My team teaching partner Mr. Huntimer and I had great discussion today pertaining to collaborative learning. We happened to be talking to one of the more experienced teachers in our department about allowing (or forcing) students to work in groups to solve problems.
Our consensus was this...
We live in a world very different than 5 years ago and very, very different than 10 years ago. Because of changes in society and the increase in technology available to children these days, the students who walk through our classroom doors are very different than the students who walked through our doors a decade ago.
A large percentage of teenagers and young adults have spent the past three or four years being addicted to their smart phones and social media. Twitter, Snapchat, Instagram, some other sites that I have no knowledge of, and Facebook are the nicotine of the 21st Century to these students. They're addicted and can't ever have enough.
Mr. Huntimer and I agreed to supervise lunch this year and our school has closed campus for freshmen. Students are allowed to use their phones / devices between classes and during lunch. It's amazing to walk through the lunchroom on a typical day. Many times all eight students at a table are staring at their 5 inch screens with glazed eyes and blank expressions on their faces. Sometimes students are texting the person they are sitting adjacent to! There is minimal face-to-face interaction and even less awareness of their surroundings.
Our solution to this "lack-of-social-interaction" problem developing in our students today: FORCE them to collaborate in class. We have students work in groups of two or three for many of our tasks. For example, tomorrow's plan for geometry is for students to come to class with as much of the homework completed as possible. (The homework was a typical angle relationships assignment - linear pair, vertical angles, algebra mixed in, complementary / supplementary.) Then in class, their first task is to take 10 minutes are compare solution methods with their partners. We expect students to have meaningful discussion if their answers don't match. We expect them to discuss solution methods if their answers do match. Regardless, they are expected to be interacting w/ each other for the first 10 minutes. It should be a bit noisy, and we want that. After all, our lunch duty is more like library duty.
I'll try to remember to post a picture of what that looks like.
Wednesday, September 10, 2014
Our computers have arrived!
We were delivered some exciting news today - our 60 laptop computers (w/ styluses) were delivered today. Our tech department is in the process of imaging the machines and we should have them ready to go for next week!
In related news, our wireless network has been experiencing some serious problems these past two weeks. Let's hope all the issues get resolved before our official roll-out.
In related news, our wireless network has been experiencing some serious problems these past two weeks. Let's hope all the issues get resolved before our official roll-out.
Monday, September 1, 2014
Week 1 - with a whole lot of on-the-fly planning
Week 1 is officially in the books. Here is a quick recap:
Tuesday was a very brief (10 min) back-to-school day for students are parents. After telling all of the parents that Mr. Huntimer and I would each have 30 classroom laptops and we would be doing as much as possible paperlessly, we find out after school that the expected delivery date on our computers is now September 11. Shell shocked, plan B was immediately hatched and set in motion.
We immediately went to our principal and expressed our frustration about the whole situation. He contacted the technology director and were able to round up about 35 laptops that would be ready for our use by Thursday. The laptops would not have a stylus for students to write with, so they aren't exactly what we need. But they do serve as a band-aid until the shipment of our laptops arrive.
Wednesday was the first technical day of school. We joined our classes together (Geometry Team Teaching) and used one of the mobile laptop labs to get all of the students signed into Edmodo. The mobile lab had 25 computers that were working, so we had students partner up and share computers. Many of our students had previous experience with Edmodo so things went very well. We created a brief trial assignment for them to practice downloading and uploading documents for submission. A few students had problems logging onto the network while others had problems staying connected to the wireless network. All in all, it was an effective day.
On Thursday, our 35 band-aid laptops were ready to go and we again had the 25 laptops from the mobile lab. Our biggest class (when combined) has 51 students, so everyone had their own laptop. We again joined our groups together and demonstrated using the annotate feature in Edmodo so students could see the process of how we will be grading once our laptop shipment arrives. We got all students logged into the Pearson online materials site. We handed out textbooks and used a Google Form (linked through Edmodo) to collect book numbers. After that, we talked about expectations, class grading policies, and other first day procedures.
Friday we decided to keep our groups separated and finally dive into some actual geometry. As we worked through the first lesson (on points, lines, planes), we used the Pearson Interactive lesson and Virtual Nerd videos. Our main goal was for students to see what type of resources were available to them, especially when absent. We printed copies of the notes and homework assignment; typically we would send these through Edmodo.
Mr. Huntimer and I have decided we have no choice but to use paper for these first few weeks until our laptops with styluses arrive. Students are missing out on Geometer's Sketchpad until then as well, even though we might supplement with Geogebra. We anxiously await the arrival of the laptops. Hopefully when we go 1:1 as a school next year our technology staff will order the devices well ahead of time.
