What do I take away from conferences?

I attend professional conferences for many reasons.  I want to:

• meet people that love doing what I do
• network with people so that I am not always recreating the wheel
• to get rejuvenated about teaching
• to learn neat things to take back and share with others.
• to have fun!
• to laugh!

This past summer, I attended #flipcon14 in Mars, Pennsylvania, and it was one of the best decision I made about teaching and my professional development.  The single best decision regarding teaching was probably choosing to flip my classes.  I met so many people, and learned so much. I left there with so much knowledge and so many cool things to take back to my classes and colleagues. 

How do I remember what I attend and learn?  I am actually very old school.  I took at composition notebook (the kind that is stringed together) and mapped out what sessions I would go to and what I would watch later via online access.  For each session, I wrote at the top the name of the session, the presenter, locations, and anything else I knew prior to attending.  While in the session I take notes, write quotes, small things that would remind me about what I heard and saw.  Each night, prior to going to bed, I would review my notes, add anything else, star the pages, etc and then review what sessions I wanted to see the next day and make changes based on what I saw that day. 

For instance, I saw Crystal Kirch on the first day and knew I needed to see her second session the following day.  I am so glad I did.  I learned about Kahoot, about WSQ, and about many other things I wrote about.  I use the WSQ daily with my students and it has improved my teaching and my knowledge so much.

I also tweet and email colleagues with things that I saw and and want to remember.

I am also lucky to have a husband that also teaches math, so I also call him on breaks, at dinner, drive home, etc, and tell him what I saw and learned.  He often asks me about it later reminding me.

I had made the decision that if my attending #flipcon15 was denied this coming summer, I was paying my own way! It was so worth every penny! I can't wait to see what I walk away with this coming summer!

Mental Health is far more important than Content

Tonight's #flipclass #flashblog is something that has been in conversations in my circles for several months now.  How do I manage to cover content while balancing student stress levels?

My students know that they can "tap out" if things get way to stressful.  If a student has a major exam, lab, project, etc on the same day as a summative assessment for me, my students are permitted to take my assessment on another day.  I have had teachers tell me that students will do that just so that they can talk to other students to find out what is on the exam and have an unfair advantage.  My responses to that include:

I tell my students what is going to be on my exam.  Why the surprise? I give my students a "focus list" with how many questions, how many points, and the type of questions.  It really should be a guessing game!

I also would rather my students show me "what they know", and not "what they could remember under the load of stress."  I would rather my students be fresh and unstressed.  I believe I can get so much more from them when that happens.

I trust my students.  Until, I get something that makes me question their integrity, they have my trust. It all comes out in the wash, right?  If a student is going to cheat, he/she WILL get caught.  I absolutely feel that way.

I rarely have a student "tap out" more than once a year.  I keep track of the tap outs.  My students don't abuse it! But, it's there for them if they need to.

How does this affect my curriculum? It simply doesn't.  That's the beauty of flipping.  I do so much more than my curriculum calls for, AND I am finished for the year with a little less than a month to spare.  I have the room to adjust my schedule so that my students are overwhelmed, aren't stressed, aren't suicidal, enjoy math, and actually show me their knowledge.  I know that this is rare.  I don't teach an AP class, but is curriculum more important than health. The kids are kids!

Why has this been in my circle lately?  I have a student that I share with other teachers (obviously) and it was brought to our attention that this young lady was sad.  So sad that she was vomitting, missing school, wishing for death.  This is a student that wouldn't speak up and make teachers knowledgable about this.  A student that appeared to be fine when in school.  Just a bit shy! We got an email from mom making us aware.  I got a private email from the mother, saying that my class was the only one the her daughter was stressed over, since she knows she can tap out if needed.  So, my students will always be able to tap out.  Math can be second!

Also, our high school is moving to a block A/B schedule next year.  Part of the reason for this is because of our building project (new school being built while we go to school in it!) and because a survey by parents and students revealed that the level of homework and stress on our HS students is very high.  Have 4 90 minute periods a day for 2 day cycle will hopefully lessen that stress and amount of homework.

I believe in teacher the whole child.  The whole child is far more important that math, I truly believe that.

A lesson that ...

