mathercizing

Principal Interview Questions

2009-05-03T19:27:00.001-05:00

Questions thus far: (or at least one draft of them)

Tell us a little bit about your self.
What is your guiding vision for Holton High School?
What are the most important characteristics of a building principal?
What is your Leadership Style?
Do you have a model for discipline
What role do feel technology should play in the high school
If you were offered this position, list your top five priorities for starting a new year with a new staff.
What is your special ed philosophy?
Explain how your would help a struggling teacher.
What is your roll with extra curricular activities
How do you deal with conflict resolution - We give them a scenario or two or let them give us two. Or What type of conflict situations have you been involved with and how did you handle it?
How do you measure the success of a school?
What is the role of career and tech ed at the high school level? Honors & AP classes.
What is the role of extracurricular activities?
What is the role of the school counselor?
Describe what you consider to be a successful teacher and how do you make sure teachers are living up to your expectations?
How will you identify the educational needs and values of the community?
"When considering AYP (adequate yearly progress), how should curriculum and MTSS (Multi-Tiered System of Support) be related?"

Purpose of this blog...

2009-03-29T11:30:00.002-05:00

I'm not a (frequent) blogger, but find me (mathercize) on Plurk / Twitter for brief, but much more frequent thoughts/updates.

This site is used for the occasional (and hopefully more frequent) thoughts on teaching.

Maybe when I get better at teaching, I'll post more...

Bouncing Ball Pattern

2009-03-29T09:38:00.004-05:00

I too would like to join the Dan Meyer fan club, for his perspective and helpfulness, but this time for his "Will the ball hit the can" activity.

His post got me thinking about the bouncing ball pattern:

And I wondered how the parabolas were related, in particular, how are the equations of the quadratics related?

So, back to geogebra (using Dan Meyer's work as a template), and in short I was able to change:

Reflections:

On the construct:

Neither the presentation of this problem, nor the geogebra file are student ready. This was just a question I had. [I'm still learning geogebra and this was a way for me to get more comfortable with the tool. I now know a way to *add a picture as a background and *create a slider.]
The picture is not mine and therefore is a bit forced as an 'application' problem. I wanted to try the geogebra aspect and so just used a pre-existing pic this time.
I feel that the whole set-up of the factored form is too helpful to be used as-is.

On the problem:

In this set-up, the parabolas have very similar leading coefficients and I think its worth testing to see if that's always true. This observation was not my original assumption.
The next question that came to my mind was what I'm calling the basketball fractal (forgive my touchpad-sketching capabilities). The question is, if basketball is shot, hits the rim and is continuously bounced back into the air (with no new force added), then, how will the 'nested parabolas' be related?

2009-03-17T19:13:00.001-05:00

leprachauns everywhere! Let's have lucky charms for dinner!

2009-03-17T08:27:00.001-05:00

Educators: What did you not get taught in college? (ex. here's what a preacher wasn't taught: http://ping.fm/943LS )

2009-03-16T00:16:00.001-05:00

what's the rule in town on burning leaves... what about at midnight? I don't trust my neighbor.

2009-03-15T19:44:00.001-05:00

Graham Crackers + homemade chocolate frosting = sunday supper

2009-03-15T17:10:00.001-05:00

family > internet

2009-03-14T23:46:00.001-05:00

play.blogger.com ... and goodnight

2009-03-14T22:25:00.001-05:00

DEER! ... (that's plural)

2009-03-14T18:21:00.001-05:00

as soon as my 3-year old gets off the 4-wheeler.... (with grandpa), we'll go back to Holton.

2009-03-14T15:01:00.001-05:00

finishing up work on a covenant inductive study. Key words: all, blood, and sacrifice.

2009-03-14T13:13:00.001-05:00

Yep, just got dun hookin up an anhydrous ammonia tank up to a rusty, trusty john deere. Total life-hours spent farming: 0.20

2009-03-14T01:13:00.001-05:00

livin la vida Courtland

Five changes

2009-03-13T21:22:00.013-05:00

I was tagged by Alan Beam to write five things I would change about education. The rules are as follows:

“List FIVE changes you would like to see in the educational system. Your responses should represent your perspective and your passion for learning and students…tag the following people…from a variety of perspectives...”