Tuesday was a very brief (10 min) back-to-school day for students are parents. After telling all of the parents that Mr. Huntimer and I would each have 30 classroom laptops and we would be doing as much as possible paperlessly, we find out after school that the expected delivery date on our computers is now September 11. Shell shocked, plan B was immediately hatched and set in motion.
We immediately went to our principal and expressed our frustration about the whole situation. He contacted the technology director and were able to round up about 35 laptops that would be ready for our use by Thursday. The laptops would not have a stylus for students to write with, so they aren't exactly what we need. But they do serve as a band-aid until the shipment of our laptops arrive.
Wednesday was the first technical day of school. We joined our classes together (Geometry Team Teaching) and used one of the mobile laptop labs to get all of the students signed into Edmodo. The mobile lab had 25 computers that were working, so we had students partner up and share computers. Many of our students had previous experience with Edmodo so things went very well. We created a brief trial assignment for them to practice downloading and uploading documents for submission. A few students had problems logging onto the network while others had problems staying connected to the wireless network. All in all, it was an effective day.
On Thursday, our 35 band-aid laptops were ready to go and we again had the 25 laptops from the mobile lab. Our biggest class (when combined) has 51 students, so everyone had their own laptop. We again joined our groups together and demonstrated using the annotate feature in Edmodo so students could see the process of how we will be grading once our laptop shipment arrives. We got all students logged into the Pearson online materials site. We handed out textbooks and used a Google Form (linked through Edmodo) to collect book numbers. After that, we talked about expectations, class grading policies, and other first day procedures.
Friday we decided to keep our groups separated and finally dive into some actual geometry. As we worked through the first lesson (on points, lines, planes), we used the Pearson Interactive lesson and Virtual Nerd videos. Our main goal was for students to see what type of resources were available to them, especially when absent. We printed copies of the notes and homework assignment; typically we would send these through Edmodo.
Mr. Huntimer and I have decided we have no choice but to use paper for these first few weeks until our laptops with styluses arrive. Students are missing out on Geometer's Sketchpad until then as well, even though we might supplement with Geogebra. We anxiously await the arrival of the laptops. Hopefully when we go 1:1 as a school next year our technology staff will order the devices well ahead of time.
Tuesday, August 26, 2014
More Information About Mr. Kreie
Follow along this year on Twitter with @BHSGeometry!
Also, @kreiem can be used to hear updates on Mr. Kreie's life.
If you're interested in Mr. Kreie's website, here is a link.
First Day - Here We Come!
The first day of school is today. In our district, the first day is a back-to-school type event where the parents come to class with the students. Each class is only 10 minutes long, so not a whole lot of learning can take place. Introductions, a brief overview of expectations, and contact information is the gist.
Still no word on the laptop delivery date. Come on, FedEx!
Monday, August 18, 2014
Flexibility in Teaching
8 days until school starts...
It turns out our 60 laptops were ordered on August 8th, and we have not received them yet. We may or may not get them in place before the first day of school. This is very frustrating because we have already put in countless hours of planning and preparing to be able to use them extensively the first three days of school.
Here's to keeping our fingers crossed they arrive in the next few days and are able to be imaged and ready to go by next Tuesday. And if not, this is just another example of teachers needing to be flexible in all they do. Even the best laid plans are sometimes too simple.
It turns out our 60 laptops were ordered on August 8th, and we have not received them yet. We may or may not get them in place before the first day of school. This is very frustrating because we have already put in countless hours of planning and preparing to be able to use them extensively the first three days of school.
Here's to keeping our fingers crossed they arrive in the next few days and are able to be imaged and ready to go by next Tuesday. And if not, this is just another example of teachers needing to be flexible in all they do. Even the best laid plans are sometimes too simple.
Saturday, August 9, 2014
MathTwitterBlogosphere - #MTBoS
I'm skimming through my nightly Common Core Math Resources & blogs I follow, and I have noticed the twitter handle #MTBoS re-occurring lately. I do a little digging and decide to join the MathTwitterBlogosphere world.
I just got done reading Andrew Shauver's blog post about why he is not worried about the future of math in the U.S. In a nutshell, he believes there is a movement that has started led by math geeks interested in changing the way we teach math. Less traditional routine - more innovative, creative, technologically rich lessons.
I have to say that I agree with Mr. Shauver on this one. We have so many free, online resources that are engaging to the students. And each day more are created. Within 5 years, I think there will be enough materials online that teachers will hardly need a textbook to teach from. Exciting times!
I just got done reading Andrew Shauver's blog post about why he is not worried about the future of math in the U.S. In a nutshell, he believes there is a movement that has started led by math geeks interested in changing the way we teach math. Less traditional routine - more innovative, creative, technologically rich lessons.
I have to say that I agree with Mr. Shauver on this one. We have so many free, online resources that are engaging to the students. And each day more are created. Within 5 years, I think there will be enough materials online that teachers will hardly need a textbook to teach from. Exciting times!
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