excited to announce that I have posted my first ever content specific item in my TPT store!  I've been wanting for over a year now to post more than just words to my Word Wall.  The words are not enough.  I've been wanting to find a way to display vocabulary words, brief definitions, and even diagrams.  The only reason I didn't tackle this project sooner is that I was simply overwhelmed by the work involved with creating such a project.

Now that I look back on it, I did it all in steps.  Last year when I put together a new curriculum map, I identified the new vocabulary words associated with each unit.  Throughout the year I narrowed the list down to the most important words to address.  I narrowed this down further, and compiled a list of words to use on the word wall.  Once I had a template made up (half page cards, chevron design, of course), I typed up the words and used our new textbook to adapt the definitions.  Once I had these all typed up, I went through each word and illustrated the ones that were able to be illustrated.

I am delighted with the overall results.  I cannot wait to put these up in my classroom.  I will be printing and laminating them for sure.  I'm just not sure yet if I want to post new words as we get to them throughout the year, or post all words at the beginning of the year for students to preview.  (Or perhaps add words to the board quarterly.  This will probably be less alarming to students.  Updating the board every unit was a pain last year.) 

Check it out:  http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Common-Core-Geometry-Word-Wall-Vocabulary-Cards-1387499

Good Memories

While deleting old photos from my phone, I found a bunch from my past two school years that brought back some good memories.  I just wanted to immortalize them on the blog.

The beautiful view from my classroom window one morning after snowfall

 Where Woodstock took place 
(taken during class trip to Bethel Woods)

The best heart graph

Random, much appreciated gift left in my mailbox

My darling H period Contemporary Math class had me solve a problem

Random silliness

Random sweetness 
(There were post-its with hearts drawn on them in every drawer of my desk.)

Collage of my Christmas gifts 
(Top left = fired Oreos!)

Our Class of 2015 sold carnations for Valentine's Day  
(I was their designated care-taker for the day.  Time to add florist to that long list of professions that "Teacher" encapsulates.)

Carnation given to me from a student




I went all out for St. Patrick's Day this year


 PBIS hosted "Everybody Rocks Day" and I just had to represent the Crue
(Teachers Rock!)

 Walked into class one afternoon to find this ceiling tile painted

They're usually a mix of amused and annoyed when I use their slang against them

A calculator cake baked by one of my talented students

Bridal shower cake baked by one of my talented co-workers
(Our school has a tradition of throwing surprise bridal/baby showers.  They're so fun!)

Sunday, August 10, 2014

How the Year Ended - Mini-Classroom Tour

At the end of last school year (2012-2013), I posted some pictures of how my classroom looked, but I had already taken down all of the glorious posters I usually have on my classroom walls.  So here are my classroom photos from the end of the past school year (before I made any changes). 

Before the end of school year, I was informed that my classroom (among others) would be in use over the summer while asbestos is being abated in our elementary school.  While this may seem as a huge disadvantage, I made the most of it.  We selected new textbooks for next year and part of the process is getting rid of all of the old textbooks.  I decided to seize the opportunity and also rid myself of all of the really old textbooks I had in my classroom.  (I mean from Math A/B, Sequence 1/2/3, and even earlier.)  Doing so cleared up so much of my cabinet space.

In the cabinet directly behind my desk (the one that housed a mouse last year), I put all of my teacher supplies (with large heavy items covering any holes that a mouse could visit through).  I LOVE the photo boxes from Michael's.  They're usually on sale for $2 each, sometimes even $1.66 each.  They have a space for labels and they hold so much. Best of all, they make everything look neater.

In the cabinet to the immediate left of that, I have all of the supplies that I routinely use with my students.  The other three cabinets are a somewhat organized mess, but these two cabinets were absolutely beautiful.

However, these cabinets do not look like this today.  Due to our visitors, I had to lock up everything from inside my desk, and anything that I normally leave on a work surface.  Also, I have been going back to school to print out the updated Geometry modules and to review with students for the August exams.  While there, I noticed that many supplies for next year had already been dropped off, and I put them away to get them out of the teacher's way.  I cannot wait to go back to the glorious organization that I had before September.

Saturday, August 9, 2014

Geometry Interactive Notebook - The Eleventh Unit

Our last unit of the year was Locus.

I started the unit by using the same locus activity I did last year.  I just reformatted the worksheet to fit into our notebooks.

 After the activity, we added some notes onto the next page.  We did many practice worksheets on this topic that are not shown in the notebook.
 Lastly, we took notes on compound locus.

Geometry Interactive Notebook - The Tenth Unit

I know, this is crazy late.  I'd rather post very late than not at all, so here is the tenth unit of study from the 2013-2014 school year:  Circles.

 
Sadly I didn't use many foldables this unit.  (It was a busy, overwhelming time for me.)  I had students glue down the plus and equal sign, and use the flaps for the each term to describe the part of the equation.
We extended equation of circles to linear-quadratic systems with circles.  In the lesson we were also able to review linear-quadratic systems with parabolas.  Two birds, one stone.  Yay!
 Next we discussed different lines associated with circles, and went over some lesser used theorems.  (So far it looks like common tangents won't be a part of the common core curriculum, which is so sad because that always seems to students' favorite topic in this unit.  Perhaps I'll be able to work it into a special project some day.)
The next day we went over the regularly used theorems.  Note to self:  Two days for the this topic next year.  This is the only other foldable for this unit.  One side has a diagram with fill-in-the-blank theorems.  The under side has examples.
 




Our next topics were central and inscribed angles and inscribed polygons.  We kept our notes simple these days.

This year, I split up one topic into three days.  Next year, I am teaching angles on circles with inscribed angles on one day.  The next day, I will teach angles inside and outside circles on the same day.  While it was nice to take this topic slow, by spreading them out over three days, students had a difficult time differentiating between the three cases.

I combined the three topics for another day of practice with complex circles.   We took notes, and completed a worksheet that we stapled into our notebooks.
 
 Lastly, we worked on lengths of line segments in circles.  I taught each case over three days, but I think for next year I am going to combine secant-secant and secant-tangent into one day.


Note:  I apologize for any weird formatting issues.  Blogger was not cooperating with me on this one.

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...