Today is the seventeenth of the month, and so this is my monthly "A Day in the Life" post for January.
8:30 -- On block Tuesdays, periods 2, 3, 4, and 5 meet. So today begins with second period. It's the first of two Math I classes meeting today.
I begin with a Warm-Up -- the students copy the statement. "This week our project will contain both individual and group components." Then they are to work on corrections for the first true quiz of the semester that they took last Friday.
Before I describe how my students do on this project, let me explain what the project is and how I ended up getting there. And that takes us back to last Friday morning's math department meeting.
At that meeting, the Math I TOSA (the de facto head of the curriculum team) was present, and he met with each of the Math I teachers during our respective conference periods. At that time, he described how we should run the projects.
First, there is a Desmos component. We have a choice of two Desmos activities -- one is on the correlation between income and SAT score, and the other is on NBA superstar Steph Curry, who plays for the Golden State Warriors (where the "Golden State" is right here in California). I choose the latter, figuring that my kids will find this more interesting. (The SAT one might have been a good choice for my Ethnostats class last year, since demographics were a major theme of that class.)
For the Steph Curry project, the students are asked "What do you notice?" and "What do you wonder?" as they look at the superstar's field goals made and attempted over his entire 15-year career. (These are common questions to ask during projects popular on the MTBoS.) His current season is incomplete, and so only his stats for the season so far (at the time this Desmos was created -- he was 230 for 450, with just over a quarter of the season completed so far).
As the Desmos proceeds, students create a line of best fit for the relationship between shots attempted (x) and shots made (y), based on Curry's career. Then they use this line to extrapolate how well he'll shoot this season, based on this line and how well he's shot in its first few months.
After the Desmos component, the kids move on to group portion. They will answer a question from the CPM text and analyze the correlation between amount of medicine taken and length of a cold. The idea for this question came from one of my neighbor teachers -- he suggested it after school last Friday. I'm taking my neighbors' input into consideration, rather than just the department chair or the TOSA.
And indeed, because I had so many tough decisions to make (Curry vs. SAT, neighbors vs. TOSA), I arrive at school this morning still undecided about what exactly the project will look like. What ends up making the decision for me was my inability to print files from my computer on campus. Originally I considered starting the Desmos today, and having them glue a helper page into their notebooks (with instructions on how to complete the Desmos in English and Spanish). But once that page doesn't print, I instead photocopy the medicine problem directly from a print copy of the CPM text, and then have the students glue it into their notebooks (even though we won't get to it until later this week).
He also suggests that I leave out the part where the groups do their own research based on an NBA player of their choice. As we've seen with "Linear Art," if we give the students a choice in their project (draw a picture, choose an NBA player), many will instead choose to do nothing.
9:10 -- About halfway through the period, it's time for music break. Today is another short 14EDL song in AA format (verses only), and it describes this project:
HOW MANY MORE?
I'll write more about this song after finishing "A Day in the Life."
9:15 -- I begin the project now, after allowing the students time to work on quiz corrections. But as is usual for this period, the project doesn't run smoothly.
First of all, only about half the students who scored below 100% on Friday even bother working on the quiz corrections -- instead, they spend the whole time either on phones or taking about non-math. And then this continues into the main Desmos lesson.
The Desmos lesson contains ten slides. After the experience of the fateful Linear Art project, I know better than to have the kids just work on Desmos on their own -- many of them won't. Instead, we go over the first six slides together, and I choose names at random to answer the questions (such as "What do you notice?") from the slides.
On the fifth slide that we reached, we must "predict" the number of shots Curry made in the 2015-16 season, based on his actual number of shots attempted, 1598. I use the line of best fit that I'd eyeballed earlier in the activity, y = (1/2)x - 17, but the students can use their own equation as well.
By the way, adjustments are still being made to the schedule. One new freshman guy joins the class -- at first he wasn't on my roster, and then he was placed in a different period. But now his schedule has settled with him in my second period class. I send him to the office to get Google Classroom access. He returns, and he's the first to figure out that to extrapolate Curry's first 1/4-season stats to the entire season, we should multiply by four.
9:55 -- Second period leaves for nutrition, but not without incident. One guy tries to leave early, or at least line up at the door during the last few minutes of class. When I tell him that he must return to his seat, he claims that he's about to "throw up," which is why he must be at the door. (Of course, he only seems to have that urge during the last few minutes of class each day.) So I assign him a one-minute detention, which he then tries to avoid serving. I must block the door to prevent him escaping, which then causes a huge traffic jam at the door.
After nutrition is my third period conference. During this time, I remember that today is Fourday on the Eleven Calendar:
Resolution #4: We start our Warm-Ups and the main lesson promptly.
I keep this mind as I prepare for the next class, since this resolution shows me how I can run the project more smoothly.
11:45 -- Fourth period arrives. This is the second of two Math I classes today.
First of all, in order to honor the fourth resolution, I change the Warm-Up. Now I ask the students, "What grade did you earn on last Friday's quiz?" And then I tell them that I won't stamp their Warm-Up sheets unless they either earned 100% on the quiz, or else completed the quiz corrections.
This goes much better. Only two students fail to finish their corrections. Then we move on to starting the project -- even starting it a little before music break. We reach my goal of matching the six slides that second period completed.
Of course, the fourth resolution isn't the only one on my mind. All three new resolutions come into play today -- most obviously the sixth resolution on implementing all components of projects.
The fourth period class also has a new student, a girl. Technically she's not new -- she missed class all of last week for unbloggable reasons. She quickly makes up her missing quiz and assignment and prepares to work on the project.
1:10 -- With only a few minutes left in class, I put up the same Exit Pass as second period: "Using my line of best fit y = (1/2)x - 17, how many shots do you expect Curry to have made in 1598 attempts?"
