You may select one from either chapter (due to time constraits only 1 is required). Hopefully you may continue to try additional suggestions in the future.
As I have mentioned in my previous post, the United States are at the forefront of the world. No current event goes unnoticed, and most affect us in one way or another. On top of that, with the super-saturation of data through the various revolutionary medias, my students are likely to have been exposed to the majority of topics I modestly hoped to brush by them. This makes it much easier and much more time conserving to teach connections between the curriculum and students' lives. (the amount of students whose relatives are or have been to Iraq is astounding; what’s more so, is the number of students who still want to go)
In my class I try to bring in primary sources whenever possible and discuss what students thought of them. Most recently, I brought in a piece of a soldier’s diary that fought and died in WW1. I read it to the class and then asked them what they thought. At first I got the zombie stares, but then I decided to be more specific and I asked the question, why do you think this soldier decided to join the army? Students discussed issues of pride, honor, fighting for one’s country, that the author was stupid and some even linked it to family members of theirs that have fought or are fighting in Iraq. They made inferences using background knowledge, it was nice.
Questioning is the one thing (perhaps next to class room management) that I am always trying to get better at. I always loved vigorous class discussions when I was a student and so I want to now recreate that for my students. It is often hard to think of good questions as I go because either I am just not good at it, I can’t think quickly on my feet, I am focused on getting to the next objective in the lesson or who knows what. In any case, I intend to use the strategy of having students write questions in the margin as they write with a modeling example before hand. I think this will fit perfectly into my classes.
One struggle that comes back time and time again in geometry is what do we know is true and what appears to be true. Very frequently students think that since it appears to be true then it must be true. Unfortunately there is no "it looks like it" theorem in mathematics. I drew on the board several shapes and various diagrams labeled in varied ways. I then had students create a double sided journal and had them list everything that appeared to be true on the left and everything they knew to be true on the right.
It was interesting hearing what they put on each side of their journal and by having it all listed, students were able to check if what they thought was true was actually true. We discussed how we know things are true by looking at what is labeled and why the mind perceives images in a certain way to make us think it is true. We were getting a little philosophical by the end of the discussion but that was just fine by me.
MEET this Thursday from 3-4 at the ROE library (bring your items to turn in) Read chps. 1 & 2 then post comments from 3/2-3/6 Read Chp. 3 and try one item from the "What Works" section (p.33-34) ----put comments from3/12-14 Chp.4 and try "What Works"---put comments from 3/19-22 Chp.5 and "What Works"...put comments from 3/28-30 Chp. 6 and "What Works"--put comments from 4/4-7 Chapters 7, 8, and 9----comments from 4/21-25
Quick Video Available
Check out the video worth watching on Teacher tube with a teacher modeling a Think Aloud. Just go to http://www.teachertube.com/ and go to the second tab marked "Videos" and use the search function to type "Introduction to Think Aloud" and you'll find one!
As I have mentioned in my previous post, the United States are at the forefront of the world. No current event goes unnoticed, and most affect us in one way or another. On top of that, with the super-saturation of data through the various revolutionary medias, my students are likely to have been exposed to the majority of topics I modestly hoped to brush by them. This makes it much easier and much more time conserving to teach connections between the curriculum and students' lives. (the amount of students whose relatives are or have been to Iraq is astounding; what’s more so, is the number of students who still want to go)
ReplyDeleteIn my class I try to bring in primary sources whenever possible and discuss what students thought of them. Most recently, I brought in a piece of a soldier’s diary that fought and died in WW1. I read it to the class and then asked them what they thought. At first I got the zombie stares, but then I decided to be more specific and I asked the question, why do you think this soldier decided to join the army? Students discussed issues of pride, honor, fighting for one’s country, that the author was stupid and some even linked it to family members of theirs that have fought or are fighting in Iraq. They made inferences using background knowledge, it was nice.
ReplyDeleteQuestioning is the one thing (perhaps next to class room management) that I am always trying to get better at. I always loved vigorous class discussions when I was a student and so I want to now recreate that for my students. It is often hard to think of good questions as I go because either I am just not good at it, I can’t think quickly on my feet, I am focused on getting to the next objective in the lesson or who knows what. In any case, I intend to use the strategy of having students write questions in the margin as they write with a modeling example before hand. I think this will fit perfectly into my classes.
One struggle that comes back time and time again in geometry is what do we know is true and what appears to be true. Very frequently students think that since it appears to be true then it must be true. Unfortunately there is no "it looks like it" theorem in mathematics. I drew on the board several shapes and various diagrams labeled in varied ways. I then had students create a double sided journal and had them list everything that appeared to be true on the left and everything they knew to be true on the right.
ReplyDeleteIt was interesting hearing what they put on each side of their journal and by having it all listed, students were able to check if what they thought was true was actually true. We discussed how we know things are true by looking at what is labeled and why the mind perceives images in a certain way to make us think it is true. We were getting a little philosophical by the end of the discussion but that was just fine by me.