University of Michigan Teaching Fellows Community Blog

Water Filters

2011-03-24T20:14:00.001-07:00

During the last two weeks, we did a lab where the students designed and built water filters. To me, this lab seemed much more successful than the earthquake lab, and I usually left the school at the end of the day feeling good about what we did. This lab was designed to take less time than the previous one, and the students' tasks were simpler than in the earthquake lab (thanks to experience and some tips from Lucie Howell). I also completely cut out the powerpoint, which I think was a good move with this age group. This was again a two-day lab, and I spend Monday and Tuesday of last week with Mrs. Buckwalter's classes and Monday of Tuesday of this week with Mrs. Karalash's classes.

Read all about it.

The Nuclear Option

2010-05-28T11:38:00.000-07:00

For me, this will mark my final entry for the year. Many things have changed in my classes during the last few weeks. Molly had to leave for the remainder of the year due to medical issues, and a substitute teacher, Mr. Mustapha, has taken over. While I always felt that Molly and I had different ways of approaching the students, Mr. Mustapha seems to share much of my philosophy. He has been more willing to write referrals and tries to be as fair and consistent as possible. Nevertheless, the students still realize that they're basically on a boat without a captain, and Mr. Flowers has started delivering the lecture for half of each class. It is in this environment that I gave my final presentation, one that I had been thinking about for quite some time.

Read ...

Final days at Ypsi High

2010-05-17T11:56:00.000-07:00

I'm not good with goodbyes, so I'll just spit it out: this is my last post of the year. This academic year has had its ups and downs, but I certainly continue to learn a lot about teaching, about high school students, and about engaging non-technical audiences in interesting topics related to technical things. In my last two days I had the opportunity to do a design activity, which was bridge building out of candy (the same activity that I did with the students at the Expo in December), and I had a while to talk about my research on vehicle design optimization. These both went really well, and it was a great way to close out the year in these classes.

Here's the rest.

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

2010-05-03T15:50:00.001-07:00

No, this post isn't about environmental friendliness. In the last two weeks I gave presentations that I "recycled" from last year, both of which went pretty well once again. Since I used them both last year and they both went well, I allowed myself to be lazy and only made a few minor changes from the old slides. As a result, I can say that they both went well, though not exceptionally so. As is often the case, many of the students checked out early and quietly ignored me for both talks, but I did feel like there were a good number of students who stayed with me and as a result learned a few things.

Read about the two talks here.

Explosives & Scaling

2010-04-14T13:01:00.000-07:00

Last time, I came in with one of my favorite talks from last year, which ties into the proportions/rations curriculum with some testing I did as an undergrad with explosives. I talked about the big picture, which is designing army vehicles to protect soldiers from land mines and IEDs, and then we got down to the question of: "how do we learn about the effects of explosions on vehicles?" The answer, of course, is scaled-down tests, and this requires an understanding of proportions. Plus, it's a lot of fun to blow things up.

Read all about it.

CSI Ypsilanti

2010-03-24T15:35:00.000-07:00

Here is the Ruben's tube video I promised, along with photos of the crime scene absorption spectroscopy activity we did today (which was the most stunning success I've had all year). The activity was framed as a crime scene investigation evidence analysis, the handout for which can be found here.

More...

Robots & Lecturing On My Own

2010-03-19T10:01:00.000-07:00

One of my students has suggested multiple times that I talk about robots, so two weeks ago I came in with a presentation on robots, trying to link them in with geometry by discussing how all robots have rotating parts (tying into the degrees of freedom talk the previous week) and they all use logical arguments in sensing and responding to their environments (tying into the conditional statements talk from the beginning of the year). I felt like this was a very successful talk, though the student who suggested it wasn't as impressed...

Last week, Ms. Tran was out, and I had the opportunity to teach two days' worth of lessons. She left me the notes, and my job was to teach the students from those notes, and have them work on an in-class worksheet as we went through the material. This was a good experience for me, though an eye-opening one to the challenges that teachers face in managing a classroom for a diverse set of students.

Get more details!

Fun With Lasers

2010-03-01T06:15:00.000-08:00

I gave my second full presentation this term to all four classes this past Friday. Since I was planning on doing the typing contest I mentioned before, I decided to make this more of a demonstration and learning session rather than a hands on activity, which usually needs a lot more time and less rambunctious kids.
I chose to do a presentation on wave properties of light and sound. For the moment, I've decided to try and focus on different fields of science or engineering than the kids are used to with their typical coursework. The majority of the hands-on activities in class focus on mechanical projects, which makes sense with the resources of the class and the concepts that kids have learned in class. However, I wanted to see if I could get kids involved in more complex ideas by introducing them to a few strange physical properties.

At this time, I'd like to put in a plug for the Physics Demo Lab on campus http://webapps.lsa.umich.edu/physics/demolab/. In the future, I encourage all of you to give this a try in any class if you want to try an interesting demonstration since they have pretty much every cool demo imaginable. Most of these are available for rental as long as you can be trained how to use it and the equipment isn't ridiculously expensive or dangerous.