Disclaimer: This post is as much of my expectations and aspirations as it is a confession of how much I'm just a traditional and boring teacher.

1. Motto #1: It's not about me. (its all about the learning)
Man is a brute ¹. Call it social contract or God's providence, I believe that a main goal of education is to civilize us and make us constructive members in our society (the kingdom of man). The best part of this contract is that when we lay down ourselves and submit to learning, to Truth, we benefit.

I fear that all too often in high school², students feel a sense of entitlement. If I am king, then there is no reason to learn the quadratic formula, heroic couplets, or the price of tea in China... unless it serves me right here, right now.

School will be done wrong until we all agree that learning is good and worth our time.

2. Motto #2: Often in life, the harder things are better (its all about the learning)

We have an great football team. This is due, in large part, because we have a phenomenal conditioning program. Unfortunately, we do a poor job of translating that diligence and dedication to the classroom. Half is given, half is earned. Our brains like wrinkles, but we don't. Math is hard³, but that does not mean that there are no rewards for the deposit given.

3. Remove the walls.

I compartmentalize. This statement itself, though, is a confession that the world does not come easily packaged. How about an example:

What is facebook?

a place for socialization
photo/music/art - sharing
advertising (personal and corporate)
self-expression
a mask

... that's the short list⁴. Inasmuch as our world is becoming digitized, the well-defined boundaries are hazy at best. In order to be effective, teaching must elicit learning that creates connections, connections within a curriculum and across curricula. The three R's are easy to keep separate. Its those darn 21st century skills that call for more than Mr. Math and Mrs. English⁵, expounding their isolated subjects. So, in the new school I would form, there will be no conceptual or curricular walls (drywall doesn't bother me, we don't all need to move to the gym).
4. Make School Bigger.

Not the building or class sizes: no, the scope. Since curricular walls are coming down, students will be equipped to tackle real problems from the world. Whether that be snapping a picture and asking "what would you do with this?" or changing the world Information is no longer in short supply with the teacher as the sole source of all that is true... but rather, knowledge and how-to's are readily available at a mouse-click. Education must change.

5. Standardize and Simplify.

Not the students or delivery-of-content: no, the scope. Focus. Clearly communicate the expectations. Let me propose this overly-simplified recipe:

Define your standards for high school graduation with as much career/college specificity as required. [In other words, list every skill in every class that students must master in order to complete the curriculum, which can include: space science, statistics, social skills... in other words, the written AND hidden curricula.]
Learning takes place (see changes 1-4 above).
Implement accurate assessments for these standards. When all standards are met, the student is done. If this happens in 3 years or 5... great. When mastery learning is achieved, students graduate.

Let's remove the time-wasting game from the equation.

That's it, those are my 5 changes I would make to education.

First things first (ie learning).

The Good, the Beautiful, and the True would be appreciated, loved, and sought (and these exist outside of ourselves, but we grow in goodness, beauty, and truth as we comprehend and apprehend ⁶ them).
Teamwork, it takes a village, as it were.
Go global. Hit this one out of the park.
Make the goal of high school S.M.A.R.T.

1. All humans... but guys especially.
2. Make that K through retirement.
3. ... or is it beautiful?
4. I dare you to ask a high schooler all that facebook does for her.
5. If you'll let me play on stereotypes.
6. or, more aptly, they apprehend us.
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Now playing: Alaska In Winter - Staring At the Sun
via FoxyTunes

2009-03-13T20:29:00.001-05:00

Made it to Courtland. Man, crazy traffic... we must have past 12 whole cars in the 3 hours.

2009-03-13T15:30:00.001-05:00

SURPRISE... heading to the in-laws... NOW.

2009-03-13T13:56:00.001-05:00

Have a seat http://ping.fm/yzImS

2009-03-13T13:42:00.001-05:00

I've got a Wrinkle meeting... post-haste!