The answer isn't the date, although the date (17) does appear in the question. (OK, I admit it -- when I eyeball my equation earlier, I intentionally include the date.) While I sometimes find other ways to incorporate the date besides the answer, perhaps in hindsight, today isn't the best day to do so. After all, there are new kids in both second and fourth period, and I want to introduce them to the idea that the answer is usually the date. Also, this Exit Pass might lead the students to believe that they should all just use my equation in their project rather than attempt to find an equation themselves.
Instead, I should have just asked them to write "Mr. Walker's line of best fit is y = (1/2)x - _____," and had them fill in the blank.
1:15 -- Fourth period leaves for lunch.
2:05 -- Fifth period arrives. This is a Math III class.
We begin the Warm-Up question -- condense the expression log a + 3 log c into a single log. Then we move on to the main lesson -- the second part of Lesson 7.1.2, on properties of logs. Today, instead of condensing, the students must now expand log expressions.
After music break, we move on to a short activity -- Concentration. The students are supposed to divide into pairs, cut out the game pieces, and then flip them over. If the two expressions are equal (one condensed, the other expanded), then it counts as a match. Then they must write them as an equation in their notebooks.
I want the students to work with their neighbor as a partner -- indeed, I pass out the gameboards to cut to every other row, so that each pair has exactly one gameboard. But then some students try to partner up with those other than the ones I choose for them, which leads to an argument.
And then that invokes the second resolution, on avoiding arguments. In fact, as soon as I realize that I'm arguing, I lose the will to talk about the activity -- I'm afraid I might start arguing again. A few pairs do successfully complete the activity after all. I don't even put up a valid Exit Pass question and end up just stamping papers for merely writing the date.
By the way, there are certain things I say during today's argument that I only say because it makes me feel better -- not because it's worth saying. It's like a back scratch when your back is itchy. It's hard to scratch my own back physically, but when I need a mental back scratch, I should do so -- scratch my own back in my mind, and don't say anything out loud at all.
And in order to get myself to argue less, I actually give school PBIS tickets to the two students I argue with the most. I'm trying to force myself to stop arguing so much -- and this goal is so important that I will reward students who catch me arguing (but only if I start arguing, not if they argue with me).
How could I have avoided this argument altogether? One way is to tell the students in advance that they must work with their assigned partner sitting next to them, or otherwise it's a detention.
Another, more interesting way is to pass out index cards with matching numbers, and then tell the students that they must work with their match. This way actually fits Concentration, which is after all a game about making matches. I could even put log expressions on the cards, but I must be careful -- if students get confused, they might match up with the wrong people. I should use only trivial expressions such as log(x^1) = 1 log x, log(x^2) = 2 log x, log(x^3) = 3 log x, ..., log(x^n) = n log x with a different n for each card.
This also goes with another MTBoS strategy for pairing and grouping -- VRG, which stands for "visibly random grouping." This idea means that students are more willing to work with others who aren't their friends if it is obvious ("visible") that the choice is random (such as a name generator, or random index cards as in this example). If the pairing instead appears forced, then they will argue (even if it's just the same pairing that we could have obtained randomly).
Unlike second and fourth periods, there are no new students in this class. But one student, a senior girl who had apparently passed the first semester as a junior but needs to repeat the second semester, started to enroll in my class last week -- and she promptly transferred out the next day. When I started teaching that complicated lesson on solving exponential equations, she felt as if she didn't belong here and asked her counselor to move to another class.
Today's lesson is much easier. I suspect she wouldn't have been scared away if last Tuesday had been more like today. Just change "Part 2" of today's log properties lesson to "Part 1," and keep the Concentration game (with VRG to avoid arguments), and I think she'd still be in my class.
So for tomorrow's first period Math III class, I think I'll set up the index cards. Of course, this means that I won't pass out gameboards until after the students have paired.
3:30 -- Fifth period leaves, thus completing my day.
The "holiday stretch" continues. Yesterday was the MLK holiday, and of course we have the usual Presidents' holidays coming up in February.
And my goal to reduce and eliminate arguments continues. Once again, the idea is to say the right things and put enough structures (such as index cards for choosing partners, a la VRG) so that most arguments are avoided.
One fifth period guy is on the baseball team, so he enjoys using sports analogies. It's important to avoid arguments, whether in the classroom or on the baseball field. Of course, arguing with an umpire will get a player ejected. In the classroom though, I am the umpire -- and it does no good for the umpire to start arguing on the field. So neither should I argue in the classroom.
Let's get to the Mocha code for today's song:
https://www.haplessgenius.com/mocha/
Don't forget to click on Sound before you RUN the program.
Once again, as an AA song, it consists of a single riff. Unlike the last tune, this is a true 14EDL song where the tonic F# really does appear.
Since Degrees 14 and 11 appear in the first bar, it's best to treat 14/11 as a major third, and so we should write Degree 11 as Bb rather than B. So Degree 13 becomes G in order to make 13/11 a minor third. We can now write the repeated line of melody as F#-F#-Bb-G-D-A.
This ought to be written as song in the Superlocrian scale. But with Degree 10 missing, our ear naturally wants to fill in the perfect fifth (C#), making the song sound more like Phyrgian (or Phyrgian Dominant, like a Middle Eastern scale). The resulting riff then becomes F#-G (both chords major).
Also, originally I wanted to sing our 14EDL songs in the F#2-F#3 range (as my main vocal range is Octave 3, the octave below middle C). But with the high tonic at Degree 7 missing, this song was easier for me to sing with Degree 14 as F#3 instead of F#2. The range of the song becomes F#3-D4, which aligns better with my vocal range.
Soon we will reach more complex 14EDL songs, with a verse and chorus (AB). These generated songs are more likely to include the entire 14EDL scale rather than skip some tones.
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