Monthly Archives: January 2013

So Sorry MS Sunday Funday – It’s JANUARY

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January is killing me.

Between December 19th and January 23rd we have four birthdays in my family. Throw in Christmas and a bout or two of sickness for everyone and my life has been on the insane side lately.  At work I’ve also been more busy than normal with parent conferences, mid-trimester grades, and MathCounts preparations.  It’s all been a bit overwhelming.

I haven’t had time to blog, or even set up the MS Sunday Funday for January.  I’m so sorry to all of my faithful MS Sunday Funday bloggers (and readers)!  I will get it organized this weekend if it kills me.  And, it might because we have nine soccer games this weekend in addition to two practices on FRIDAY NIGHT.  Soccer is evil.

I’ve missed tweeting and blogging terribly, along with sleep!  Today I got to go to a conference, and even reconnect with an amazing friend (who also happens to be a math teacher) from my past.  Today was inspiring, refreshing, and fun!  I’m even more anxious after today to get everything back to “normal”.

I love my life, and I love my job.  I just need more time!

 

iMovie

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The iMovie is coming!

I Speak Math's avatarone good thing

We had only 50 minutes.  I let the kids group themselves and then choreograph their own part of our fraction song.  I gave them only ten minutes to make props.  It was the coldest day of the year so far (and the windiest).  But, in only 50 minutes they designed, rehearsed, and even preformed their rendition of “The Fraction Song” for me AND the 2nd and 3rd grade students at our school.  I was as blown away as many of their signs on this windy day!  I’m working on the iMovie and will post it when finished!  Until then, here is the YouTube of my creative, adorable, sweet, and enthusiastic students.  I love 6th graders.

Here is the iMovie…

The Fraction Song

Adding fractions L-C-D,

Equivalent fractions each will be!

Denominators stay the same,

Numerators add some fame!

 

Simplify and Multiply,

Simplify and Multiply,

Times the bottom and the…

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MS Sunday Funday Favorites of 2012

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Click here to submit your MS Sunday Funday post!

#msSunFun

If you would like to add a post about your favorites of 2012, please click the link above.  I’ll be accepting posts all week!

My Favorites of 2012

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2012 was the best year I have ever had professionally.  I started my third year teaching middle school, and do not have a new prep or new book for the first time ever in my entire teaching career. This (and some bonus planning time in our new schedule) has freed me up to improve my existing lessons and actives, as well as create some fabulous new ones.  I feel more inspired (and effective) as an educator that I ever have, and I look forward to getting better each year!  This year would not have been as fabulous without the support from so many amazing math educators that I connect with on blogs and through Twitter.

My Favorites of 2012

Favorite Professional Development:

  • Twitter Math Camp (TMC) tops my list of my very favorite thing of 2012 (if not of all times!).  Professional development for us, by us.  Thanks Lisa and Shelli!
  • Global Math – Continuing in the TMC theme, this internet conference keeps me in touch with real teachers and helps me learn multiple new things every week.  Thanks Megan  for all of  your hard work on this!
  • MathTwitterBlogosphere – I love this incredible site created by @samjshah that introduces newbies to tweeting and blogging with fellow math teachers. 
  • Math Blogging Initiative –  Dreamed up by @samjshah, 140 new baby bloggers were born!  
  • A Day in the Life – I love that this series exposed how much teachers do in a day!  Thanks Tina (@crstn85)!

Personal Favorites:

  • Having Dan Meyer include my blog in a post on “Great Classroom Action”.  Dan was one of the very first math bloggers I found when I went back to teaching.  He helped me immensely and taught me what it means to share my ideas with other teachers freely!  I feel so honored to be mentioned on his blog.
  • MS Sunday Funday – I had no idea how amazing it would be to connect with other middle school teachers.  We teach the same topics at the same time, so having them in my GReader is pure gold.
  • One of my students Graphing Stories made “front page news” on Dan Meyers blog!  It also is in the top 10 for graphing stories most frequently downloaded!  Great job Arianna, Emily, Matt, and John!
  • Starting interactive notebooks – I can’t tell you enough how much this (along with Foldables) has changed my teaching practice.  Thank you Megan!
  • Foldables, foldables, foldables.  Enough said.
  • Barbie Bungee Activity – STARTING with a project and then teaching students the math as they need it is the way to go.  They actually care because their answer matters – if they don’t want to kill Barbie that is!  Plus, they just get it when they experience it first.  Seriously, it does not get any better than this!
  • Getting over 3,000 hits on my blog in one day.  For so long I barely got three hits a day.  I don’t live for the stats, but I love helping other teachers and this shows me that I am doing that!

One Good Thing

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My wonderful friend and teacher, Rachel, started a truly inspiration blog for teachers called “One Good Thing”. It is a compilation blog where different teachers post the great stories about their day! Just reading these stories can lift up any teachers spirits! She explains the concept best in her “About” statement on her blog.

“We are dedicated, fascinated, hard-working, inspiring. We teach. Our days are challenging. Some are great; some push us to the breaking point. Every day may not be good, but every day there is (at least) one good thing worth sharing. Here are our stories.” — Rachel —

Today I blogged on “One Good Thing” about my students singing the quadratic formula song. I hope you enjoy this blog as much as I am!

I Speak Math's avatarone good thing

This is my first time ever coaching a math club.  I have wanted to start a math club since I began teaching at my school two years ago.  However, as I went from teaching high school to middle school, all of my preps were new to me and I just didn’t have time.  I finally decided this year to start an official middle school math club.  We meet about once a week at lunch time.  It has been a lot of work for me, but I think it is amazing fun!  My math club students are very eager to learn advanced math concepts and they love competition.  I even bought buzzers!

At the last math club we talked about quadratic equations and parabolas, and I showed them the quadratic formula.  I played a quadratic formula song for them and we sang it a couple of times.  Quadratic equations are  pretty…

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Barbie Bungee iMovies – Line of Best Fit

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The Barbie Bungee iMovies are finally finished!  Barbie Bungee was my favorite activity of all times.  There is nothing more exciting then seeing seeing if your Barbie is going to come crashing to the ground.  The students learned so much and we ALL had a blast!

I’m not an iMovie expert, but I learned much more about it by making this movie.  The text moves way too fast – I wanted stationary text but it kept cutting it off.  My students told me they would help me with that.  They are only 12 years old, but much better at iMovie than I am!  I love them.

I told them they could make an iMovie if they wanted to – totally optional.  Three students made movies.  I have put them all (and the movie I made) here.  Enjoy!!

Zoe G, Ellie M, Trent A  (iMovie created by Zoe G)

 

My iMovie

iMovie by Ellie M.