Monday Must Reads: Volume 27

Happy Monday! I hope you all had a lovely weekend. I had the awesome opportunity to give a 2.5 hour workshop on interactive notebooks on Saturday. It went super-well, and I look forward to sharing lots of files and information about what we covered in the workshop after I give the workshop one more time next Saturday. After the workshop on Saturday, my husband and I went to the restaurant where we had our first ever date to have lunch. It was fun to reminisce about our first date and talk about lots of math and math teaching.

Every Monday, I try to compile a list of the great ideas I’ve seen on twitter and in blog posts during the past week. Here are this week’s Must Reads.

Basketball Graph

Mashup Math recently tweeted a graph of every shot Kobe Bryant has ever taken in his career. I’ve seen this data before, but today was the first time that I thought about it in the context of being a math teacher. What trends would my students notice in this data? I had to stop and think a bit about why there was a half-circle section with almost no shots. I felt a bit silly when I realized the reason!

Image Source: https://twitter.com/mashupmath/status/955220829872238594

Solving Equations Opener

Looking for an interesting opener for solving equations? Goytre Fawr Primary has got you covered.

Image Source: https://twitter.com/GoytreFawr/status/941326955076562944

Balloon Proportions Task

Working on proportions? I like this task from Bluecoat Wollaton Maths.

Image Source: https://twitter.com/bluecoatmaths/status/449241969802223616

Order of Operations Countdown

Team Maths shares a fun order of operations puzzle from Mr. Taylor. I need to file this away for next year!

Image Source: https://twitter.com/Team_Maths1/status/751652779199004673

Volume Task

Mr Knowles has hit it out of the park again with two more great tasks shared on twitter.

Image Source: https://twitter.com/SK18Maths/status/955153052478132225

Pentagon Perimeter Task

Image Source: https://twitter.com/SK18Maths/status/952625242236702721

Equation Station

I’m always on the lookout for interactive classroom displays. I love this Equation Station from Michelle Courville. This could be adapted for many different grade levels very easily!

Image Source: https://twitter.com/CourvilleM/status/954858041794486272

Statistics Tutorials

Some of my favorite things to include in interactive notebooks are calculator tutorials. Students often forget the steps or happen to be absent on the day that we went over the steps in class. With the steps written out in their notebooks, all students are on an even playing field when it comes to being able to take full advantage of everything their calculator has to offer. Shaun Carter has typed up some lovely looking calculator tutorials for the TI-84 that address univariate and bivariate statistics.  You can download them here on Shaun’s blog.

Image Source: https://twitter.com/theshauncarter/status/954720908081496064

Geometry Area of Polygon Activity

Shaun also shared a hands-on activity that should appeal to all geometry teachers. I love how this approach gets students thinking about the math behind the formulas instead of just memorizing formulas and having no idea where they come from! You can find the downloads here.

Image Source: https://twitter.com/theshauncarter/status/954111219564150786

Measuring Angles

All math teachers know that time we are given to teach is never enough. I love the way Casey Ulrich makes the best use of his time by combining two topics: measuring angles and finding the sum of the interior angles of a triangle.

Image Source: https://twitter.com/ulrichedu/status/954502318724206597

Back to Back Graphs Activity

Paul Jorgens shares a back-to-back drawing activity that he uses with his students as a type of formative assessment. This could be adapted for so many different topics!

Image Source: https://twitter.com/pejorgens/status/954468182907011072

Combining Like Terms Card Sorting Activity

Jae Ess shares a great card sorting activity for combining like terms. Students have to match all of the cards that simplify to the same expression. I’ve done sorts like this before, and students always love them. Looking forward to stealing this in the future!

Image Source: https://twitter.com/jaegetsreal/status/954454292634722305

Chemistry Brain Teaser

Sigma-Aldrich shared a fun brainteaser with a chemistry theme. I posed this as one of our chemistry warm-ups this past week. I was a bit sad that only one student was able to figure it out. It turns out that the rest of my class claims they have never been taught the words “cirrus”, “cumulus”, and “stratus.” I’m certain this is NOT true. When the answer was revealed, the rest of the class also said that they had never heard of this saying before. This led to an awesome conversation about the origins of various common sayings.

