Musings from Mrs. Galvan

I had a lovely conversation with my new Poly colleagues about using student blogs as digital portfolios.

My algebra and geometry students have been creating digital portfolios (using blogger) for the last 4 school years. Summer 2013, spurred on by my school's upcoming 1:1 laptop program, I attended CUE Rockstar conference. While there, I had time to think about how I might have my students use their laptops in class. I wanted them to be able to look at virtual manipulatives , graph things quickly and interactively using desmos, create constructions using geogebra, use online formative assessment tools like socrative and generally be able to use the internet as a tool to enrich their learning. All of these enhance learning, but I was also looking for a way to build in reflection and creativity into class also. After all, as Dewey said  “we do not learn from experience... we learn from reflecting on experience.” My theory was that blogger would be the house for my students' reflections.  Via the blog they have... ... Reflected on in class problem based learning tasks ...

New use the digital portfolio this year - a digital nod toward interactive notebooks - concept summaries and reflections for key problems for each unit. I am trying to make the my students' blogs simpler and more helpful for them as they look back on key concepts. We will see how it goes. I will post student work when I have some examples. Directions Sample Concept Poster from Cleo

This is now the 3rd year my students in Algebra and Geometry have made digital portfolios using blogger in my 1:1 laptop classroom. Posts range from simple summaries of in class PrBL tasks to elaborate projects. In geometry, students make constructions using geogebra and embed those on their blogs. Over the summer, for about a month I had "have students in algebra make interactive notebooks?" on my to do list. I was inspired by Sarah Hagan Carter and the sense of ownership her students must get from creating their own mini textbook via Interactive Notebooks . Additionally, her students are making a convenient and interactive study resource. I ended up deleting the to do item and moving on as I didn't want to give up on digital portfolios and I thought that having both seemed like too much. Yesterday in class I was thinking about how students can find a sample problem of an older concept when working on one of our interleaved problem sets? We don't use a textboo...

Today my geometry kiddos used our favorite Geogebra to construct a line through the center of a circle that is perpendicular to a chord. Directions: 1. Draw a circle 2. Draw a chord (use a segment) 3. Construct a line through the center of the circle that is perpendicular to the chord. 4. Add a point at the intersection of the line and the chord; measure the segments. 5. What do you notice? Make a conjecture and publish via digital portfolio.

Here are a few of my favorite student video blogs. I assigned each kid a different proof from our book to demonstrate. Lucas Samantha Uma Annie Will Gaia Maddy Prompt: Tips for making video blogs and embedding 1. Must be typed, including diagram, symbols and tick mark notation (I suggest using Google Drive's Drawing App) Must have decent "watchability" Copy/Paste diagram and proof into slides of a presentation, adding a new step on each slide (make sure diagram is always visible) Energetic Explanation NEVER type out reasons as you talk... add tick marks as your prove congruencies 2. Must use a screen capture tool like jing that will record your voice and your typed completion of the proof Practice. Find a way to inject humor and energy into this video. I have to grade like 50 of them. Make yours pop! Remember that you can pause jing 3. Must be embedded in your blog - control the size of the embed 750 x 750 ish is great 4. As always,...

New year! Among my resolutions include trying to blog more. Given grad school and school and family, it falls to the bottom of my list, but I really miss it. There is something about taking the time to reflect about my teaching that feeds me. I can't explain it other than to say that I am a major reflector. Today my geometry kiddos dove into the new year with discovering one method for proving a quadrilateral is a parallelogram using geogebra. Geogebra constructions are great for getting students to make sense of the theorems and for getting students to do a bit of inquiry. They are getting more proficient at using geogebra and publishing their creations on their blogs so it took 20 minutes for them to get to the point of publishing. Here is the  Prompt . I will try to remember to add student examples once they turn things in.

Students added this geogebra construction to their digital portfolios today. Prompt . I will add examples of student work when they turn them in.

The other day in geometry we defined medians and altitudes . Today they used their definitions to draw them, as accurately as possible. This activity consistently takes my students longer to do than I think it will. They struggle with drawing the altitudes especially. The struggle is good for them and deepens their understanding of the vocabulary. They added their drawings to their digital portfolio. Alex  Lucas Donovan Stephenie

Last week in Algebra (well the week before retreat) we started our unit on graphing linear equations. Generally we begin with tables and move quickly toward graphing via intercepts, the slope formula and slope-intercept. This year being my first time through with truly interleaved daily problem sets , they had already had several opportunities to remember from pre-algebra graphing via tables and calculating slope via counting rise over run from a graph. Hence, right away we were able to dig in to more detailed tasks. On day 1 after playing polygraph (lines), they began thinking about MAP's  Comparing Value for Money: Baseball Jerseys . From: http://map.mathshell.org/lessons.php?collection=8&unit=8200 They worked in pairs and quickly established that the price per t-shirt corresponds to the slope and that the one-off print set cost was the y-intercept. Actually graphing on paper was harder as I gave them a graph that went from 0 - 500 for the range and 0 to 25 for ...

True, to form, it is has taken me to the end of week 3 to finish my week 2 post... Highlights: Tuesday  in Geometry, students learned to use Geogebra while also learning about transformations - prompt here . Wednesday  in Geometry was spent reviewing for a quiz and writing their own chains of reasoning blog. Prompt: Examples: Annie         Andrew       Caroline In algebra, we are spending a lot of time taking questions on homework. Sometimes 10 minutes, which in a 40 minute class, is a significant potion of time.  Interleaved problem sets are harder, which is the point. The reasoning behind mixed over masses practice is that having to go from topic to topic forces the learner to concentrate more. More thinking = more retention. So yes there are lots of questions as they are remembering a lot of different concepts, but the time spent for homework review is  valuable. I am reading Creating Cultures of Thinking and lat...

