It's now October. Normally, this is the time I would blog about a book I bought at the biannual library book sale, normally held the first Saturdays of April and October. Well, due to the coronavirus, the library is still open for special orders, but not for used book sales.
Anyway, my copy of Eugenia Cheng's latest book -- x + y: A Mathematician's Manifesto for Rethinking Gender -- arrives as a special order for me at my local library today. Just as I did with her previous three books, I'd like to summarize her newest volume as our side-along reading book -- so this is what I'd like to blog about now instead of a used book from the sale.
But side-along reading books make sense when I'm a day-to-day sub, but not as a long-term sub. I need to focus on what's happening in my classroom, not what's in some book -- but then again, perhaps Cheng's book is exactly what I need to be reading right now.
After all, I already know math. It's the students in my class who are learning math -- and yes, many of those students are girls. Cheng's book answers the fundamental question -- why are girls and women underrepresented in STEM fields? And this leads directly to another question -- do males and females learn math differently?
What I don't wish to do is spend long periods of time blogging extended summaries of Cheng chapters, as I did with her first three books (when I had the luxury of time). Instead, I want to write brief summaries and, more importantly, apply what I learn from her books to the classroom. My biggest fear, as a male teacher, is that I'm subconsciously favoring the boys over the girls in my classes -- and that this could contribute to the girls in my class being turned off by math.
Indeed, when I first took this position, the regular teacher let me know about some troublesome students, and he warned me about a certain eighth grade girl. She seems to struggle with male teachers, and this includes him. She's exactly the student I'm worried about -- and I'm hoping that reading Cheng's book now will help me understand this girl's perspective and perhaps help her become a better math students. I'll meet her for the first time in fourth period tomorrow.
By the way, the regular teacher also warned me about some talkative guys in first period -- and sure enough, they are goofing off today. They are members of my largest group -- 18 eighth graders, including 13 in person (or is it 14 -- like yesterday, an extra girl is in my classroom for Cohort WF, yet according to the roster she's Cohort WO, online only). This is why I'm focusing on this largest class on the blog -- I know it will be a challenge to keep these two or three guys from taking over the class.
Today's lesson is on the graphs of functions. This includes those simple piecewise linear graphs without units, such as a positively sloped segment for walking away from home, a steep segment for moving quickly, a negatively sloped segment for walking towards home, a flat segment for stopping, and so on.
Some of the other eighth grade math teachers are considering dropping the slope lessons from the current unit. I wonder whether they'll delay it to after similarity -- since after all, some questions relating similarity to slope appear in APEX. Oh, and speaking of APEX, I finally gain full access to all the classes on this website. So now I can find out which students are succeeding in the lessons and which ones are slacking.
Tomorrow, I have one of those meeting with a special ed student and parents. I've subbed for many such teachers who have those meetings, but this will be the first such meeting I've ever had myself. (This meeting will be after fifth period, not during any class.) It is inappropriate to post any details about this student or the meeting on a blog post or a tweet, and so I won't.
Oh, and speaking of Twitter, this is what I'll do about Eugenia Cheng and her new book -- instead of devoting long blog posts to a discussion, I'll just tweet instead. After all, Cheng herself is on Twitter, and she's written a little about her book in tweets. (I expect her to explain the words "congressive" and "ingressive" -- two words I've read from her tweets -- in her new book.)
I won't tweet this discussion everyday -- I'll spread it out over the next several weeks. And once again, the goal is not just to summarize the book, but apply it to my teaching. I hope to become a much better teacher -- of girls and boys, of all students.
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