#NCTMNOLA

There are two things I hope to get out of a conference like NCTM.  The first is an idea that I can use next week in class.  OK, maybe not next week, but basically something very specific and useful.  The second is an overall feeling of inspiration to continue improving, creating, thinking, teaching.
I did not achieve goal #1, but I did come home pretty inspired.

For starters, I've been inspired to write this blog.  I do not love writing, but I do think it would be helpful to organize my thoughts and maybe, if I'm lucky, hear the thoughts of my colleagues from other schools.

I attended a total of 6 sessions.  Well, if I'm fully honest, it was more like 4 and 2 halves.  Yes, I walked out twice.  It wasn't you, session presenter, it was me.  I'm sorry!  I wish it didn't have to end this way.

Did I mention that I don't love writing?  Maybe it's because I don't know how to organize my thoughts.  This time I'm going award-style.

Coolest Session award goes to.....
Eli Luberoff and Desmos for

Enhancing Mathematics in the Classroom with Online Tools and Lessons

I really don't know how to talk about this session without gushing like a school girl with a crush. The Desmos team has developed an amazing product.  It has incredible potential to challenge our students and make them learn in ways they actually find enjoyable, which would make my job soooo much easier!  Imagine teaching without having to sell the kids on the subject.  Imagine kids wanting to graph distance vs. time over and over and over until it's perfect and it makes sense.  And I don't need to convince the district to buy this.  It's free!  It's available to everyone with internet!  My kindergartener at home can be (ahem, will be) graphing the trajectory of a little parachuting man being shot out of a cannon!  

I admit, I already loved desmos before this session.  I already used it for a class project and my students loved it almost as much as I did.  It is entirely possible that Eli could've just stood there and not even said anything and I would've still thought the session was the coolest ever.  But he didn't.  He was charming and at ease and had the attention of everyone in the room.  Everyone was engaged, even though not everyone could participate.

Which brings me to......

Organizational Fail award

This one goes to whoever decided that a national conference on 21st century teaching and learning does not need WiFi.  What were you thinking, NCTM?  Seriously.  Quick shout out to T-mobile for unlimited hot-spotting from my phone.  Where would my iPad and I be without you?  Certainly not in the student.desmos.com (code nctm) cupboard of fame.  Maybe consider WiFi for future conferences, that's all I'm saying.

Now back to something positive. 

Most Entertaining Session award goes to

Video Games and Making Math More like Things Student Like

Dan Meyer!  Did anyone else think he won NCTM this year?  The auditorium was full for his session on making math class more like playing video games.  I'm not going to re-cap it.  I'll just highlight the parts that made me think.

• Isn't it interesting that Dan's mother-in-law wanted to read the instructions first and his father-in-law just went in and started playing Angry Birds?  Dan's take-away message was that the struggle helped his father-in-law have context for when he did go to the instructions.  He was more successful because of his approach.  I thought this was interesting because there's research that shows that boys and girls act this way when faced with a new task, too.  Boys just go for it, even if they don't know what they're doing.  Girls are more reluctant and want some rules or guidance.  I feel like I should have a source, but I can't remember where I read this.
• In games you can always go back and repeat a level.  Why not do this in class?  Well, I tried this.  I'm still trying this.  It makes sense to me!  I want to teach this way.  But it is very hard.  It is very difficult to find the time to do this well.  Because my classroom is not a Montessori classroom.  I can't have each one of my students learning at their own pace.  We have a test tomorrow, but you have a basketball game tonight?  No worries!  Just fail it and study when it's convenient for you!  Let me know if you have any questions!  When you're ready (is 2 weeks enough?) I'll just give up some of my free time, I have so much of it anyway, and we can sit down and you can demonstrate your understanding of the learning targets you previously didn't master and recover your lost points.  Until then we can both pretend like you're learning the new material in class, even though you kinda need that stuff you didn't quite understand in order to understand this stuff..............I think this approach really helps some students.  These are the students who are generally responsible and want to learn and do well, but occasionally life happens.  So I get annoyed when a student nonchalantly tells me they'll just fail the test and do the retake later because they didn't study.  Even though they're within their rights in my class to do so.  I'd love to hear what others' experience with AfL has been and if this resonates with anyone.  It's certainly a work in progress for me.
• Closed beginning - Open Middle - Closed end.  I like this!  I want to try it with my unit on Conics coming up.  My dear seniors' last unit of high school math!  At least in my mind.  In some of their minds the first unit was their last unit.  They've tuned out a while ago.  Here's what I'm thinking......Hey guys!  What would you do if you wanted to know something you didn't know?  Where would you look?  Google?  Great!  And say you wanted to know how certain parts of an equation affect a graph, what could you use?  Desmos?  Thank god for Desmos!  I want to give them a list of what they need to know and give them time to figure it out.  Then I want the groups to present what they found.  In other words, I want them to do what Dan's father-in-law did.  Jump in, play around, understand the context, formulate some questions, and then read the instructions.  For the closed end I want to fill in the gaps, do some patty paper folding and some practice problems.  Will run this plan by my co-teachers tomorrow.  