Having long decided that 180 blogging won't fit my working mom of two life style, this year I am going for weekly blogging. It is important to me to blog to model ongoing learning for my students - I blog to reflect on my teaching and to have a place to receive ideas and feedback. I am already behind as I had planned to do this over the weekend, but I can blame grad school (this time) as I spent time working on my research project. Last week was great. The beginning of the year is typically a simultaneously draining and energizing time and this year was no exception. On top of getting into the rhythm of my new schedule and meeting my new students (who by the way this year seem to all be named Isabella or Madison or Ryan), I also sent my own son to school. William (I know, a far more unique name) started kindergarten and suddenly, I am a mom of an elementary kid. I am breaking all the rules from parenting books on how to get your kid to talk to you by grilling him everyday on th...

Tomorrow we will learn to use geogebra. Students will use transformations and publish their results on their blogs. Here are my instructions . Here is my sample. Criticism: My instructions are pretty specific and don't leave a lot of room for exploration. I am hesitant to give less structure though as this will be their first time with geogebra this year.

It is late. This blog post is only going to be adequate. I like linear programming. I just do. It just seems so practical and reasonable and Linear!   Last year I improved a class activity . My old activity was a handout on which I created parameters about a fabled farm for students to analyze. It wasn't terrible. However, the new task has students creating a business in which they research and set constraints according to their idea. Guess which one is more engaging and fun for 8th graders... This year I scaffolded the project a bit with a day dedicated to have students work with their business partners on their  Business Plan  before jumping into the project. I also added a bit of competition by calling the project Shark Tank . The groups with the best plans would earn my "investment."  I never did find the quintessential, short clip to show from the show, so feel free to link to your favorites in the comments. :) Link to prompt Here are a few of...

So one of my favorite people I have met since discovering the #mtbos is Jed Butler . At Edcamp earlier this year we got to chit chat in person and in just a few minutes, I had several ideas that I wanted to implement, including doing a variation of his assignment called Recycle Robot. Last year (see old prompt ), I had my geometry students find an object at home to measure and calculate surface area and volume. Then they wrote a blog post about their item (see student sample ). This year, I wanted them to create something and the Recycle Robot was a good match. I made a few slight changes, including a requirement to convert the surface area to units of post-it notes as I wanted them to connect this project with the day we spent on File Cabinet . I reread my short reflection on how this assignment went last year and my goal for the assignment holds. Like last year students are doing more than calculating something from a textbook. They are interacting with the object in a way that ...

Just like last year , the   Vi Hart inspired Time Lapse Video project was a favorite among students and for me. My students remarked in their end of year assessments that they liked the creative aspect. I enjoyed seeing their creative side and the simple truth that fast videos are much more pleasurable to grade when you're grading 56 of them. Throughout the year, one of my key teaching goals has been to teach to our school's recently revised mission statement. The examples below put the joy into "joyful pursuit of educational excellence." :) Caity's Blog Kendall's Blog Bella's Blog   Maddy's Blog   Brigid's Blog I couldn't get the video from  Angie's Blog  or  Bianca's Blog  to embed, but you can watch it on their blogs... and you should because they made great videos.

I like this project because it gets students looking for what we learn in class outside of class. It also gets them writing creatively and is a cumulative record of all the theorems they've learned this year. I have assigned this for many years, initially with students handing in actual photos in albums,  and have steadily made improvements.   Last year's improvement was having the students publish their safari journals on their blogs as it was my first year having students create math blogs.This year I added the rubric and the google presentation requirement. For next year, I would like to work with the English Department to make the writing assignment portion better. Perhaps we can research the literary requirements of a quest to help them to write better stories? Honestly, I am not sure why a lot of their stories are wanting. Does the geometry make it seem contrived? Are they waiting until the last minute to write? Did I not spend enough time talking about how to writ...

Way back on March 12, I started what I thought would be a 3 Act with blog summary activi ty to dig deeper into vertical motion in my Algebra classes. They watched a video of the Human Cannonball, we gathered questions and I gave them more information. I will definitely do this again next year, but, as I often discover even though I have been teaching for an eternity, well 15 school years now, is that things always take longer than I plan for. Converting units and being okay with pressing the sine button on the calculator required time, individual attention and counseling. After that hurdle, most students were able to answer two questions (What is his maximum height and what is the height of the net) and summarize their results on their blogs. Check out what Lucas published . Entirely valid way to collect time data. Question gathering ahead of Act 2

Desmos is reason enough to lobby your school for a 1:1 program. I had my students make their own Desmen , or Deswomen , exactly how Fawn directed her students , with lines and parabolas only. We had 20 minutes of class time. Some finished their faces in class, others did a little more. They turned theirs in via their blogs. Check them out: Sirus Claudia Will Keon Opal Brandon Bella Brigid Bryce Kelly

My Algebra kiddos recently (well two weeks ago; it too me forever to get around to grading these) completed their how to videos on factoring. I assigned kids different problems. They create a presentation with the step by step solution and take a Jing video of their explanation. I collect these via our LMS (Canvas) and grade them with a handy-dandy, clickable rubric. The rubric makes it easier, but grading 56 videos is still time consuming. Thankfully, it was rainy on Sunday so I had time. Here are a few of my favorites: Opal Angie Lucas Prompt: Step 1:  Find your assigned problem  (Links to an external site.) Step 2: Solve your equation Create a google presentation in which you add a step to your solution in a new slide. Use daum and save as a new image as you add the steps. Add hints, tips or define key terms using call outs, text boxes or arrows. Step 3: Practice Rehearse explaining your solution while you advance your presentation. This video sh...