2009-03-13T12:43:00.001-05:00

I need to find a Cadbury Creme Egg.

2009-03-13T10:12:00.001-05:00

t-minus 5 hours (until spring break)... but who's counting

2009-03-13T08:59:00.001-05:00

t-minus 6 hours and counting. Spring Break approacheth.

2009-03-12T23:18:00.001-05:00

The New FOUR R's of education are: Rigor, Relationships, Relevance, and Results.... discuss.

2009-03-12T19:41:00.001-05:00

dumbest thing I've said to my wife recently: "It's not bad... you've made grosser things than that and called them soup."

2009-03-12T19:26:00.001-05:00

back from class, had two gone; so me and student, we are alone

2009-03-12T16:04:00.001-05:00

home->supper/play-with-daughters :: night-class->exam/teach/factor :: home->grade/plan/sleep

2009-03-12T15:12:00.001-05:00

pretty sure the kids made AYP... w00t, w00t

2009-03-12T12:54:00.001-05:00

... actually, i just feel left out

2009-03-12T12:38:00.001-05:00

I say 'Wrinkle in Time', you say...

2009-03-12T12:27:00.001-05:00

found an old Finley Quaye CD (do they still make CDs?), reggae-pop makes a chilly day seem warmer

2009-03-12T11:36:00.001-05:00

tired of school lunches by this point in the year... must find sustenance

2009-03-12T11:14:00.001-05:00

tired of school lunches by this point in the year... must find sustenance

another go

2008-07-31T18:21:00.001-05:00

I did an awesome job blogging for one week last year. I'm giving it another go this school year. We'll see.

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Now playing: IndieFeed.com community - Natalie Walker - Pink Neon
via FoxyTunes

Unit Circle Trigonometry - Follow the White Rabbit

2007-09-19T12:01:00.000-05:00

Last class period, my PreCalculus (juniors) and Trigonometry (seniors) built up an understanding of the unit circle through discovery. The basic idea of the activity was, according to one student,
"if you choose one angle, and graph it in each quadrant, then the sin, cos, and tan values are the same in each quadrant, ignoring the plus and minus".

My students were able to work through it with minimal prompting. Through dialogue, students were able to encounter reference angles & triangles and learn the patterns of the unit circle. This and the next pdf are now available on ilovemath.org.

Today, students completed an arts and crafts activity (they had previously drawn the multiples of 30&45 degree angles on paper plates) by placing the points on the unit circle (all 16 of the 'main' ones).

Then...

Students were given the "Follow the White Rabbit" activity. There was a secret message encoded in the Trig and Inverse Trig problems [ "IF I AM A KID, DOES THAT MEAN THAT TRIG IS FOR ME?"]. A few years ago, a student made a poster that morphed the Trix rabbit into a logo for our classroom, "Trig is for Kids", and so I had a scavenger hunt based upon this idea. It was a mixture of Trix, Alice, and Trig.

Here's the progression in the hunt:

Students use trig to decode the message
Students use clues on bottom of worksheet to find an online quiz
Students enter the secret message in the online quiz
Students are given a locker number and combination (to an empty locker)
Students go to the locker, open it, find the Trig Rabbit Poster and a piece of paper with a web address.
Students come back to class, go to the webpage and are given instructions to download a video.

The "prize" at the end is a video of a commercial that a previous student made. In the commercial, I dress up as a bunny. "Silly rabbit, Trig is for kids". It was my first year teaching, and in retrospect, a silly first impression to make on some staff.

Even my most apathetic students were excited and said that they enjoyed the class period. Also, two of my most proficient math students were paired up and, although they finished the trig ratios with little trouble, were some of the last to figure out the rest of the non-math clues.

Students practiced the content, problem solved, and made connections. I want to play more with my students (enhancing mathematics through the play) and this was a great day for both.

Linear Relationship Open-ended Questions

2007-09-08T22:12:00.000-05:00

I'm working on asking more conceptual, open-ended questions in order to challenge students, encourage critical thinking, utilize the "Rule of 4", and prepare students for AP Calculus level of rigor. The questions below represent my first serious attempt. Visit ilovemath.org for the full pdf.