Basically I wanted to focus on the wave properties of light and sound since I know that this is kind of an abstract concept in junior high. Although many of the kids in class had heard the term "sound wave," they didn't quite understand what this could lead to. I can give more details in the future if anyone wants, but my demos included sound amplification, the doppler effect, properties of lenses and mirrors (including the formation of a mirage using two concave mirrors which the kids LOVED), how the human eye lenses/glasses work to focus light, and a total internal reflection demo involving the aforementioned laser.
Given the shift to a different classroom and the typing contest, I think these demonstrations went pretty well and most classes were able to calm down, settle in, and even ask a few questions. A few of the kids wanted to know if they could buy this stuff from somewhere :) For my next class, I hope to combine a demonstration with a hands-on project. I'm also hoping to take a poll to ask each class what they would be most interested in learning about to see if perhaps I can generate some excitement through involvement.
Regarding that, I'll quickly mention that the typing contest went pretty well. Considering that I could only be there one day a week since the announcement and couldn't actually take them through a typing lesson or two myself, I found that a lot of the class took the contest seriously and the top five people in each class were at least over 20 WPM. The nice part is, even a few kids who were already good at typing used the website to improve and I saw one student, in particular, jump up to 52 WPM. I'm going to try and consider over the coming days if there is any way I can get them continue practicing and hopefully taking more of the lessons.

Transformations in Shaun White and Tetris

2010-02-23T14:58:00.000-08:00

Today I came in with a discussion on degrees of freedom in design, which I think was crafted quite well and fit in with their unit on tranformations. I was planning to open up by talking about the game of Tetris, but I got an email yesterday about Engineers' Week, which gave a fun fact about snowboarding that I thought was more exciting. So I opened my talk with the video of Shaun White's victory run in Vancouver from last Friday, which was awesome. A lot of the students had already seen this, which was good because I think it drew them into paying attention as the talk was about something interesting, and for those who hadn't seen it, they got exposed to an exciting and quasi-important international event. After we watched the clip, I shared with them a bit about the history of the snowboard (straight from the E-week email), stressing the engineering effort and genius that has gone into the modern snowboard. I then went back to my original talk and brought up a screenshot of a Tetris game. Fortunately, almost all of the students had seen this game (I wasn't sure if it was too outdated, but apparently not), and I was able to get someone from each class to explain what the game was about. I was able to get it out of them that the player actually ROTATES and TRANSLATES the pieces into the desired position. I then asked how this might relate to something that people do in real life...

Here's the rest

Ideal gas producing close to ideal results

2010-02-23T09:08:00.001-08:00

Good news! I was right about my chilly propane tank. I was worried that the low flow rate may have also been due to the regulator valve connected to the outlet hose, which I would have been less than pleased about, since I wasn't in the mood to buy a new regulator. I'll have a link to the video of the first successful trial of the Rubens tube once I figure out where I can easily host a 27MB file.

Additionally, after initial testing, it occurred to me that the wavelengths of the tones I was playing on my guitar were longer than the length of the tube, so except for some of the higher notes, the flame waves showing up are actually representative of one of the harmonic modes being played. I think this is a neat idea to incorporate into my presentation (which I'll give tomorrow), since the class had just been learning about interference and how waves can be linearly combined. Perhaps being able to show a visualization of one of the harmonic modes individually might be a good way to illustrate how the constituent parts of a complete wave can be parsed.

Ideal gas producing less than ideal results

2010-02-16T09:51:00.001-08:00

The first version of my Rubens' tube is built, but the results are less than impressive. It's hard to light, the flames are very small, and the standing waves that should be generated by a constant tone aren't very defined. However, it recently occurred to me that my having snagged the propane tank from the gas grill sitting outside in 20 degree weather may be the cause of my problems. Having been outside all winter, the chilled propane in the tank is going to be at a relatively low pressure, which would explain the emaciated-looking flames I observed. Time to bring the propane tank inside and give it some hot cocoa and a warm bed to sleep in to help it re-pressurize.

Perhaps this would be a good example to introduce the ideal gas law to the chemistry class.

The MShoe, Take 3

2010-02-02T21:17:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, I came into my geometry classes with a tried-and-true talk that I've given for the past two years on a project that I did in grad school to develop a running shoe that generates power. This discussion is usually a hit with the students, as they seem to really understand this application of science to their lives. I used a model that worked last year...

Read the rest here

"It's not that I'm lazy, it's that I just don't care."

