What's with the foreign language? Or Failure to Blog

"Chasm of Communication"
--Cory Sheldahl

LATE ENTRY==oops I meant this for 8/22...

Sometimes there comes a time (especially when one hasn't blogged in a while), that there are moments of inspiration that caused me to try to blog a few light bulb ideas from my not-so-smart phone. I cannot remember the sparks that prompted me to blog, but obviously they fell in a chasm of protocol (or programming) where the translation back to earth yielded gibberish.

I cannot remember the few inspirational thoughts that I wanted to share, but I do remember how good I felt at sending these epithets...It's ALWAYS good to double check before sending.

How does this relate to communicating math? We (teachers/adults) have a frame through which we transmit our thoughts and ideas, and generally assume everyone else has the decoder which to decipher our transmission (technically speaking). While the students MAY have the ability to translate it, they may not care or want to, which still makes the outcome just gibberish.

Mr. Shel

Comments

Times of Transition

I used to DESIRE to dig into research and to experiment and try a hypothesis in my classroom. Since COVID I have felt complacent and unsupported to try anything. This is the danger of not just the pandemic, but ANY major situation. Then I also became involved with MCTM and worked with people whose desire was to make math more connected again. There were several feeling the same way as I did, and for once that gave some comfort. I've discovered through personal study and investment in my thinking habits, (as mentioned in previous posts) that I am an Architect. Not by trade, but by mindful construction of the "Big Picture" and commanding the tools, resources, and assets I am connected to make it happen. Not to brag, far from it, for Architects also are behind the scenes people, and some have the opposite of superiority complex; that is to say, an inferiority complex. This is a dangerous feeling to have, especially if one is in a competiti...

Hope for the next standards....

Though the picture represents a different reason for my mug smile (taken in May 2022), it makes me feel the same way to try to continue to hope for the future of math standards. Currently we are working underneath the 2007 Minnesota Math Standards, and version III of the new standards have been out for comment by the public. Before, there were general ideas what was supposed to be presented to Algebra 1, Algebra 2, Geometry, upper standards (advanced data and statistics), but yet did not account for the College Now or other preparatory math many schools have implemented to be competitive. Here's a case example of hope for improvement. Currently I teach Algebra 1 to the eighth graders in our district. The curriculum we have is very rigorous (that is to say, the book focuses on rational exponents), and gives students little practice with integer exponents to build their confidence. This gap, paired with a low numeracy and low fraction exposure fr...

Incognito

Oh my... I have operated under the radar for the last year . There are so many things that have happened. For one, my post from winter quarter disappeared. Can't remember everything, so here goes... The picture you see is of my daughter being ready for summer camp before I left her for the week. I realize that I will yet again be teaching college now algebra (this was ladt fall). . Based on my last experience I was not excited to do what I had done the previous year. However when the school year started, I then realized how sweet a schedule I actually had. Actually this year's college now class was very concerned about their learning. There were a few, of course, that tried to command my attention, and I reminded them of course, this was a college-level class which required college level expectations. There was also a question whether or not I would return the following year and if so what capacity would I be teaching. It made me look for other possibilities well still ...

Blackboard Notes

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