Fibonacci Day, Zero Socratic Seminar, SLCs, Genius Hour, Coke Project and Thanksgiving Break!

Well I made it to Thanksgiving week!  I'm still amazed at how fast it is all going!

Fibonacci Day aka 1, 1, 2, 3...
Today was good day.  On a whim last night, I decided to do an inquiry lesson on the Fibonacci numbers today (it being Fibonacci Day and all), which meant scrapping my lessons plans last minute, but it was totally worth it.  For my 6th graders I showed this TED Talk and this FoxTrot comic from the NCTM, and for my 7th graders, I did this activity from Teaching Channel.  It took some additional planning, but my 7th graders were really engaged and asked to do similar activities in the future, which was awesome, and inquiry totally ties into one of our schools core values, which was great.

Zero Socratic Seminar
Tomorrow is our "What is Zero?" Socratic Seminar with one of my 6th grade classes (since we have a double period) and Wednesday I am doing it with my other 6th grade class and my 7th graders.  I'll be recording all of them, for inter-visitations, and I cannot wait to have them discuss!

SLCs, Genius Hour, and Coke Project
We debriefed SLCs as a staff during our PL time after school today and the feedback was really positive. Our next steps will probably be to incorporate more student reflection on their work during advisory time (maybe once a month or so).  We also discussed doing Learning Celebration Conferences later on in the year.  Something really interesting that came up after debriefing with students (and that I hope to blog more about at a later time) are that with SLCs, students are already discussing their work with their parents and don't really see the difference in a 10 minute SLC at school vs what they do at home.  It just made me think about the differences I'm learning about teaching G&T students.

Another thing that I was reminded about during today's PL time is how I still want to try to incorporate a Genius Hour soon.  This would tie into my goals of doing more learning centers and self-directed learning.  Even though I do have differentiated work, my students are all starting at A, for example, then some of them work through B, C, D, and E, while some only get to B, which is fine, but I would love to give them more freedom to study mathematics, in class, that they are truly interested in (I say in class because I do have some students who are teaching themselves trigonometry outside of class).  I need to do some more research and make a plan to make Genius Hour happen.

I also paired up with the Science teacher about planning out parent engagement visits (she's doing one next month and I will follow up when my 6th graders do their Coke project in February or so).  I'm very grateful to have her a resource.  Random side note, I am also learning how similar the 6th and 7th grade CMP3 curriculum really is, and I'm happy (since I am the only math teacher) that all the middle school students at my school will go through this curriculum.    

SLCs, CMP3, Schedules, Socratic Seminar (round 2), and I survived teaching Art!

I cannot believe that we are more than a quarter of the way done with the school year!  Last night was  Student-Led Conferences (aka Parent-Teacher Night), Thanksgiving Break is within site, and then the glorious Holiday Break!

SLCs and CMP3

Last night was our first round of Student-Led Conferences.  It was a long night, but they went well.  My advisees did great.  We are going to de-brief as a staff during our Professional Learning time after school on Monday.  There are definitely some changes we can make (in terms of scheduling the conferences, and having the students actually do a task with their parent rather than just presenting on their work).  I even got some really great complements from parents (my favorite was from a parent who said that they had gone to a private school open house with their son a few weeks ago and it turns out they were also using CMP3.  Not only was the teacher they spoke to impressed that we were also using this curriculum, but she was so impressed with how her son was able to talk about the math we have been doing (specifically the Locker Problem.)  She didn't have to stop in and tell me that, but the fact that she took the time out of her night to share that with me and thank me, was just another reminder why I (and all teachers do what we do.)  It also reminded me why I am so happy I am teaching with CMP3 again.  It is by far my favorite math curriculum (another student even said she loved how it wasn't just worksheets and practice, but actually fun).  Definitely no regrets there!  

New Schedules

We started new schedules this week, and at first I was not happy with it.  The reason for the new schedules was so that every class could have at least one double period a week (our periods are only 42 minutes long, which is just not enough time).  I guess I am getting used to them, but when my administration suggested changing the schedule, I would have preferred longer periods overall (like 60 minutes or so), not one day of 84 minutes and three days of 42 minutes.  I also don't like that it wasn't really a collaborative effort by all of us.  I'll give it some time.

Socratic Seminar, Round 2

I am going to be doing another Socratic Seminar next Wednesday!  After some very passionate discussions among my 6th graders about whether zero has an opposite or not, I decided that it would be awesome to do this as a Socratic Seminar!  Not only will this be what I used for my video inter-visitation in two weeks, but I asked my AP if it could be my next informal.  I am so excited!  I found these resources: Socratic Seminar Plan for Full Definition of Zero and Thoughtful Dialogs and Socratic Seminars, which I will be modifying.  I will even be doing it with my 7th graders, because it is such a rich mathematical idea.  I cannot wait! 