2010-02-02T08:18:00.000-08:00

As most of us have experienced and have mentioned at the last TF meeting, classroom behavior, distractions and lack of focus seem to be the largest barriers to effectively communicating, well, anything. This lack of focus and motivation also seems to be reflected in the class grades and district graduation rates. That said, I wondered if the students in Ms. Hardy’s classes were aware of these two significant indicators and what their general attitude toward school was. I was half expecting a response resembling the line from Office Space I quoted in the subject of this post, so put together a small survey to try to get at the answer. A sheet with the following questions were distributed to all of Ms. Hardy’s chemistry and physical science classes (not just the ones I’m in):

What grade are you in?
What is your favorite class?
Do you think doing well in school is important?
Are you happy with your performance in school?
What percentage of students do you think graduate from YPSD schools?
Do you think you’re going to graduate from high school?
Do you want to go to college?
Do you know the difference between a bachelors, masters and PhD degree?
What do you want to do after high school / college?
What’s your favorite song?

The answers and much, much more.

Calm Before the Storm

2010-01-25T19:57:00.000-08:00

Things are about to start getting a little crazier for me coming up with UPSM, but I'm getting excited. I've got my first full class period coming up this Friday where it will somehow be my job to command these kids' attention :) The field trip I organized to the LNF Nanofab in the EECS building is coming up (February 17th if anyone is interested in helping from around 9 am - 3 pm let me know (afkaplan@umich.edu)) and the next week I have another lesson planned where I'm either going to summarize and go over some of the details of their field trip, or possibly just pick what they think was the coolest topic and go a little deeper into it.

For the lesson at hand, I'm going with the DC Motor project which I think is a nice, quick hands-on activity that we can get done in one period. There's also a fair amount of room to talk about design improvements, etc. which I think is really the most critical part of this. I think quite a few of the kids are interested in engineering, but training them to think like one is a little tougher and that's the whole point of the class. I plan on running over the general operation of what they're about to build, having them build it, then working on troubleshooting and improvements with them at the end. Not sure if anyone else got to do this in school, but you basically have to wind copper wire, hook it up to a power supply, and place it over magnets to create a simple induction motor. I actually didn't even do this until college, but I think it's a great start for the kids to get interested in electrical engineering.

Of course I'll update everyone on the details when I get through with it. BTW, thank you for your suggestions, Carol! I plan on leaving some time at the end to get started with the kids on the typing contest to keep them interested and hopefully a little competitive ;)

Two Minor Victories

2010-01-22T13:57:00.000-08:00

This Tuesday, I came in without a presentation and was able to help students with their in-class work. They are reviewing for their final next week, and they had the entire class period to work on a worksheet, and it really should have taken them almost the entire time to finish it. As is often the case, many students simply ignored the worksheet, less so in the accelerated classes, but there were always students who just didn't care to do the work. I spent most of the time walking around the room and looking over shoulders to see if the students were doing the problems correctly, as well as answering questions when they arose. There are two cases in particular that I want to highlight here...

Read about the two incidences

All good things must come to a pause.

2010-01-11T07:00:00.001-08:00

Over the past three years, I have been involved with the Ypsilanti High School outreach efforts coordinated by the Office of Engineering and Outreach Engagement. It has been a very rewarding experience. I had worked with a total of three teachers in a number of Algebra and Geometry classes, as documented initially in the teaching fellows community blog, and more recently on my blog. While everything was not easy, with the problem of discipline in the class being at the top of the list, all in all, it has been something I looked forward to every week.

This year, I had been working with the Algebra Project (AP) classes. There were a total of two classes, which had been since combined to one due to scheduling difficulties. Since this class happens at a specific time everyday, I was not able to work my own class schedule this term to go along with the AP class schedules. I was hoping one of the classes would be moved to a different hour as was being considered initially, but that did not happen. As a result, and unfortunately, I will have to pause my involvement this semester.

It has been great working with the team, including Jill, Joy, Mary Beth, Angela, Abram, Carol, Leigh, Mrs. Lewis, Mrs. Porter, Mr. Tuttle, Mr. Weigel and all the other TF's, past and present, and I hope to continue being involved in other ways. Have a wonderful semester.

Back-to-School Car Talk

2010-01-08T11:10:00.000-08:00

This week, the first week back after the holiday break, I've had the opportunity to spend three full days in the classroom. Ms. Tran is out of town for the week, so I filled in for her on Monday, Tuesday, and Friday. She left worksheets for the students to work on each day, but I wanted to also bring in a technology discussion for the geometry classes. So, I prepared a talk about "the future of cars", as I thought it was appropriate to our location near Detroit, the recent big changes in the auto industry, and the fact that it's now 2010 and all of my friends back home were asking me on New Years where their flying cars are.

Extended version

End of the Trimester

2009-12-21T18:51:00.000-08:00

Since it is the end of the UPSM trimester, I wasn't able to work as much with the students over my last couple of visits outside of assisting them with finishing their final project. They were basically testing/making modifications to their wooden cars that they will raise using compressed air. Because of this, most of my duties have been reduced to making sure the kids use tools safely, operating the air compressor, etc., but this actually gave me some time to consider the upcoming trimester.

