Back to School Ignite Talk

Man, I love a good Ignite talk.
5 minutes.  15 seconds per slide.  20 slides.
Concise.  Succinct.  Compelling.

Why not do my own version of an Ignite talk at Back to School Night next year? I get 10 minutes with parents and would love to change it up a little this coming year. Trust me, after surviving last year, I think the parents deserve a better, improved, and more reassuring version of Mr. Stadel. I'll explain that last sentence in some upcoming blog posts that I'll use to debrief about the 2012-2013 school year. If you're not sure what an Ignite talk is, let me introduce you to my man, Steve Leinwand.

If you like that, check out more Ignite talks by Annie Fetter, Dan Meyer, Max Ray, and Phil Daro. These are my go-to talks when I need a math pick-me-up. Do the math, that will be a little over 20 minutes well spent, being inspired by some key people in our math community. Seriously, check out those four talks.

I'm brainstorming in this space, so feel free to share some input please. At Back to School Night, I'll start by giving a brief 30-60 second introduction of what an Ignite talk is and how they work. I'll give an Ignite talk for 5 minutes, covering any of the following things:

• Standards Based Grading (SBG)
• Noticing and Wondering
• Common Core State Standards (CCSS)
• 8 Standards for Mathematical Practice (8 MPs)
• Problem Solving
• Homework (or No Homework)
• Find my Mistake
• High School Placement Tests
• Desmos
• A healthy balance of mathematical application with procedural and conceptual understanding
• Problems of the Week (PoWs)
• Quotes of the Week (QOTW)
• 3 Act lessons
• Reassessments
• Estimation (Number Sense)
• Tangram Tuesdays
• Whiteboarding

This leaves approximately 4 minutes for parents to ask questions or something else... Have any suggestions for those last 240 seconds?

Who's with me? Does anyone else want to do a Back to School Ignite talk? There's already been some interest generated on Twitter and I started a Back to School Ignite list. Shout at me if you're in. Or is this a really foolish idea? Seth Leavitt, my new online colleague and EnCoMPASS Fellow asked if I'll post it online. I don't see why not. Maybe we can create a space for Back to School Ignite talks.

*UPDATE: Each item listed above does not correspond to its own slide. I simply listed ideas that could possibly work their way into the presentation. Some support each other. For example, when talking about the importance of problem solving, I would mention resources such as 3 Act lessons and The Math Forum's PoWs. Feel free to add to or subtract from the list.

Ignite,
930

We don't need no stinkin' homework!

What are our students saying when they don't do practice exercises outside of school? This isn't a revolutionary thought. I'm just a slow learner. Last week I finally had enough of seeing too many empty desks when they're supposed to get out their Home Jams (homework) after our daily warm-up. I assign about 3-4 questions nightly Monday through Thursday. They're not worth any points because of the Standards Based Grading model I've adopted this year. I use Dropbox to sync all my home jams so students have access at home and I don't need to make photocopies or rely on students using a workbook or textbook. I don't collect them. I don't keep track of complete or incomplete home jams. Furthermore, chances are pretty good I will spend the first 5-8 minutes of class having students review the previous night's home jams as a group on their giant whiteboards. My school is in an affluent area and every family has internet access so why do I still see a strong majority of empty desks? I'm not the only one who is absorbing this pain and bafflement. Chris Robinson, Hedge, and Fawn Nguyen (my trusty cohorts) jumped in on this conversation/quest.

Let's find some scapegoats: laziness, apathy, age, adolescence, immaturity, puberty, hormones, SBG, points (or lack thereof), Gangnam style, etc.

Are these really worth my blame and energy? Should I be looking to point fingers, because I'll run out of fingers if that's the attitude I take. There seems to be a more productive use of my time and energy. I like Chris' idea of designing meaningful tasks for students outside of class, but right now I battle the clock with trying to design meaningful tasks for students inside of class. Therefore, should I be associating my home jams with incentives? Let's ask our kids what they think first before we rack our brains out. Here are the two questions we asked our kids today:
1. Briefly explain what reasons cause you to regularly complete or regularly NOT complete the homework assignments.
2.What incentives would motivate you to complete more homework assignments?
The results.

