Reply To: Katrien's Progress Log

[Katrien Vance]

Goal one finished:  year finished and evals written.  Goal two finished:  met with Maggie and created plan!  New plan: Maggie and I are mixing 2 groups who are uniquely suited to be combined and mixed.  Inspired by some ideas from Krall’s book, I thought, how fun would it be if we taught math through projects and problems we know we love.  I color-coded the NCTM 5 strands (jumping ahead to week of June 24).  Then I took a week-long math summer camp I ran a couple of years ago, listed everything I do, and then color-coded things according to those strands.  Turns out I hit every strand without even thinking about it. So, now I am looking to craft 3 more rich “units” that are not Algebra units but are collections of projects and activities and tasks connected by a thread but which allow me to hit all kinds of math strands.  The hope is to have math class look more like what mathematicians do–exploring, analyzing, problem-solving.  @jon and @kyle, my goal is to NOT preteach but instead to present situations that the kids work through, noticing patterns and finding shortcuts, which I can then codify for them.  I have questions, which I’ll pose at the water cooler.  But I’m interested in hearing if it sounds like I’m just exchanging one kind of unit for another . . .