Both Monica and I remarked about how much more quiet the classroom has been recently with the kids working on their cars. This has only cemented the fact in my brain that my upcoming lessons over the next two months will most likely need to revolve around hands-on activities. Monica and I agreed on a couple of days where I will have the entire class period to teach a lesson of my choice to my 4 classes.

Along with hands-on activities, I wanted to attempt some kind of performance incentives for a couple of things. For example, in my first class, I would like to teach a topic, then have the kids do some research of their own and possibly bring me what they found after a week or two. One more thing I've considered is to give the kids some incentive to increase their typing abilities. Like reading, I believe that a lack of typing ability can hold kids back from the very start when they are asked to write complex reports or papers. Of course most of the kids still type with a single finger or two and I remember how quickly I went from typing like that to being able to type something as easy as 40 or 50 words/minute simply by playing some typing games on my computer. I'm planning on finding similar programs and giving the kids time to practice before holding a contest of sorts.

Since I am relatively new to this, I was wondering what other teachers' experiences with little contests and outside work have been. Has something like this been helpful in the past?

POW on last day of 2009

2009-12-19T12:19:00.001-08:00

I went in on Friday, the last day of school before the winter break, and we had a half-day with only 2nd (accelerated) and 3rd (non-accelerated) hours. I wanted to try another problem of the week (POW), and I tried the "congruent rectangles" problem that was featured in the training session with the Math Forum folks. This problem definitely looks like a math problem, so I wanted to spice it up a bit, and I began by talking about money, and then about foreign money. We briefly discussed the European Union and the Euro, and then I showed the graphic, which I superimposed 5-euro notes onto. So instead of asking the dimensions of random rectangles, I was talking about the dimensions of money...

Pre-break demonstrations

2009-12-17T09:19:00.000-08:00

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I was going to try to use more counterintuitive demonstrations to engage students. Ms. Hardy asked that I do one of these demonstrations on the 18th, their last day before the break. In my digging to find experiments of this nature, I discovered the Briggs-Rauscher oscillating reaction (see a video of it here). The rest of the post...

Second POW and Rollercoaster Discussions

2009-12-10T08:26:00.000-08:00

Last week I finished up the first Problem of the Week (POW), talked about computer viruses (as per a request by a student in previous weeks), and in some classes began a second Problem of the Week. While the first POW was successful and got most of the students engaged, the second one wasn't nearly as exciting or interesting, or maybe it just looked too math-y, because the response just wasn't the same level of engagement. This week I came in with a powerpoint talk that built off of a similar one I did last year about rollercoaster design. This was a fun discussion, and we talked about why we have rollercoasters, what we need to think about when we design them, and then the importance of the triangles and angles that we see in the truss structures.

There's more!

Fractional Learning

2009-11-30T10:42:00.000-08:00

Over the past months, I've noticed that there is a severe deficit in the students' understanding of fractions and it has not been improving. Realizing that they're shorthand for division, how to reduce, reciprocals; each class I get a question about one of these subjects. In an effort to cement their understanding of fractions, I chose to do the PotW #5260, "Fraction Debate", over a period of two days. Usually, Mrs. Porter and I have attempted to finish problems within a single class period over the course of twenty minutes. However, this doesn't provide enough time for the students to produce a whole lot of work on their own. Spreading the problem out over multiple days is an obvious solution, but my days at YHS are not consecutive. By the time I return to the classroom, the students will have either lost the problem sheet, lost their notes, or forgotten about the problem entirely. In this case, we started on Friday, and I returned on Monday to complete the problem, as the students were off after Tuesday for Thanksgiving break.

Read...

Mixtures and suspensions and cornstarch, oh my!

2009-11-29T10:23:00.000-08:00

The rest of the story...

First Problem of the Week

2009-11-20T12:08:00.000-08:00

This past Tuesday, I brought in a talk that combined two previous talks that I've given. I started out preparing to discuss the idea of tolerance in measurements, which I discussed in Ms. Tran's geometry classes last year, and I decided to add on a section discussing nanotechnology at the beginning, which I talked about with Mr. Lancaster's class two years ago. Today (Friday) I came in to make up for last week, when there was no school on Tuesday, and I attempted my first Problem of the Week with the students - the "Filling Glasses" problem. Over all, it was a very successful exercise that I plan to continue with.

There's much more if you follow this link...

My First Foray

2009-11-17T13:33:00.001-08:00

Although not the first time I've had to handle a group of 10+ year olds, I am about to finish my first month of junior high school teaching. Judging from the rest of the blogs on here I am having quite a different experience teaching at University Preparatory Science and Math, but I hope some of what I say will be at least somewhat useful.

I guess I'll start from the beginning. I work with Monica (teacher) in an engineering-based course for 6th, 7th, and 8th graders that has students use design software and methods to build simple structures. The idea is to get the kids to realize the tools they have at their disposal and how these tools would be used in engineering projects. For example, my first day consisted of helping the students out (and learning some myself) with a simple wood-block toy they created using AutoDesk. From here on, we will work on projects such as building race cars that we can run against each other using compressed air, etc. Overall, the class is fantastic. Even in the downtime if a project isn't being worked on, the kids are given a task such as making a presentation about what type of engineer they want to be.