Most Important Session award

Teacher Influence on Girls’ Math Identity

The session was a little slow to get going, but once it did, it rocked.  Unfortunately, I thought I could be in two places at once and only stayed for the first half, but I quickly regretted this decision and came back.  The presenters, Lynda R. Wies and two ladies who appear to be her students, talked about how much a teacher can influence a girl's self-esteem in math.  I was there with a co-worker and the two of us brought it up during lunch with the rest of the teachers from our school and had an interesting conversation.  Did you know that when working in mixed gender groups boys are more likely to handle the equipment and girls record data?  The list of strategies is pretty much what you'd expect.  Reach out to girls, bring them in, encourage them.  Do not praise ability, praise effort, in other words Growth Mindset for the win!

Because this is sort of related to the theme of girl power, I met a lovely teacher from NY while having breakfast at the Ruby Slipper (OMG, so tasty!) who teaches at an all-girls school.  Apparently girls are not shy about doing math and doing it well when there are no boys around.  She recommends I check out TYWLS.org.  

Least Time Spent in a Session award 

Why did I step out of the girls session even though I was enjoying it?  I wanted to hear about teaching the ambiguous case of the Law of Sines.  Why did I come back to the girls session 10 minutes later?  Because apparently I already know how to teach the ambiguous case.  Did I misunderstand that the big secret method is to use your arm as a swinging gate to demonstrate?  I hope I missed something.  Otherwise I also recommend 2-3 other methods.

Most Personally Affirming Session award

Speaking of already knowing how to teach stuff.....

Tactile Trigonometry: A Hands-On and Technology-Focused Approach

The session was full of information.  If I was a new teacher, I'm sure I would've learned a ton.  But I already knew most of it.  A lot of what I knew, I knew from googling.  Yes, I literally google "How to teach the unit circle" and do quite a bit of research before planning my lesson for a topic I've never taught before.  I'm sorry I didn't stay until the end.  When i saw screen shots of the uber pixely graphs done on a graphing calculator, raised my hand and asked if they'd heard of Desmos, and heard that they can't use it because the school forces the parents to spend $140 on Inspire calculators, I realized that I needed to go walk off some anger.  I can only imagine how angry the presenters and teachers who actually have to work in that reality must be.  

First Session I attended at NCTMNOLA award

I know that's a lame title.  

The Conic Sections: From Paper Folding to Sketches to Equations

Thank you for reminding me how the patty paper folding to develop conic sections works!  I only remembered the parabola before the session.  I've taught this once before, but it's been a while.  

Last Session I attended at NCTMNOLA award

I almost made it to the end of my first blog post!  Many thanks to Anna of http://borschtwithanna.blogspot.com/ fame for the inspiration to join Twitter and start this blog.  And thanks to Kate Nowak of http://function-of-time.blogspot.com/ fame for the 

One of Us: Every Teacher a Blogging Teacher

session, which solidified my resolve to write at least one blog post.  I would raise a glass to you both, only I'm not in New Orleans anymore.  :)