Shopping with Algebra

We have just finished our unit ten project. explain how you felt the project went. Did you work well with your group? How do you think the final product came out? Did you have fun working on this project?

Technology

As we move into the 4th marking period we continue to use the technology that is at our disposal. My students seem to enjoy using the computers and the smartboard, and I am definately enjoying it. We have been using castle learning in the classroom, along with xtranormal. My students love making their own videos, and have been creating some pretty cool math conversations using the website. They have been using my website to respond to different posts on my reflection page, and have been using the calculator to graph functions. The grades have definately improved since we got the equipment and I am excited to jump right into it at the start of next year.

Welcome Back! One More Marking Period.

It's been awhile since my last post. I hope everyone enjoyed their time off and are ready to finish the year off strong. We are now entering the 4th marking period and the regents is going to sneak up very quickly. As we keep working with exponential functions I have a few questions that I want to ask you and hear your response.

1) When will an exponential function increase, and will will one decrease?

2) When an exponential function is in the form y = b^x, what will the y-intercept be every time and why?

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Common Assessment Results

To piggy back on my last post about my students doing more work and being better organized, the results of the common assessment proved this. I had 18 students pass this common assessment for the third marking period, when I only had 9 kids pass the midterm. That means that I doubled the number of kids passing in one marking period, and I believe that's a result of organization and more engaging lessons. Although we have improved this marking period 18 out of 60 students is still not a good percentage at all. We need to keep working and keep improving. It starts with the students that just missied passing this test. I had four students get between a 60 and a 65 and four students get between a 55 and 60. That means if I can get those 8 students to work a little bit harder to get to that point of success and keep those that are already passing where they are, the improvements will be huge.

Third Marking Period

From my point of view I feel like the third marking period has gone the best out of the three. I feel like I am receiving more work than any of the other two and my students are more organized. I attribute this to the use of binders, and to the technology that I have recently been using in the classroom. I feel like the students are getting more exposure to the material and old regents questions where in the past they weren't given this opportunity.

To my students...

I want you to write in a short paragraph how you feel this marking period has gone in comparison to the other two. Has it been easier to stay organized, have you improved, and why did you improve/not improve?

ARRA

On Thursday, March 24th Laurie came into my room and helped me with a few of the technologies that I can use in my class. She helped me get a helpdesk ticket for some software that I would like to use in my class as well as the scanner installation. We discussed using the scanner to upload students' work onto their websites. this will benefit them in their education, because they will be able to keep track of their grades and will be able to stay organized.

Common Assessment

Seeing as how we have a test next wednesday in class, I want to know from my students what we need to review in order to be prepared for it. So, in a few sentences or a short paragraph tell me what it is we need to review next week in class in order for you to be successful.

Triangles

With the 3rd marking period common assessment looming in our sights we need to get through this trig unit. That's the last topic that will be tested next week. Thus far my students have done pretty well with it. Again it's the common theme where the ones that pay attention and complete their notes and classwork are successful. My students have been using Castle Learning to answer questions using pythagorean theorem. Tomorrow they will complete another assignment using Soh Cah Toa. Hopefully they are successful and the technology is benefitting their education.

FINISHED!!!

We are finally done with our projects. Three days of hard work, and I received a project from every group today. I'm hoping the finished products came out awesome and we will find out tomorrow when I grade them. Besides all the excitement that occurred today I was happy with the work my students did, and let's hope this will improve many of my students' grades.

Quadratics Project

For the past three days my classes have been working on a group project to finish off the quadratics unit. Mr. Mceneny, another math teacher, created  a project for this unit and instead of giving a test I assigned this project. It's going well so far. The students that are working well as a group and working efficiently are obviously doing well, and the others are going to receive a poor test grade. Everyone in their group will not get the same grade. If one person does all the work they will receive a good grade, and the ones that don't help won't. For the most part I am seeing a lot of good work being done and I think the kids are enjoying the process.

Classwork 3/11

1) Explain a real life situation that we have talked about in class where we have used quadratic functions.

2) In your own words explain to me how we find the solutions to a system of a linear function and a quadratic function.

3) Out of everything that we have done in class the last 2 weeks what is your favorite thing?

xtranormal creations

Once again it was a lot eaiser to manage my first block today while introducing a new activity. In class I paired the kids up and had them create a skit that they were going to input on the website xtranormal.com. it went well the first block but not nearly as smooth as third and fourth. I found that there is just too many kids in the room to rotate on 5 computers. It took longer than I had anticipated using the site. I was prepared with other work to do while the kids were waiting, but if I were to do this again it would be done in the library. Here is the link to two of my students' movie. It's a short clip, and hopefully there will be more added to it in the future.

http://www.xtranormal.com/watch/11341810/

This was done by Jerry Kelly and Caleb Perry.

Graphing Quadratic/Linear Systems

Today the kids used Castle Learning and Jmap to practice graphing quadratic/linear systems. They are gettting the hang of using the calculator to set up a table of values and creating their graphs, as well as finding the intersection between the two lines. As usual they make the same mistakes and don't adjust when given the correct way.

Using Castle Learning went great with my first block class. They worked very hard and for the most part they completed both assignments that I had put up over the last few days. My third and fourth block classes did not go as smooth. First of all there are a lot of immature students in that class who can't cope with anything and focus on the task at hand. Once they learn that they are not going to win arguments and just keep quiet and listen they will succeed. The other issue we had was the internet was working very slow today on every computer. Therefore we were not able to totally complete the assignments on Castle Learning. Of course the kids could not cope with that and get over it so they shut down.

Castle Learning

Today in class my students got their first taste of Castle Learning and being on the new computers. For the most part everythng went pretty smooth. Not many of them were able to finish the assignment but that's ok because they can finish tomorrow or on their own. I set the assignment to close after friday so if they wanted to finish at home or in the library that was a possibility.

I created a Prezi to use as notes for my class today as well. It went very smooth with the smartboard because I didn't have to have somebody up front clicking the mouse to switch to the next topic. The Smartboard is working out magnificently and I feel like the kids are also enjoying the experience of it as well. I am having as many of my students come up to the board to experience it as I can and for the most part they are pretty excited.

New Technology

The new technology is finally here. I am very excited believe it or not to get back from break and start using it with my students. I have been working over the break to get my website updated since the demise of my last one. It is now updated, but now needs a little flair to it. I will keep working on it as I come up with new ideas. Monday my students will set up their e-portfolios and hopefully the computers will be all set to use.

midterms

          On January 11th, 2011 our ninth graders completed an algebra midterm that consisted of the first half of the algebra curriculum. This resulted in only eight of my students passing with the scaled score of 30. It was very frustrating grading these exams as I watched my students make the same mistakes over and over even after we discussed those mistakes on more than one occasion. The lack of study skill and motivation to study is the demise of the majority of my students. Work ethic is an issue that is almost impossible to impose on them and it only results in a failing grade. The amount of work is a direct correlation on how well students are doing on their tests. As I have said before I am receiving very little work from these kids and they are earning very low grades on their tests, quizzes and other assessments.