So...first day. I started by giving a ~15 minute presentation about myself that the kids really seemed to enjoy. After a brief introduction about my hobbies, etc., I decided to do something that I really loved in class to grab their attention a bit. My physics teacher always used to show clips from movies and point out the scientific inaccuracies. This can pretty much be anything, but I chose two examples. The first was how lightning and thunder often occur simultaneously in movies and the other was the classic "bus-jumping-over-a-highway-gap" scene from Speed, obviously discussing gravity and projectile motion. Obviously everyone got really in to this and I tried to involve the kids by playing the clips and then calling on them to find out what they thought was wrong. After this I went into what I work on in a typical day (I'm an EE grad student so I gave them a brief overview of my research) that they seemed pretty impressed by as well. This was followed with taking questions then helping the students on an AutoDesk project.

All in all, control seemed to be the main issue I took away from my first day. :) The trick with my presentation was to get the kids involved without letting them run the show. Whenever I asked a question I would typically get the raised hands, but once one answer was out a bunch of other students wanted to join in. This typically led to me talking over the students rather than trying to quiet them all down. First, I just wasn't sure whether they would listen if I DID tell them to quiet down, but furthermore, they seemed to be quite interested in the presentation so they generally settled back in.

My second and third weeks have mainly revolved around the presentations the kids were giving on a specific field of engineering. The second week involved helping them gather information while the third was mainly spent listening to presentations, providing critique, and keeping the class in line. The second week pretty much went off without a hitch (although I found many students copying a pasting information into their presentations and changing the words and not grasping the subject, I'm debating whether I will do a lesson on research practices and skills with them if Monica will allow it). The third week is where the discipline aspect started coming in and that's where I started to debate some things.

During a good 50-60% of the students presentations, there was some kind of chatting or general craziness that involved some action on my part. Being only the 3rd week I've had with these kids I wasn't sure how to go about handling this, but didn't really have much time to think it over. Throughout the day, I generally decided that giving the students a slight tap and asking them to pay attention while standing next to the more troublesome ones for awhile worked most of the time. Inevitably, some would go back to talking after I left, but there were fewer doing this than I expected so it seemed like I was doing ok. The next challenge occurred when students were checking notebooks and one girl got upset and cried since she felt another student wasn't grading her fairly. Judging by the mood of the class and Monica, it seemed like they were just going to continue working and let her calm down. If I was an only teacher in a class I probably would have done the same thing, but I decided to try and help out and eventually I was able to coax her into finishing up by asking her for her help and letting her know that we needed her to finish the task.

All of this was done off to the side while the class continued, but it was here that I debated whether I should do what I did (basically a good cop, bad cop routine) or whether I should have followed the instructor and just let her be. Since she is in junior high, I didn't think I had to worry about coddling her too much which would just cause more future breakdowns, so this is why I decided on my course of action. Any input from you guys would be great!

Guess that's all for now. Kind of a quick summary I know but I'll try and get more specific about certain days over the coming weeks.

Sound Principles

2009-11-06T14:19:00.000-08:00

Today I gave my first large presentation to my two classes. On an earlier occasion I did a short talk on the LCROSS mission and had the class do basic calculations. That didn’t go over so well because I think many of them don’t share quite the same enthusiasm for space as I do. A few weeks ago I handed out a small piece of paper asking the students to write down a topic that they’d like me to talk about. I left the field open to any subject as I didn’t anticipate having any trouble finding math in even the most obscure suggestions. One of the most frequent suggestions was music; though many simply wrote ‘rap’, there were others that mentioned music, and how to build instruments. I decided that a presentation that covered the basic principles of sound and how it can be described mathematically would be the best place to start.

Read...

Logic and Programming

2009-11-03T20:44:00.000-08:00

Last week I came into Ms. Tran's geometry classes with a talk about programming in electronics, where we discussed some of the logical arguments that are embedded in the electronics that we use. I started off by saying that the conditional statements that we've talked about so far are things that we don't control, and I gave them a few examples of topics that we've discussed and other things that are relevant to the students. I then posed the question: "What if we had complete control?"

What happened next?

A few posts

2009-10-30T13:57:00.000-07:00

A few posts about computers thinking, analyzing a social graph and Dan Moses' visit to Ypsi High. Enjoy.

John Travoltage

2009-10-27T12:24:00.000-07:00

I'm in the process of putting together a presentation on sound and music. While searching for some good interactive examples of waves, I found this website hosted by the University of Colorado - Boulder. They host a large number of java simulations for common phenomena (including ones in math, physics, chemistry, biology) and they're all free. The quality varies greatly between applets, but some of them are really clever and make for great visualization. Just try out My Solar System and you'll see what I mean. I may try to work the sound wave one into my presentation, or take the students to the computer lab at a later time to use a few of the applets together.

