I have been mulling this question over for a while now, since last summer at least. It is a offshoot of the time I spent working with Exeter materials at an Exeter summer institute, and if anything the question has grown in my mind to the point where I must answer it for myself and [...]
It is spring break, so what am I doing? I am attending AP workshops and volunteering at my local university. All in all, a great spring break. So, Let me start with the question first. Why do we make it so hard to learn functions? I mean really. We treat each topic; linears, quadratics, cubics, [...]
I have been thinking and struggling with these ideas for a week now. I read Dave’s post summarizing the study about repeating Algebra 1 and the lack of success in CA, and I really felt I needed to dive deeper in this topic. So I read many link and downloaded almost every article that was [...]
Grr. Really. I have some frustration I need to get off my chest, so this will be a “constructive venting” post. Constructive, because I really do have a point, and venting because I can’t believe the things that occur in math education. First off, I have been really interested in how the curriculum of mathematics [...]
One short lesson that came from the Exeter sessions was how they teach lines and what formats they use to teach writing equations of lines. It is amazing how often we, as math teachers, fail to build connections between different elements of mathematics simply because we feel like we have to hold to some form [...]
In this post I want to show Exeter’s problem solving strategy. This is important, because it is SO different from how a problem like this is typically approached. First off, the problem I am going to model is M1:21:11 [Math 1, page 21, problem 11] 11. Alex was hired to unpack and clean 576 very [...]
My district (Washoe County School District in Nevada) puts together blueprints for us each year. They change a little from year to year, but generally don’t have tremendous changes. This year, of course, being an exception because of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) that we are required to roll out. The page I linked [...]
Many people ask me why I ride my motorcycle long distances in the summer. This summer I traveled from Reno, NV to St. Louis, MO. It was around 4000 miles, round trip, and brutally hot for a couple of states worth of riding. But, that traveling allows me one single thing I rarely get. Time [...]
For today’s #myfavfriday I am presenting an idea that has been percolating in my head for a while. If you want to know what a #myfavfriday is, then see Druinok’s blog here. Learners have a devil of a time with quadratics. Afterall, there can be 2 solutions, 1 solution, or no solutions in Algebra 1, [...]