I was teaching (or trying to teach) conic sections.  I wanted the students to fully understand the definition of each of these conic sections.  The students were having a hard time understanding the idea of the "sum of the distances" for an ellipse, and "absolute value of the differences" for the hyperbola.  To understand these phrases from the definitions allows one to take the concept to a deeper depth.  So, I decided to design my classroom desks in an ellipse one day, and a hyperbola another.  I had a long rope that I had bought from Lowes, and designed the room so that the desks were in a true hyperbola with the "absolute value of the difference from the focal points" being constant.  I had a center point, endpoints, vertices, foci so that the shape was true to definition.  I randomly had 2 students that were sitting on the "wings" of the hyperbola measure the distance from the foci (another student holding the rope).  The students could visually see what was meant by the distance.  I did the same with the ellipse.  After defining and visually moving thing around, we then came up with the equations using the distance formulas.

The students found this approach more meaningful and more memorable.  When a student was stuck at a point in problem solving using hyperbolas and ellipses, the students would say, "Remember when..." and the students would be unstuck.

I am not sure that this would be considered an "off the wall" type of lesson, but it certainly was a lesson that wasn't normally planned.

Deep Learning looks like...

• chaos

          Very rarely will you find the class working in any particular order.

• students  working together

          Students never work alone.  They are discussing, scribbling ideas, trying different things.

• students yelling (well, not really yelling, but disagreeing about an avenue)

          Some groups actually end up disagreeing and then agreeing and then disagreeing.

• students walking around room talking to one another

          Often, the students are going from group to group to discuss with each other their ideas

• I am no longer the center of attention or even in control.

          I circulate around the room, stirring the pot, offering counterexamples, but never telling what to           do.

• many "aha" and "wow" moments

          Students get the smiles, when they might have it.  I love to hear the "wows" and "really"

• authentic learning!

          Students not being talked at, or lead.  Students create the road.

What I heard in my classroom, on a Monday!

I happened upon a twitter hashtag of #CelebrateMonday.  It got me thinking about my Monday, my students, and my classroom.  Here are some of the comments that I remember students saying today that made me smile.  There were many, but these are the ones that came to mind as I was thinking about my Monday.  These are in no particular order!

1.  Can't I just stay here with you? Your room is my happy place. (This came from one of my low-level remediation math students!)  This was probably my #1 #CelebrateMonday comment.

2.  Who knew that fractions made things easier?  (I wasn't going to bust her bubble and say that I knew! Students were working with fractional exponents.)

3.  I love radicals within radicals.  (One of my 8th graders shouted out as I he was working on a team check with his team.)

4.  Why can't all teacher's teach this way?

5. Math counts, BABY! (I gathered that one of our middle school math counts teams did very well this weekend!)

6.  Rational exponents are HARD! Time to rewatch the video! (said to the "Time to make the donuts, theme!)

7.  Thanks for caring, Mrs. McGowan! You are like our mom!

8.  I hope we have an early dismissal, BUT after this class, of course! (and no, we didn't have an early dismissal.)

9.  Student 1: Can't we just abolish Mondays?
     Student 2: Then Tuesdays will become the new Monday.

So, as several of my teaching hero's say, "You got a day here! Make it a great one!"

Depth vs Breadth, that age old question!

What I teach in which course actually is on both ends of the pendulum.

In my Flipped Mastery remediation course, I have to cover/review topics from Algebra 1 to help the students pass the Keystone Exam.  I really have the say of what I remediate and how I remediate those students.  I generally use the Keystone Exam results to structure those topics. Not much depth goes into that because it's a limited amount of time that I see the students prior to them taking the exam.  I try different activities to engage the students, such as popsicle stick activities, online matching activities, puzzles, online interactive games, and stations, but the depth isn't really there.

As for my Advanced Algebra 2 class, my department got together and looked at the PA standards for all strands, and decided where certain topics should be and would be taught.  So, the course is outlined for me.  We do take the standards to a much higher thinking for the advanced level student, and cover far more content than our college prep level of Algebra 2.  With flipping, I am able to teach the basic foundations through video, which allows class time to take the depth a little farther.  Without flipping, I never had time to pause and explore.  Now, I do that with my students far more often.  When a student fills out a WSQ that asks a question that is perfect for this, I am able to use the time to have students explore.  Before flipping I used to have to say, great question, research it at home, and tell us about it tomorrow.  Now, we don't need that.  Also, now that we are 1-1 with chromebooks, students have the devices at their fingertips (or at least in their backpacks.)