P.S. They also provide a whole collection of contributed lesson plans and questions for certain subjects.

Notice & Wonder, Part 2

2009-10-27T06:00:00.000-07:00

If you missed the previous discussion, on 10/15 Steve’s freshman algebra class came up with a whole mess of observations on this problem. On 10/19 I returned to put the same problem up on the board (to much groaning and general consternation -- “We already DID this one, Mr. McDonald!”), followed by a Powerpoint slide of all the N&Ws that I scraped from their notebooks into the previous post.

Last post, I made a tongue-in-cheek allusion to saturating the number of synapse connections you can make in a given time in the last post. I think this is a legitimate concern, and maybe just a science-ey way of saying something that’s common sense – you don’t go from ABCs to astrophysics overnight.

<pseudoscience>
My basic understanding of learning is that you are forming new synapses between neurons (brain cells), and that by repeated exposure to a new concept or way of thinking that you use and strengthen these new connections. Given that framework (and any biology or biomed types who want to clarify this, feel free), I suspect you pretty quickly reach a limit to how many new synapses you can form in a given time. Put simply, try to string too many neurons together too fast, and the chain breaks.
</pseudoscience>

There’s more…

Notice & Wonder

2009-10-26T10:44:00.001-07:00

Here's an activity I did on 10/15 with my algebra class. Note that everyone in the class has a class notebook, so I had them draw a line down the middle and make two columns, writing "I notice..." at the top of one column and "I wonder..." at the top of the other. Then, I put this problem on the board, titled “Spare Change”.

Now, take a moment and ask yourself what I asked the students – what do you notice, and what do you wonder? Take note, as I told them, that there is no wrong answer here – there’s not even a question! We’re just after what you see, and what you think could use some clarification. Here’s what I, as a grad student in the engineering and physical science fields, would say:

There’s more …

First Presentation

2009-10-14T13:01:00.000-07:00

I've been meaning for a while to post the first presentation I gave, but every time I thought to do so, I was never on the computer on which it was actually stored. Finally though, here is the link: first presentation. I feel that this first attempt was a pretty profound flop. I think I overestimated the students' prior knowledge when I was assembling the material, and underestimated the amount of time needed to present the material, which in turn caused many of the students to lose interest (though that may have already occurred in the first few minutes).

More...

The Finite Element Method and Problem Solving in Geometry

2009-10-07T05:57:00.000-07:00

The last two weeks have gone well in Ms. Tran's classroom, and I am starting to feel like the students appreciate my presence. Yesterday, there were students in both of the first two classes who looked around for me at the beginning of the day to see if I was there. A highlight occurred yesterday in fourth hour just before my talk, when a student came up to me and said: "You would make a good teacher." That made me feel like I am doing good things in this classroom, and that I am getting through to at least some of the students. Last week I came in with a talk about nodal networks and finite element models, for which I recycled much of a powerpoint slideshow that I used last year, with an iteration of improvement. This week I came in with a new discussion on problem-solving, showing them an example of a real-life problem that I encountered just a few weeks ago. This will be the basis of the students' first project of the year, which I helped Ms. Tran formulate.

I want to read more!

The first day, for the second time

2009-10-05T10:00:00.000-07:00

Pardon the stolen title, for those who recognize it, but it's a fitting sentiment for my first visit to Ypsi High on 9/17. It's both exciting and a little frightening to walk in on the first day to a strange new class. Still, I've done it before, I know what to expect this time, and I expect to do a lot better job getting to know these kids and influencing their lives. I'll be in two classes twice a week this year, instead of four classes once a week last time around. Plus, if there's any justice in the world, I'll be able to stay with these kids for the full year, rather than having them switched at the semester. Put it all together, and I'll be spending 4x as much time with these students as I did with most of my kids last year.

There's more...

Problems with Words

2009-10-04T20:22:00.000-07:00

Almost all Teaching Fellows have the same set of responsibilities; we all do presentations, a field trip, demonstrations, and several other things. As a math TF, I have the added fun of integrating new ways of teaching problem solving. Last week was my first attempt at using some of the methods provided by the Math Forum. Herein, you will find out how well that attempt went.

Read...

The Algebra Project

2009-10-04T16:34:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone,
I have been back at Ypsilanti High with the Office of Engineering Outreach and Engagement from the University of Michigan, where I help out with STEM classes at the high school level. This would be my fourth semester, second year participating in the program, and I am very excited to be back one more time. This year's program for me is a little different. Instead of taking on two or four big classes every semester and going once or twice a week there, I have been participating in the Algebra Project.

To read more, click here.

What happens when mathematicians die?

2009-09-30T11:23:00.000-07:00

They no longer function.

Remember what I said about my impression that the class was moving too slowly and that kids were getting bored? At least some of the students in the 3rd hour physical science class may have finally found a challenge, though not in the sort of material I was hoping it would be. This Tuesday, the class was learning basic unit conversions--really just one conversion, from cm to inches. The task was very straight forward: measure a set of lines on the page in cm, then convert the values to inches using the method and conversion factor explained earlier in class, and presumably, the day before as well.