Reasons for NOT doing home jams:
I forget: 17
Online hassle: 12
Not worth points: 10
I don't need the practice: 1
I have other homework: 9

Reasons for doing home jams:
Master/practice skills: 18
I don't understand: 3
Prepare for assessments: 10
My parent makes me: 3

I didn't enjoy homework as a student and still don't (BTSA). I don't think students should be doing hours of homework. When my children get older, I hope they don't have hours of homework because I believe it would rob them from family time or time simply being a kid.

As for incentives, students suggested the following:
Make them worth points [that's not happening].
Make them fun [curious what that means].
Give candy [yup, all I need to do is encourage tooth decay, obesity, or diabetes].
Extra Credit [really? Again, that's not happening].
Put them on paper [I'm listening].
Bring in food [that co$ts money, y'know].
Play music [yes, I considered that and I like].
Redeem points for class prizes [who's paying for the prizes?].
Work it into Math B-ball [I considered that too and I like].

So now what? Enter my thought process and your input here. I'm open to the incentive idea. Could there be something for the group (since my students sit in groups) who completes their home jams all week? Their group DJ's music. They get comfy chairs to sit in during class. They get extra points when we play Math B-ball. They wash my car. Oh wait, that last one seems out of place. I'm going to sleep on this.

My parting thoughts go like this. It eats at me that learning just isn't more intrinsic, valued, and supported at home as much as I'd like it to be. Could that be another job for some caped homework crusader we all dream about? Incentives are cool, but is that just trickery? Am I tricking kids into practicing math? Once again, I think I'm asking more questions than necessarily providing answers. I'm not going to rack my brain out here. I'm not looking for a permanent and magical solution. It would be great to see students participate more and value their learning by practicing math. Is this asking too much of my 8th graders?

Jam,
1101

CMC - South: What could be?

November 2 and CMC South are only a few days away! I'm excited for a few reasons:

1. World of Nathan Kraft is flying in (if Hurricane Sandy isn't too absurd this week) from PA to attend. I'll pick him up and we'll carpool to Palm Springs for the conference.
2. Fantastic Fawn is literally missing her favorite football 'game of the year' to attend and cause some trouble with Nathan and me.
3. Mullet King Matt Vaudrey is both attending and presenting.
4. Recent doctorate and newly appointed Mathalicious brain Matt Lane is making the trip.
5. The infamous Dan Meyer is presenting (need I say more?).
6. ... and there will be a Tweetup on Friday with all these fab people, hopefully with John Berray too.

There are some appealing conference speakers this year. I wish there were more on Standards Based Grading. I think the two presentations I'm most looking forward to (besides Dan's) are Standards Based Grading to Evaluate Mathematical Practices by Lisa Miller and Take Your Places by Brad Fulton. I've seen Brad present before. He has got some great ideas and is hilarious with a capitol H. Sorry Mullet Vaudrey, I truly wish I could be at two places at once. Video record yours and post it, will ya?

I'll admit, there are parts of me that would get a kick out of the following:

1. Nathan checks his tuba at the airport, pays the outrageous fee, and carries it around CMC testing out the echos. Heck, we are in the desert, but there is a small mountainside nearby and we could test the echo off of that sucker. 
Tuba Echo from Nathan Kraft on Vimeo.

2. Matt Vaudrey needs to sport a mullet the entire CMC (if he hasn't grown one out by now) and have his camera ready to take pictures of some locals with mullets. I'll bet Matt a beer that by the end of Friday, we spot at least 3 mullet-y locals worthy of your ratio lesson for this year.
3. Fawn, better bring me that box full of avocados she owes me from File Cabinet. I'm tempted to pack my OG Nintendo and Tetris so we can have a little Tetris showdown. That way, she can't cheat on her Xbox (Okay, she might still kick my butt). At least I'll stand a better chance, right? If she doesn't bring me the avocados, maybe she'll bring me all her Brad Fulton books so I can steal, I mean copy them.
4. As for Dan Meyer, I'm looking forward to meeting him and actually looking up at someone for a change. I'm speaking of height here people. I look up to everyone mentioned in this post! However, wouldn't it be fun if our Twitter group heckled him during his entire presentation?

