This is the second song that I'm composing in 16EDL, our main scale for March and April. And it's the second 16EDL song in the AAA format, with verses only.
My original plans for today's fourth period Math I class include continuing with the elimination method, perhaps giving systems where one of the equations needs to be scaled (multiplied). But before school, the TOSA appears in my class and asks how we're doing with the Chapter 6 projects. I quickly poll my neighbor teachers and discover that they have already started the projects in their classes.
As it turns out, it all goes back to the WASC visit and coming up with a presentable lesson. One of my neighbor teachers wrote four word problems that could be solved using systems. The idea is to divide the class into groups and assign one problem to each group. Then the group members must create a poster -- the four sections of each poster are for the question, tables, graph, and algebraic solution (which only requires substitution, not elimination).
My neighbors planned on giving the project yesterday (the block day) as opposed to Monday. But as I wrote in yesterday's post, the WASC committee member arrived in my classroom on Monday -- and naturally, if he was in my room that day, then he proceeded to visit my neighbors that day too. Thus the project plans were foiled -- he saw the same thing in their classes that he saw in mine, namely an ordinary traditional lesson (albeit on substitution review, not elimination). They still started the poster project yesterday though.
During third period conference, I visit my "prep period buddy" -- the lone other Math I teacher who shares the same free period. As usual, I tell her that I definitely want to have our usual Math III tutoring session on Friday (especially with the Chapter 8 Test coming up on that same day). But today we discuss our Math I classes as well.
Recall that my prep period buddy taught the lessons in a completely different order. Last week she taught elimination, not substitution like the rest of us. And for WASC, she found some different word problems that are set up to make elimination more suitable than substitution. Her classes still work on them in groups, but on regular paper, not posters. Since poster paper doesn't need to be passed out, she does have them begin their group assignment on Monday. (Her classroom is out in the bungalows -- and WASC did visit her bungalow yesterday.)
I reveal to her how my neighbors taught the lesson, and she asks me to share the poster project document with her as well.
Since we're all eventually going to give this poster project, I do so as well. And so I completely change my own plans -- instead of finishing elimination, I start the poster project today in fourth period.
But notice that this leaves me out of sync with everyone else. My neighbors haven't started elimination yet, while my prep period buddy hasn't begun substitution yet. I've done a little of both, mainly because I was trying to follow the pacing plan, which shows a project as the last week of the chapter (a couple of weeks from now) as opposed to now.
Perhaps I should have known that the others would rearrange their lessons to impress WASC. Then again, perhaps we all should have taken WASC into consideration at the meeting when we first discussed the plan (and thus placed the project during WASC week in the first place). It's also notable that everyone thinks it's better to have a word problem project during WASC, when my original master teacher once told me to avoid word problems on visitation days. (Then again, that was over a decade ago, just before the advent of the Common Core with its added emphasis on problem solving.)
The one thing I said about projects on the blog is that I don't wish to do them on my own, since I'm not necessarily good at implementing them (hence my sixth resolution). Instead, I should follow my neighbors and heed their advice when it comes to projects. That's why I start the project today in fourth period (and tomorrow in my other Math I classes).
How many points should the poster be worth? The pacing plan also shows a Chapter 6 Test, so I don't necessarily want to make this project be worth as much as a test (unless the others change their mind and decide not to give the test). Today is the first day of the project -- I haven't decided yet whether I'll continue this on Friday or give the usual weekly quiz. If I skip the quiz, then I could make this project be worth as much as the quiz it's replacing would have been.
Today is Eightday on the Eleven Calendar:
Resolution #8: We are mindful or books and other materials.
And of course, those materials today include poster paper and markers. (Meanwhile, since Resolution #6 is about projects, note that Sixday was on Monday. None of us started the poster project on Monday, though since it's a multi-day project anyway, we really could have done so.)
Here's a link to today's Mocha code:
https://www.haplessgenius.com/mocha/
Don't forget to click on Sound before you RUN the program.
This is the first song that I'm interpreting as 15EDL rather than 16EDL. This means that Degree 15 is the tonic -- this note is F, so the song is in F major. For 15EDL songs, Degrees 13 and 11 will always be interpreted as G and Bb respectively, since this fit the F major scale.
The chord riff for this song is a simple C-F (or C7-F). Actually, since Degree 12 (the note A) is avoided, we can get away with interpreting this song as F minor (with C-Fm or C7-Fm as the main riff). Since both Degrees 9 (D) and 8 (E) are including, this would be F melodic minor. Here is the complete melody of the single line: E(low)-E(high)-Bb-C-E(high)-G-C-F-D-D.
This song has just two verses, even though the project has four questions. The reason is that these questions come from one of my neighbor teachers, not the CPM text. I don't like to post anything created by a colleague on my blog, not even a song inspired by their work. Thus I only include two of the questions in the song version that I post here, though I might perform other verses in class. (In addition, one of the questions mentions the name of our school and that of a rival school -- which is also a school where I once subbed during the early days of this blog. But I don't post the names of schools where I work.)
This post is labeled Days 125-127. Monday is a teacher day with no students on campus. (I mentioned this earlier on the blog in explaining why this isn't quite a "Big March" stretch for the students -- but in a way it marks the midpoint of the "Big March" for teachers.) So my next post will be Day 128 on Tuesday -- which also happens to be Pi Day. And don't worry -- this is the last post in which WASC will be mentioned.
No comments:
Post a Comment