Continued...

First Week

2009-09-28T09:32:00.000-07:00

So far, I've been in the classroom on three separate days. I'm almost to the point of knowing all the students' names, though I think a smaller proportion knows mine as of yet. I'm in Miss Hardy's 1st period chemistry class and her 3rd period physical science class. These classes are comprised of mostly juniors and seniors, and freshmen and sophomores, respectively, though--at least from what I've seen so far--the level of complexity of the material being covered so far doesn't differ much between the two. However, being the first two weeks of school, it's a bit early to judge the classes' curricula quite yet, since the beginning of the semester is generally very straight forward.

More...

Getting Started

2009-09-22T11:00:00.000-07:00

This semester, Ms. Tran and I decided that it would be best if I come into four classes one day a week, and I chose Tuesdays to fit my schedule best. She has Geometry classes 3rd and 4th periods and Accelerated Geometry classes 2nd and 6th periods, so I come in for 2nd through 6th.

My first day was last Tuesday, and I came into all four classes with a quick presentation to introduce myself and explain to them what I am doing in their classroom...

On the need for empowerment - Zinata's case

2009-03-24T12:34:00.001-07:00

As I catch up with blogging, I would like to share a story about a particular student which I have gotten to know over the past couple of months. As such, this story will have several installments. So here it is....

I began noticing Zinata last semester in Mr. Mullins' Gen Chem class, a body of students he often describes as his brightest yet toughest students. Indeed, it is at times baffling to see the discrepancy between their inability to remain in their seats and their uncanny analytical abilities when one eventually manages to command their attention. Zinata's is one of those bright yet unruly students who stand out in that particular class. Her story however embodies all the struggles most of our students face and reinforces the need for empowerment.

Zinata is a bright girl in 11th grade who moved to the U.S. from Cameroon a couple of years ago with her family - mother and siblings. As far as I can tell, her academic struggles result from cultural adjustment as well as from many of the systemic failures we've all come to recognize and are trying to remedy. A couple of months ago, I stayed for a while after class, assisting Mr. Mullins with some of the students who were seeking extra help. Zinata was one of them and as I was helping her figuring out some chemistry problems, I took the opportunity to engage her into a more personal discussion about her high school experience and her goals and ambitions (to be continued...)

A spate of new posts!

2009-03-07T13:46:00.000-08:00

Well, never let it be said that I'm good about regularly keeping my blog... but when I do get around to it, I post in spades! Hop on the link and let me know what you think. I'm especially interested in hearing ideas about my proposed class activity, the "practicum".
Link!

Class Size

2009-02-09T18:54:00.001-08:00

Last week, the students at YPSH started a new semester. This new semester is special to my students, the majority of which are in 9th grade, because they have now survived their first semester of high school. I noticed an improvement in their behavior at the start of this semester and I only expect it to continue. Behavior seems to be a topic of discussion lately, as our next TF meeting plans to discuss how students’ behavior affects on the learning environment. I suspect the relationship between learning environment and class size to be universal across all of high school education. Last semester, we had a class of 34+ students in a freshman biology class. Even with the teacher and myself there were always too many questions or, even worse, too many distractions. This semester the same class has shrunk to a ~ 25 students. This semester, the class environment is considerably more conducive to learning. I feel that this TF experience has cemented my belief that the education system will be creating bigger hurdles for itself, unless more teachers are hired and class sizes are limited.

Here come the midterms

2009-01-16T13:49:00.000-08:00

This week at Ypsi High was mostly reviews. The all important midterms are next week. We have a particularly challenging hour that we are worried about. While many students are trying to catch up with the material (these tests, at in the math classes I am helping with, are comprehensive) over the last semester. The good news is that most of the material has been building on itself, which means the students often had refreshers about material covered early last semester. Nonetheless, it is not easy being tested on an entire semester's worth of material. More at my blog...

Small Improvements

2009-01-12T09:05:00.000-08:00

Remember the student that just stared at me when I offered him paper to take notes on? (http://umk12tfs.blogspot.com/2008/10/imperfect-interactions.html) Well, last week things were different with him. I said hi to him on the way into the classroom, as I often do, and he acknowledged me this time. Then when it came to the work period, he went up, grabbed the worksheet, went back to his desk, and before he could begin copying from his neighbor like he usually does, I sat down in front of him and offered some help. He actually accepted and we started going through the algebra homework. I gave him more help than I do with other students (I usually make them struggle a bit if they want my help.), but overall I was happy that he knew what to do about half the time. We were productive for a good 20 minutes. I imagine it helped that I had become familiar to him over the course of the last few months, but primarily, as Mr. Tuttle agreed, this student was just in a good mood that day. Whatever the reasons, it was heartening to see that even the most troubled students can shine on any given day.

