mathloverandteacher-blog

[mathloverandteacher-blog]

New Teacher Orientation

Fortunately and unfortunately, my district dedicates five whole days for new teacher orientation.

I say fortunately because I definitely feel like this district truly is a family. All the new hires got to introduce themselves to the mayor, all the principals and vps in the district, and all the supervisors and cabinet members. Of course, they introduced themselves too. But I don’t think that’s normal. I don’t think the whole administration of every district takes the time to listen to hours of new hires introduce themselves.

It is also unfortunate because it takes up a lot of time. Some parts of the orientation are pretty boring, simply put. The Danielson model is very important, especially if that is how we are evaluated as teachers, but I don’t want to spend a couple of hours every day on it.

The logistics of teaching is daunting. I honestly feel overwhelmed by the amount of usernames, logins, databases, and registrations I have to do. I don’t like talking about insurance or pensions! I don’t want to hear, “Oh, your login isn’t working? Call the tech support,” another time. I feel like there’s so much adult responsibility put on me and all I want to do is forget about how much is getting taken away for taxes or the union - I just want to teach and get paid.

The other day, my fiancé and I spent time looking through our bank statements to figure out how much money we make and need in a month. It was pretty sad. We’re going to have to live some frugal lives.

A part of me feels like I have to start grad school (for a masters in math education) soon. Partly because I miss taking math classes and challenging myself intellectually in that way. And partly because I feel like I’m already in stale water. 

Of course, being a new hire in a district is anything but stale. I mean, I’m overloaded with information that I could actually puke at the idea of all the things I’m “supposed” to know.

But one negative aspect of my district is that steps 1-3 are condensed. Which means I won’t get a single raise, no matter how minimal, for another 4 years.

On top of that, I won’t get reimbursed for grad classes until AFTER I’m tenured (into my fifth year of teaching) and then I have to commit another two years to teaching at the district at the small sad reimbursement of 33% of my grad school tuition.

Pretty much, I’m paying for grad school classes on my own penny.

So, logistics. Daunting. Earnings/ spending. Sad. Progress? Minimal.

I really want to start grad school soon...

[mathloverandteacher-blog]

Curriculum Building 101?

As part of a new, innovative STEM high school adopting a new math curriculum (integrated approach versus traditional), I honestly didn’t know where to start when I was told that I was going to build the curriculum from scratch. On one hand, this was part of the reason I took the job. I know whatever math class I’m going to teach, I’m going to do everything I can to revamp it so that it doesn’t look like your typical lecture and I do-we do-you do. If I am going to go through the effort of changing everything I know of high school math and make it more relevant and more truthful (I will get to that later), I might as well be in a school that supports the idea of switching things up. I am in a unique position where the director of the school, principal, and district math supervisor trust and support me in whatever direction I chose to take. With great power comes great responsibility.

But on the other hand, what?? I only graduated from college with my undergraduate degree eight months ago! What were they thinking, hiring someone so new to the game to start something fresh? I know high school math like the back of my hand, but I honestly don’t know the standards and PARCC expectations of those standards that well. I student taught Algebra 1 and 2, but this integrated math thing - it’s so new. I don’t even know how it’s supposed to look like though I conceptually understand that it’s meant to INTEGRATE math.

Unfortunately, the only curriculum maps I have found for Integrated math doesn’t really integrate math. I love the idea of project based learning (PBL) but their curriculum isn’t integrated... it’s just expedited. Numbers, algebra, function, geometry, and statistics are literally chunked into units like they are separate entities living side by side. Vision Project has great activities that introduce topics (honestly, I think a kid could teach themselves math painlessly just by following the curriculum), but it’s also split by modules that separate the maths. Aside from those two resources, I have stalked other schools and their curriculum maps, but they’re all the same. Algebra is separated from geometry which is separated from statistics which is separated from number sense. How integrated is that?

Maybe it’s because I’m stubborn and I don't want people to criticize my lack of integration despite the course name of “integrated”, but I cannot do that. I cannot teach a curriculum that does not say what it claims to be! But mostly, I think it’s because I LOVE math. Why in the world would I make math seem like a hot mess of randomness when it is a beautiful discovery of human intellect?

So what do I do?

I literally find the standards addressed in each course (standards are law, in case you’re not familiar with how the education system works), and I literally mix it all up. I was going to use post it notes or index cards so I could shuffle all the standards around, but I found that stormboard does the function just fine.

Is there a method to the madness? It is 100% NOT backed up by research. Most of my math peers love the structure and organization of textbooks (I do too- I always believed that a good textbook was infinitely more necessary than a good professor when picking my courses in college), but this was deliberately ruining the simple order that these standards were placed in. Let stubbornness and zeal take hold, because I am building a new curriculum from scratch and I will make it beautiful!

For integrated math 1 (IM1), I am going to start off with statistical modeling and move into functions. For IM2, an algebra 1 review (because it’s necessary) and writing equations based on word problems, graphs, tables, etc.

I know that’s an extremely vague way to explain what’s going on but I think I will  post what happens as it happens. Those lessons are going to happen in two weeks after the initial beginning lessons (what I’m calling Unit 0.5) so I don’t want to talk about them too much right now.

So before I close for tonight, I just have to elaborate on what I mean by the lack of truth of math in our education.

For starters, people believe that math is all about numbers. That word problems are the only way to connect math to everyday life. That math in projects (if done right) will lead to using statistics or algebra in a way that pretty much spells out engineering.

Well, that couldn’t be more wrong. Math is so much larger than that. One of my favorite youtube videos, The Map of Maths, explains the different areas of math. To put it simply, I believe math is the DISCOVERY of truth, the JUSTIFICATION (in the form of proofs) of these truths, and the USE of this truth (application). 

How much do schools teach us about math? Some schools are moving into discovery/ exploration activities, but most classes don’t. Proofs? Do students even see a glimmer of truth outside of geometry? Students are told, it’s been found and it’s right --- just use it for this problem. God, no! How dare schools limit the use of math to minimal application?

How is it that students are not taught LOGIC in school? Even basic truth tables don’t show up. Why don’t students learn that Ancient Greek philosophers were often mathematicians because they were the ones THINKING? Seriously... if there’s one purpose for teaching math in school, it is for students to learn and practice how to logically think. Yet many classes avoid thinking and tell students exactly how to follow directions and replicate that. If you want to work in a factory, sure. If you’re a little more creative with product, maybe you’ll become an engineer. But that kind of thinking will never lead you to become a true lover of mathematics.

And that’s why I say math is not represented truthfully in schools. It’s been limited to a little thing that is full of consequences if you’re not good at it. You might not even know why people make such a big deal about it. I mean, even the adults that say, “Math is every where!” can barely give you a good enough reason why to genuinely believe that because they are forcing their opinions on you instead of actually telling you the truth (probably because their education of math is also limited and they don’t know for themselves either).

Anyway. New curriculum. Integrated math. It’s going to happen. I’m going to make it happen. Hopefully it goes well