Stay tuned for a full report from CMC and some fun contributions to Estimation180.com

CMC to be,
930

Parent Conferences 2012

Today I had Parent Conferences from 7:45am to 3:30pm with a 45 minute lunch in there somewhere. We hold them in the gym as the middle school teachers sit at tables placed around the perimeter of the gym. Parents roam around the gym looking for teachers to talk with. I suppose I should back up a few days before I dive into today's happenings.

Wednesday, I did two things. First, I sent all my parents an email saying how excited I am to meet them on Friday during conferences and that I request they bring their child so they can help lead the conference. Secondly, I gave students a Review Quiz to assess their mastery, growth and retention of the concepts from the first few weeks. Many students demonstrated mastery, substantial growth, and are retaining algebraic concepts. They came into class Thursday to receive the results of the Review Quiz and were expected to fill out the following form. This form [editable version here] would help students lead the conference with their parents.

This form had multiple benefits such as guiding the student and giving them talking points. It was so cool to hear kids tell parents the concepts they were mastering such as "Distributive Property" or concepts they needed to improve like "Number Systems." It gets better. I had kids explain to their parents how Reassessments worked and how many they've set up with me. Again, there were some fantastic moments of kids proudly explaining the process. Of course, there were kids who haven't even set up one reassessment who should have by this point and it really drove the point home that their learning and 'grade' is ultimately in their hands. I wanted students to remind their parents that I only assign 2-4 home exercises each night and although they're not worth points, I wanted students to use their own words to illustrate why it's important to still attempt and complete them. Behavior was an additional suggestion by Chris Robinson and kids were actually very honest, if not modest at times. Lastly, let's move forward and have students come up with some specific, yet attainable goals and ones other than "Get good grades" [BORING!!!!]. Check some of these student created goals:

1. Don't be afraid to ask questions.
2. Do all Home Jams completely.
3. Keep myself organized throughout the year.
4. Avoid doing PS on Sunday night.
5. Ask at least one question per day.
6. Learn with a smile.
7. Avoid making careless mistakes.

Avoid making careless mistakes! I found myself telling parents that 'careless mistakes' are a natural feature built into a middle school student. My job is to help them get better at strengthening their skill of double-checking their work by being their own "math lifeguard." Yes, having goals, working toward mastery, and learning concepts will lead to "good grades." It was amazing how little I actually informed parents of their child's current percentage and grade in my class. It was amazing. Compared to previous years, there was a huge, apparent, and welcome shift in the context of Parent Conferences. Thanks SBG! Numerous times I told parents that students are being less "grade enthusiasts" because they are owning their learning and working on mastering concepts one at a time. See ya later points!

Some parents came in with agendas, skeptical of this "different way of teaching". Oh, you mean the teaching where I present students with a question, task, or problem and let them grapple with it for a few minutes, fleshing out ideas with their group members on their giant whiteboards as I circulate the classroom listening? The teaching where I only jump in if they are a hundred miles off base? The teaching where I look for students to discover solutions on their own and then share their work with the class using a document camera? The teaching where students are learning from each other and not following a contrived algorithm or procedure blindly without direction, interest, or appropriately struggling with it first? The teaching where I encourage students to take ownership of their learning? Right. Well, after a few weeks of ironing out some kinks from being too 'hands-off' at times with instruction, I've found my groove and I've found that happy medium between being hands-off and knowing when to intervene and instruct students. Not all students are ready or welcome the idea of a teacher being hands-off. Some, especially these middle schoolers, still need that procedural learning from the get-go. I respect that and am sensitive to that. Therefore, my happy-medium place is that where I allow students to grapple with concepts at first and with each other, but students will always leave my class that day knowing an efficient way to navigate to a solution, even if it's procedural.