---------- ---------- ---------- ---------- ---------- ---------- ---------- ---------- ----------

Give an example of a linear relationship in graphical, numeric, and analytic (equation) forms. Use the same linear relationship for all three representations.
What is the relationship between the slope formula and the point-slope form of a line? (How can you derive one from the other?)
How can you identify two perpendicular lines if they are both in General Form? (What is special about the numbers A, B, and/or C between the two equations)
Why is the “intercept form” given its name? (What makes it different from the slope-intercept form?). Also, give an example of a linear relationship in intercept form and graph the line.
Will 2 pair of parallel lines that are perpendicular to each other always form a square on their interior? If so, state how you know and if not, provide a counter example.

If : L1 || L2 and L3 || L4 , L1 _|_ L3 and L4 , L2 _|_ L3 and L4
Then: Does the interior of these lines always form a square?

Given the four lines described in question 5, if you multiplied the slopes of the 4 lines together, what would be the product?
Do the following four points form a parallelogram? How do you know if it does or does not. Points: (−4,0), (2,4), (−2,−3), (4,1)
The table below gives the price, the supply, and the demand, for a certain video game.

Graph the points representing price & supply and the points representing price & demand.
Estimate the price at which the supply of video games will equal the demand. Also estimate the quantity that is supplied/demanded at this price.
What happens to the supply and to the demand when the price of the video game is higher than the price you found in part b? .... lower than the price of b?

linear functions review (skills)

2007-09-08T20:51:00.000-05:00

A full pdf with solutions is located at ilovemath.org. Students solve linear function problems (slopes, equations, intercepts, etc.) to fill in parts of the sudoku board. The final solution requires solving the sudoku puzzle.

Students seemed to be motivated to work the problems. Not a lot of high-level thinking, but lots of practice problems.

First day of school... postponed

2007-08-18T20:12:00.001-05:00

So, Thursday was our first day of school, but only for freshmen and new students. This left me with only a handful of students all day... and lots of welcomed time to continue to work. Friday was to be a full day with all students.

BUT.. 5 minutes before school is out Thursday, principal asks all teachers to shut off as many computers, lights, and appliances as possible. We were then directed to release students at the bell and then leave the school directly after them...

Come to find out, one of the transformers was in dire shape, throwing alarms, and ready to blow (which happened a few years ago). So, no school Friday.

We're good to go for Monday, but crazy way to (try to) start the year.

Job Targets 2007-2008

2007-08-14T11:02:00.000-05:00

First post on blogger. Some of my goals (personal and math PLC) are humbling, but I want them to be attainable.

Personal S.M.A.R.T Goals for 2007-2008

1. At least 60% passing rate on the AP Calculus AB exam this year.
a. Complete curriculum before Spring Break
b. All students take at least 2 full practice examinations
c. Students will classify at least 5 years worth of Free Response questions and examine grading standards.

2. Direct Instruction in my classroom will be no more than 40% of class time.
a. Direct Instruction will entail the rule of 4 to develop a topic.
b. Group work and cooperative learning will examine and analyze open-ended questions.
c. Homework and Quizzes will practice and assess skills

3. Students will utilize technology daily to solve problems and organize class work
a. 100% of students will subscribe to their class iCal.
b. I should observe students using TI-83's, graphing calculator(on laptop), eigenmath, etc. every class period.
c. I will experiment with other online tools including PBWiki, interactive classroom blog (more than just a place to post class information), and math content sites (Purplemath, InteractiveMath, etc.) by using them in class at least twice a quarter.

Math PLC Goals for 2007-2008

1. Meet or exceed state average for state math assessment, ACT, and AP Calculus scores.

2. Positively affect student classroom learning by increasing focus during PLC time
a. 75% of PLC time is focused on student learning in the classroom.

3. Implement UPIC problem solving strategy
a. Place a poster in each math classroom and at least 8 other classrooms.
b. Each math teacher will share a UPIC anecdote once a month during PLC time.