The Popcorn Challenge

Today we did what I'm calling the Popcorn Challenge.  Students were presented with the question, "How much popcorn would fit in this classroom and how long would it take our class to eat it?"  I love the idea of this problem because there is no right or wrong answer.  Students just have to be able to support their answers with math and be able to explain them.

The students were highly engaged.  I brought in some popcorn for them to measure as a frame of reference and some to snack on.  They began by measuring the classroom.  Some used yard sticks and others went to the tape measure.  Once there was an agreed upon measurement for the length, width, and height, students were then able to explore various ways to figure out how much popcorn would fit into the room.

The students then focused on how long it would take to eat all of that popcorn.  One student referred back to the last movie he saw where he ate an entire bag of popcorn (however much that is) during half of the movie.  So he looked up the length of that movie to use as his frame of reference.  Others got out a timer as their group ate popcorn to figure how much the class could eat in a given amount of time.

My favorite part was when I happened to catch two students discussing the problem.  They were sharing their ideas and explaining their thinking.  They just kept going back and forth with their ideas.  The critical thinking was so evident.  It was also a great example of students showing perseverance and grit.  I was able to catch it on video.  The first part was actually during their break (which explains some of the background chaos).

Overall this was a great activity.  Students were highly engaged, thinking critically, and challenged to work through a fun, yet difficult problem.  I'd like to do more of my math this way. 

Post by @MrSorensen805

Match Stick Problem

Today for our number talk we did the match stick problem above where students are give match sticks arranged to show "6 + 4 = 4" and make the equation true by moving just one stick.  We used cotton swabs in place of the match sticks and tried to find how many ways we could solve it.

Students were highly engaged and very creative in their answers.  They surprised me by coming up with answers using variables and inequalities.  See how many ways you can solve the problem.

Here are some of their results:

And the Periscope...

Post by @MrSorensen805

School Energy Project

Day 1

A couple of weeks ago, our class was working on a project on how humans impact the climate.  We were finishing it up with a look at how humans can have a positive impact.  One suggestion that came from a student was to get solar panels on schools.  I thought that would make for a good project in itself.

Today we began that project.  We started with just a simple brainstorm.  Students thought about, researched, and discussed "How might we conserve energy at Rio Vista?"  They came up with some good ideas that they are now going to take home.  They will also seek to answer how they can conserve energy at home be discussing it with their families and responding in Google Classroom.

We will develop the project further as the week goes on.  The students will be the ones steering the project.

Day 2

Students were to complete their personal plan for the project.  They formulated groups and created roles within those groups to decide what part they will play in the overall project.  The groups changed quite dramatically from what I thought they would initially be.  My vision was that this would be a lot more about solar panels.  But since it is a student-led project, I let the students steer us in the direction that they wanted to go.

The final groups that were created were:

• a light bulb group looking at the potential energy and cost savings of switching school light bulbs 
• a water group exploring potential water savings at school and its relation to energy 
• a social messaging group looking at getting the message out to students, parents, and teachers of ways to save energy
• an artificial grass group exploring the cost and potential savings of replacing some of the school grass with fake grass 
• a tree group looking at the cost and overall environmental advantage of planting more trees on campus  

I'm very excited to see what each of these groups come up with.  I love the passion, excitement, and creativity the comes from the students when we allow them the freedom to control their own learning.

Day 3

We got a little distracted by the popcorn challenge today.  We took a short detour, but got back on track by the end of the class.  Students were only able to spend a short amount of time on their projects today.  Some took it upon themselves to work on it outside of class.

I received an email from one of the head grounds people for the district.  She seemed concerned and confused that one of my students had contacted her about getting the blueprints to the school.  Apparently that's against district policy.  While I suppose that I understand that giving students the blueprints isn't the best idea, I still love that my student took it upon herself to make this happen.  Her group is working on planting trees around campus and just wanted a map of the school grounds.

I loved getting that email.  I later got an email from my student asking if I will print out the map that she eventually received from the district. Yes, I will.

Day 4

Today the students continued on their projects.  Some needed to measure.  Some continued to research.  Some worked on posters and other visuals.

I reflected on this project and realized that it now looks very different than what I had in mind going into it...and that's OK.  Part of the student-led classroom is allowing the students to make the decisions about their learning.  It makes me think back to a keynote by Sugata Mitra where he recommended that teachers "get out of the way" of the learning.  I could have steered it back to where I originally thought it was going to go, but why?  Let the students decide where it's going.  And it's been great.