Ending on a positive note, I had two conferences that truly brought warmth to my heart! Two girls in separate classes struggled in my class the first few weeks of the year. By no means are they strong students. They try and work hard, but not as hard as many of my other students. At first they wanted good grades, but that's changed to wanting to succeed and learn. They figured this out on their own. Their 'grades' were in the dumpsters the first few weeks. I gave the Review Quiz this week and holy smokes, they kicked math butt! Giving them back their assessment yesterday, sharing this news with their guardian at conferences today, and seeing their current 'grade' was an experience that confirmed that SBG is here to stay.  I'm proud of you two girls! We don't need no stinkin' points-based-grading.

Conferenced out,
942

Hey points, meet my new friend SBG

Dear Points,

We've been in school together for such a long time. Remember those book reports in elementary school where I just read enough to complete the book report so I got a good enough grade? or that time in high school where I colored a few extra maps and did some word searches in my geography class to earn points and raise my grade? or how about that senior English class in high school where I racked up massive extra credit points for turning assignments in early? or that one time at band camp? O wait, I wasn't in band. We had some good times, didn't we? Or so I thought.

When we went to college, we hung out way less and I wasn't ready for that. I missed you because my classes and instructors actually wanted me to demonstrate understanding of course content. They didn't really have a relationship with you. Now I know why. I had those math, science, and engineering courses that simply assessed my understanding through tests and labs. You abandoned me many times throughout college. After college, I fell into teaching and you showed your face again because I was confused and thought we could be friends again.

After teaching for 8 years now, our relationship has taken a toll on me. Last year, we definitely butted heads mid-year with a student and their parent who demanded I give them a point-based assignment to raise your grade from an F to a D-. What did they learn? Nothing. What did I learn? YOU SUCK! Our relationship while being a teacher has always been constrained. I'll admit, I was never 100% committed and vested in our relationship. Each year I was trying new ways to convince myself and my students that we needed you on campus or in my class by revising homework procedures, quizzes, tests, etc. I couldn't wait for last school year to end and be free from you during the summer. I ran into someone new over the summer: Standards Based Grading. He goes by SBG.

SBG introduced me to friends (teachers) who keep learning exciting and relavent for their students: Sam Shah, Shawn Cornally, Frank Noschese, Dan Meyer, etc. They have open relationships with SBG and share how their students are benefiting from it. In the short months of summer 2012, I've already learned more with SBG than my entire academic career with you. Points, you suck! Even better, I got to spend my summer getting well acquainted with SBG and discussing with Fawn Nguyen and Nathan Kraft about how flexible SBG is. All three of us had our reservations about committing to SBG, but we have now seen how SBG is the BFF to both students and teachers. SBG doesn't put any clamps on student learning nor hold a carrot in front of them. SBG has a circle of friends that welcomed me. They have unconditional love for my students and their learning. It feels naturally right. Recently, Chris Robinson even devoted an entire website to SBG.

This isn't the first goodbye letter you've received. I read the letter my pal Timon Piccini sent you and I was thoroughly excited to write you one as well. There's been others and I hope you receive more... maybe more letters than Santa receives at Christmas time. Be lucky it's just a letter and I'm not filing a restraining order. I wish I could. However, I know that we will have to coexist at my school. I'm not moving to another school, but if I ever do I know SBG will come with me and can only hope there are SBG friends there too. Since we have to coexist at the same school, I will respect those you hang out with, even if they're in my department. You still have their friendship based on fear of changing. Leaving you intimidates them. Points, you suck! My department wants to see how long and fruitful my relationship with SBG is this year. They're ready and willing to spend next summer getting better acquainted with SBG. I think your days are numbered. However, my greatest joy is that you will no longer bully my students this year. On the flip side, I hope you don't bully kids in other classes too much or let teachers abuse the joy of learning. I wouldn't want them to be the victims of your rebound.

I bid you farewell, points. Feel free to keep anything I've lent you. Keep my worksheets, handouts, CDs, that one t-shirt you borrowed, and even my book report from third grade. I need a fresh start and SBG has given me that. If we see each other on campus, in the hall, or in another teacher's classroom, I won't turn my nose up at you or talk down to you. We can still coexist at school, just know that you're not welcome in my classroom. If I see you bullying any of my students, expect me to stand up for them. SBG has my back, know that!

Sincerely,
Andrew Stadel