Polynomial End Behavior and Multiple Roots Video
You just NEVER know where a math lesson is going to go once you bring in the “teenager” element. After a few very random events in class I decided to make a video to help explain end behavior and multiple roots to my students. Music included!
I was teaching multiple roots with the help of the fun terms “bounce” (double root) and “wiggle” (triple root) coined by Rachel. (Thank you again Rachel for sharing your files). So as I was talking about “bounce” and “wiggle” in class I MAY have said (sang?), “Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle” once…or twice. I have a tendency to sing random song clip-its throughout class, so it just may have happened. Towards the end of the lesson one of my students, Michael, raised his hand to share how he was thinking of it with the class to help everyone. He then started taking about Bounce It with Juicy J and Wiggle with Jason Derulo. EVERYONE in the room was like, “Oh yeah! I get it now.” Well, everyone but me that is. You know you are old when you cannot even understand what the teen people are saying. At least I DID know the Wiggle song, but all of the J names completely threw me.
After class I shared all of the dance fun with my teaching partner Chris. He talked about how he hi-lights what the roots look like at the graph when explaining multiplicities. He said he even draws a little frame around the root so the picture inside the frame looks like a line, a parabola, or a cubic function. I don’t think I’ve thought of roots visually this way, but when I shared it with my students they were like, “Duh, Mrs. Reulbach”. How do I always miss obvious things?
We also did the “End Behavior” dance to High School Musical (my sophomores are obsessed with High School Musical – it’s adorable). I threw in a lightening round of Simon Says End Behavior at the end but quickly had to cease all manic dancing when I noticed I was being observed from the door by several other teachers and one of our deans. Luckily I don’t embarrass easily! During all of the madness one of my students found an adorable picture of little ghosts doing math graph dances. I had seen this with stick figures before, but never ghosts! Adorable. Thanks Kallie!
I Speak Math 
Dang, Julie, this is awesome! Is this for Alg2 class? I haven’t taught end behavior in a few years, but if I did, I would do this!
Love how you ask the question in Nearpod if they got it or not, and if they have any questions, enter them in the box. That’s a great idea.
I can whip out the Nearpods in no time flat. I usually make up the slides in ActivInspire software – the SW for the promethean board, because I’m fast with that. I usually see the need for a Nearpod the period before and crank it out. They’re not as pretty as Mathy Cathy’s, but they’re funtional. Cool that you inserted the cute video.
Thanks for sharing!
I am so jealous of your Nearpod skills. I hope to become faster in time! Do you pay the monthly/yearly fees for Nearpod? My storage space is getting full quickly, but I don’t use it enough to want to pay $12 a month.
No, I haven’t paid any $ for nearpod. Although my school gave me some special version, so maybe I have more storage?
The only bummer is I have to borrow the iPad cart from another teacher. He rarely uses them but still wants the cart in his room.
I love this approach !
I went to Rachel’s blog and am now following it. Thanks.
She’s awesome! You’ll love her blog!
LOVE the Nearpod with the music – that is too funny with the wiggle, wiggle, wiggle! I used Nearpod when I piloted iPads, but haven’t tried it with Chromebooks (which we went to this year). What devices are you guys using? I felt like it took me forever to create the slides too – but Steph’s comment gives me hope that maybe a little practice will speed things up. Sounds like you are enjoying high school!
Thanks Mary! Our kids have PC’s that you can write on, so they can use their stylus to participate in the “draw-it” slides. Kids can also use their iPhones. I am getting used to HS, especially now that I’m being more “adventurous” with my lessons. I think next year will be even better as I should have more time to plan fun lessons. I can’t live lecturing, I need to have fun when teaching. Lol!
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