Art

My first trimester as an art teacher is coming to an end. This week is our last session together and then the week after Thanksgiving, we will be going to a Music and Drama (the other two art electives) presentation and my visual art students will hang up their three major pieces from the past ten weeks.  For our last session together, we will be studying Keith Haring, and they will be creating a Haring-esq Social Issue poster.  I am looking forward to it.  I am also looking forward to modifying my "curriculum" for the next trimester of visual art, with my 7th graders. Being that this was my first time teaching art (and I had no clue what I was doing) I want to make my curriculum flow better and change some things.  Overall I am really proud with how I did.  It wasn't perfect, but I tried my best, learned a lot, and am optimistic about the future.  Last week was also my first time leading a field trip at my new school.  We went to see the Canstruction Exhibit in Manhattan.  It was tiring, but I think everyone had a good time.  I am glad I got to go back again this year.  

So next week at this time, we will officially be on Thanksgiving Break!  I still cannot believe how fast this year is going.  It seems like just yesterday I was going to an info session about job openings at this school.  I remember how nervous I felt submitting my resume, while at a Starbucks (probably on a Wednesday night) and getting a call back for a demo lesson.  I was so nervous then - was I doing the right thing? Was I being crazy for taking a risk?  But here I am, loving what I do (even though it is not always easy) and happy with the choices I have made that have led me down this path.  I am a math (and art) teacher <3 

I survived the first full week of school, and I got a cold to prove it!

It wasn't a bad cold, more annoying than anything, but yes, the school year is *now* officially official.  A couple things to share about this past week:

* I painted with my art class for the first time last Friday.  It was messy, but I survived.  It was a two-week project, so we will be finishing it up this Friday (luckily only a couple of them need to actually finish painting).  They are coming out so good.  I really am so impressed.  Even more than the actual works, we had a great discussion before we started painting, using the elements of art.  This week they'll also be doing a formal pop art critique, so I am pretty excited with how are is going.  After this week, there are only six more sessions before we switch classes.  I am really enjoying teaching art.

* Speaking of electives, my Math Club this week will be exploring an engineering project on building towers, which I am super excited about!

* This week we finally got our grading system, Jupiter Ed, up and running, and I have at least two pieces of graded work in for all of my classes!  (yay me!)  I have never used this system before, but after a short PD on it from our literacy teacher (who is all about blended learning) and I am really impressed with it, specially with the potential for standards-based grading and parent communication aspect.   

* This week I had my first informal baseline observation.  My principal and AP came into my last period ICT class yesterday, and it went well.  My students were exploring when finding the common factors of numbers might be useful.  I was happy with how the lesson went, and the feedback I got today from my principal was positive and helpful.  Moving forward, I am going to work more on class discourse and discussions, which lead me to my next topic...

* I am trying my first socratic seminar ever this Friday!  I have always wanted to do a socratic seminar in math, especially since my social studies colleague last year was amazing at it, so after talking it over with my co-teacher today, and seeing how this Friday's lesson was kinda bland, we decided to try it this week.  The 6th graders have been doing them in their literature class, so they are familiar with the expectations, and I am excited about it.  My big concern (besides having never done one before) is that the questions my 6th graders will be discussing aren't really big, philosophical, open ended questions, but rather they will be exploring different approaches to finding the least common multiple and greatest common factors.  I am really excited to try something new that I have never tried before and always wanted to.  I will be sure to share the outcome next time.  

* Something that has been on my mind, especially this past week as we continue to move through the first unit on integers and rational numbers, is challenging my 7th graders.  Our first unit is on working with integers and rational numbers, which most of them already know how to do, being G&T.  They will do any work I assign in class, but the investigations we have been working on are all about understanding conceptually how integers work, and I am finding that, again most of them, already know this.  Today I even suggested playing the Stock Market Game, and about 10 of them said they had already done it in 5th grade.  So moving forward, finding challenging and meaningful math for them to explore will be a much bigger focus of mine, because CMP3 might be too easy for them.  

  

*Lastly, and this is a silly update, yesterday my boyfriend found this article on how much it would cost to build the Death Star, so of course the first person I thought of was my advisee who is obsessed with Star Wars, and I couldn't wait to share it with him this morning.  He was so excited, it might have been my favorite moment of the day.

So that's where I am.  Learning, trying new things, and nerd-ing it out, as usual.  I am pretty lucky to get to do what I do for a living <3