Post by MrSorensen805

Today, I Failed

I was having a great start to the day.  During my zero period intervention class, I worked together with two students to figure out a way to visualize 6 ÷ 2/3.  That was a challenge for me, let alone my interventions students.  But together we worked it out and came up with a system to make the math visual.  The two girls then used the strategy we came up with to solve the rest of their problems as they came up in ST Math.  The girls even shared with the rest of the class as they came into the classroom their new way of looking at dividing fractions.

We then moved on to a real world math problem.  Students worked on these collaboratively in groups.  They had success at varying levels.  During that activity Jason Green, Mr. Redbird himself, came to visit the class.  I got to chat with him while students worked on their problem.  We then went over how the students solved the problem in different ways.

I then moved on to our next activity.  It was one that I was excited to try out.  I was going to use Jon Corippo's Iron Chef activity to introduce a lesson on natural resources.  I had the template all laid out and ready to go.  I pulled up a YouTube clip of the actual Iron Chef show to explain the idea behind the activity.  I showed the students the Google Slides template and explained the secret ingredient to them.  I thought that it was clear and self-explanatory...I was wrong.

The lesson flopped.  Students were lost and confused.  What I thought was going to be a simple, quick activity turned into a long, drawn-out ordeal.  And all of this in front of Jason Green, head of Redbird, a blended learning PD platform.  My blended learning lesson failed. But I did learn from the experience.

Come watch me fail again in the Lab Class.  Let's learn together.

Post by @MrSorensen805

A Different Look to Learning

Today we had some visitors in the Lab Class from around the country.  Members of the EdLeader 21 STEM NIC came to visit and see some of the great things that are going on in our class.  The students were working on their climate projects where they were looking to design solutions to their global climate problems.

One story that was shared from one of the visitors was from a conversation she had with a student.  The student said that his parents thought that he wasn't learning very much this because he didn't have homework like they were used to.  Because he wasn't bringing home math worksheets or problems out of the textbook, his parents felt like he wasn't learning that much.

It wasn't until his dad showed up to our student-led parent night that he realized how much his son was actually learning.  At our parent night, parents were asked to do various activities from number talks and blogging to science experiments and building a spaghetti and marshmallow structure.  Some students even led a discussion on showing "grit".  There were several comments from parents about how much fun they had and how much they learned.  Parents could see how rigorous the class was despite the students not bringing home their textbooks and not having pages of worksheets to do.

Post by @MrSorensen805

Student-led Parent Night

After attending my first EduCon at the Science Leadership Academy in Philadelphia, I was inspired.  Also inspiring has been reading Paul Solarz's Learn Like a Pirate.  Both of these experiences have motivated me to not only move to a more student-centered classroom (something we've been working towards all year in the Rio Lab Class), but to a more student-led classroom.  One where students make choices about their learning and everything they do in the classroom.

The first step towards this goal was to have a student-led parent night.  One of our aims this year for the Lab Class was to try to increase parent participation with middle school parents.  We have held a couple parent nights to show parents what we are doing in our class that is a little different than what they've seen in the past.  We've gone over class technologies, discussed growth mindsets, and even had parents participate in number talks.  This time we decided to leave it up to the students.

The students had lots of ideas (as they always do!).  Ultimately what they decided on was to have the parents go through what a typical day might look like in the Lab Class.  They planned everything.  The created the groups that were in charge of the various tasks and chose who would do what.  Everything from flyers & posters to food & beverage to all of the activities that the parents would do.  They decided the order of events and who would say what.

Going into the night of our parent night, I really expected many to fail (which would be a learning experience in its own).  As parents began to arrive, the students became a little nervous.  The food group got all of the pizza and snacks ready to serve.  The parents filled the room and then some (we had 22 of our 27 families represented).

Our number talks group kicked things off with a number talk using the Bridge Riddle from TED-Ed.   They set it up with a brief explanation of what number talks are and how we do them in our classroom.  They then showed the first part of the video which sets up the riddle.  Parents then had to collaborate with each other to try to come up with a solution.  They were highly engaged, but struggled both with the riddle itself and the collaboration.

We then went into a blended learning model where students led three group: 1. An independent group using the computers where they taught how to use Student Connect to check grades, ST Math, and blogging using Blogger. 2. A collaboration group where they did a hands-on experiment and did some research together and 3. A student-led discussion on "grit" including the spaghetti challenge where parents tried to build the tallest structure that they could in collaborative groups using just raw spaghetti and marshmallows.

Overall, the student-led parent night was a huge success.  The parents were highly engaged and seemed to have a really good time.  We had several parents thanking us for a fun evening and that they learned so much.  I was really proud of our students, and it showed me how much they are capable of when given the opportunity.   Sometimes we just need to get out of the way and let them lead...

Post by Jay Sorensen (@MrSorensen805)