I wrote a blog about my espoused platform just recently, and in it, wrote about how my teaching philosophy has changed over the 19 years of teaching.  As it was discussed at Flipcon 14, learning is at the intersection of content, curiosity, and relationships.  My classroom has moved from content heavy to where there is starting to be a balance of all 3.  It only took me 19 years, and it wouldn't have happened without flipping.  So, the skills that I feel that are important to teach my students tend not to be entirely based on math, but on living.  Here is a short list to start those skills:

1.  I want my students to learn how to appreciate everyone, accept everyone, and to get along with all beings.

2.  I want my students to take risks, and learn from failure.

3.  I want my students to be able to work with other people, to problem solve with each other, and to trust each other's opinions.

4.  I want my students to be able to communicate effectively and affectively.

Oh Yeah,

5.  I want my students to appreciate math and learn life-long skills.1

Overcoming my fear of skiing

Today was monumental.

I have had a fear of skiing, both downhill and cross country, for many years.  I dislocated my knee cap 18 years ago, so the thought of skiing scared me to death. Furthermore, I hate snow and I hate being cold.  

Last weekend, my husband and I went snow shoeing, which I do like.  I have a lot of control over that, and falling isn't often.  We decided to snow shoe at the golf club which I am a member.  No golfing happening now, so it wasn't an issue.  Living in the Appalachian Mountain range, the golf course is quite hilly.  So, it was a challenge and a phenomenal workout.  While we were snow shoeing, we saw cross country ski tracks.  The snow was quit deep, and we were often thinking that cross country probably would have been a little easier than snow shoeing that particular day.

After snow shoeing, we met a couple friend for dinner and this couple are snow birds.  They love skiing, and in fact, they both have worked on ski slopes in Colorado.  Through this conversation, I thought maybe my husband and I would rent a pair of cross country skis to try it out.

Today was the day.  The weather was beautiful, sun was shining and the temperature was in the 40's.  An avid cross country skier recommended a particular canyon to go to learn how to ski.  This canyon follows a creek and is relatively flat, with very small inclines.  My husband and I embarked on this adventure.

We had a blast!

I watched a video on the basics on cross country skiing.  It was very helpful.  The only thing I didn't watch, and should have, was how to get up after falling.  We traveled more than 6 miles, and I fell 5-6 times.  I was actually happy about that.  The one fall was particularly interesting, because I right on the edge of the creek and was fearful of falling in.  I could not get up for anything.  At one time I was on my back with my skis in the air.  My husband politely reminded me that he didn't think that was going to be much help.  I finally got up, but not gracefully at all.

We also decided to climb a rather steep grade that wasn't part of the canyon.  Climbing was a work out, but fun.  When we go up to a bend, and realized the hill just continued up and around the next bend, we decided to turn around and go back down.  This was when we realized that we probably didn't make the best decision.  For a newbie, going down hill on cross country skis is not easy.  In fact it was quite rough and very scary. A couple of tumbles later (Thank God nothing is broken!) we made it down to the bottom.  We celebrated at the bottom.

This particular fear was mastered.  I loved it! I want to go back soon.  I want my own skis.

Why is this important to me realize?

How often do I get students that have a fear of something.  Possibly a fear of math all together, or a fear of tests, or a fear of working with others.  There could be a long list of fears a student may have.  My job is to try to help them overcome those fears.  My job is to find the beginner's canyon trail to help them move forward.  As I did with learning today, I had failures.  I fell, and I fell again.  I stepped on my own skis, and my husband's skis.  Coming down the hill, I wanted to cry.  I wanted to just sit down and not move.  But I didn't.  Overcoming those obstacles made me proud, and made me love cross country skiing.  Not quite ready for down hill, but frankly, that fear isn't s profound as it used to be.

If I can help one student this year overcome a fear related to math, I will be thrilled.  I will feel accomplished.