Image Source: https://twitter.com/SigmaAldrich/status/952998889686274048

Pythagorean Theorem Soccer

I am super inspired by this real-world inspired task shared by Regina Dashiell to practice using both the Pythagorean theorem and scale factor.

Image Source: https://twitter.com/rbdashiell/status/872864812967100416

Shrinking Your Classmates

Rachel Blunt shares another awesome activity to address scale factor.

Image Source: https://twitter.com/MrsRachelBlunt/status/927622978078044160

Calculus Lanterns Art Project

Looking to combine arts and crafts with calculus? Check out this project by Michelle Ott that uses paper lanterns to demonstrate volumes of solids of revolution.

Image Source: https://twitter.com/michelle_ott/status/731216518126686208

Function Gallery Walk

Another great idea from Michelle Ott: Give students a set of criteria which they must draw a function to fullfill said criteria. Then, students have to do a gallery walk to evaluate each other’s work. Brilliant.

Image Source: https://twitter.com/michelle_ott/status/844258467737165824

Law of Sines and Cosines Stations

I could definitely do a better job of bringing real-world applications into my classroom. It looks like Silviya Gallo has this concept down, though! Check out these stations for law of sines and cosines.

Image Source: https://twitter.com/Gallo_wths/status/941322205442568193

Polynomials Telephone

One of my favorite function activities is a telephone game. I love how Liz Mastalio adapted this telephone structure for polynomials. I’m looking forward to adding another activity to my upcoming polynomial unit!

Image Source: https://twitter.com/MissMastalio/status/953736978620706816

Around the World Geometry Task

Pam Wilson shares an awesome geometry task that I need to set some time aside soon to work out for myself!

Image Source: https://twitter.com/pamjwilson/status/953641381137960960

Praise While You Print

Looking to improve your school’s culture and boost teacher morale? Check out this awesome idea from Kam Renae Koyama. Encourage teachers to write positive notes to one another while waiting for their copies to print!

Image Source: https://twitter.com/KamRenae/status/953096206774763520

Translations with Transparencies

Teaching translations can be a tricky task. Lisa Dollar breaks out the transparencies to make the topic slightly less abstract.

Image Source: https://twitter.com/LMoneyMath/status/950848856182460416

Finger Paint Reflections

Lisa Dollar shares another awesome activity to make reflections less abstract that involves finger paint.

Image Source: https://twitter.com/LMoneyMath/status/951562065189199872

Pot Stir Group Discussion

Katie Roznai shares a creative idea for structuring group discussions.

Image Source: https://twitter.com/krozaline/status/840230949006778368

Baez Triangles

John Carlos Baez shares an interesting mathematical fact regarding on-going mathematical research.

Image Source: https://twitter.com/johncarlosbaez/status/952335645740969984

Cookie Cake Area Task

When will I ever need to use math in real life? Jennifer Michaelis shares a real-world example from the bakery section.

Image Source: https://twitter.com/MichaelisMath/status/955269585976127489

Types of Angles Task

Teaching angles? Julie Morgan shares some great ideas in a recent blog post.

Image Source: https://twitter.com/fractionfanatic/status/954766276097970176

Exponents Investigation

I appreciate Julie‘s willingness to be open with the world about both the lessons that go well and the lessons that don’t go so well. More of us should take a lesson from Julie (check out her blog post) and start sharing our own lesson fails. If we reflect and learn from them, then they really aren’t failures.

Image Source: https://twitter.com/fractionfanatic/status/952552187195994112

Exponent Puzzles

I’m super excited to see Amy Gruen blogging again! Her exponent puzzles that she recently shared on her blog are awesome. I especially like her use of leveling with the puzzles. Level 1: Find the missing exponent. Level 2: Find the missing base and exponent. Level 3: Use the same base to complete two different equations. Seeing these brilliant puzzles are making me wish I was teaching Algebra 2 again.

Image Source: https://mathequalslove.net/2018/01/exponent-puzzles.html

Until next week, keep sharing all the ideas!

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