Later that day, in 6th hour, I had a different experience. During lecture, several students were yelling across the classroom and being very disrespectful. Mr. Tuttle stopped class twice to give them a talking to, and I kept walking around putting out the smaller fires. By the beginning of the work period, I was about to tear my hair out in frustration, but I kept it together and sat with the most distruptive students. After a few minutes of trying to get them to do their work, I could feel my frustation level growing again. Then, one student pointed to my shoes and said, "Those are old man shoes!" This got a little chuckle from the others, and I was about to say something very adult-like back to him, when changed my mind and said, "Well, you've got little boy shoes on." This loosened things up a bit and we got to talking about being old versus young and how I'm still in school even at 29 years old. I told him that I'm still in school, because I'm scared of the outside world. He asked, "Are you scared of being on the streets?" I explained that I was scared of being stuck in a dead end job, that I worked for a while and it was boring. He couldn't understand how school could be better than a job, since you get paid in a job. Luckily, one of his friends backed me up and said, "Man, I've worked and it sucked. It's the same thing every day. Even if school is boring, at least it's different every day." Not surprisingly, the other student stuck to his initial assertion that any job is better than school, even after I explained how you can make more money and get a better job with more schooling. In the end, I only got 2 minutes of actual math homework out of this student, but at least we made him think about taking school seriously. Who knows, maybe he'll slowly change his mind someday...

Grade curving in question

2008-12-03T11:50:00.000-08:00

In the wake of last semester's sub-par midterm performance (hi: 72%, lo: disparagingly low), most students in my class were expecting to be bailed out by the usual grade curving, rather than reflect on the reasons why they did so poorly and think of ways to improve their performance. This behaviour was highly concerning to me, especially considering that quite often teachers would go along with it, in order to placate the disgruntled or disheartened students. This practice also allows the teacher to cover-up their own deficiencies in pedagogy with some kind of display of generosity. In my class though, I decided to step up and fight this detrimental practice. I spent time convincing Mr. Mullins that it would be better - and more fair - for the students if he assigned a make-up test instead which he reluctantly agreed to after I offered to come in one extra day to give the students a thorough review of the material they clearly failed to assimilate. The extra work paid off and most of the students were able to improve their grade in a much more deserving manner. Kudos to Mr. Mullins for his willingness to challenge bad habits and reverse negative classroom culture.

Learning Presentations at UPSM

2008-11-27T22:58:00.000-08:00

Last week at UPSM I helped Ms Mylor grade some of her classes exams. While helping her I had the opportunity to listen in on a learning presentation given by the student. Each student must give a learning presentation to show and reflect on what they have learned throughout the semester.

Listening to this student's presentation was quite a special moment for me and the highlight of my time here at UPSM. I was amazed at how introspective this student was at his age. He discussed how the best part of the semester for him was "learning to believe" in himself and to "never give up". He also how chose "integrity" as his disciplined principle. He spoke how "integrity" was important to him. I was impressed that he chose this principle since it is so important in the times we are in today. The need for more people with who demonstrate "integrity" is essential in managment and I am glad that he realizes this at such a young age. I am sure he has learned alot about integrity as a student at UPSM.

The student also shared the quote below from Eleanor Roosevelt and then proceeded with a slide show about Barack Obama both of which resonated with me in a powerful way.

"No one can make you feel inferior without your consent"

When the presentation was finished the audience (or students) gave stars and wishes (constructive feedback) to the student. One student's comments included stars for using video but that he wished the student would have given more eye contact throughout his presentation. It wasn't until college and my first job that I gave and received feedback from my peers. This is really an important lesson since the ability to give and receive feedback in the professional world is critical.

Once again I was impressed by the curriculum at UPSM.

This past month at Ypsi-High

2008-11-23T21:42:00.000-08:00

I have been working this semester with Mr. Mullins in both the lecture and lab sections of his AP Chemistry class. Given the voluntary nature of the enrollment for the AP class, I didn't expect to deal with rebellious and unmotivated teenagers in this class. Indeed, I soon realized that our students were good kids but also lazy ones . The biggest challenge I face is trying to change the classroom culture in the least confrontational manner. Mr. Mullins has done a tremendous job at creating a comfortable and enjoyable environment in his class but I feel that with that relaxed atmosphere, he's also provided too much room for laxism and facility. Systematically, most of the students showing up for the lab sections on Thursdays and Fridays don't have their pre-lab questions done and spend the first 45 minutes of the class trying to figure them out. Sometimes they even simply copy the solution from the Instructor's manual while pretending to check their answers. This attitude has prompted me to hold on to the Instructor's manual for the duration of the class, thus forcing the students to ask me questions about the nebulous points of the assignment.
To be fair, the situation is partly due to the fact that often students don't get the lab handouts early enough before lab time. Mr. Mullins tells me that this problem comes from discrepancies between the course material and the requirements of the current week's lab assignment. Our labs come in prepackaged kits supposedly suitable for the AP Chemistry exam requirements but often not challenging enough from an analytical standpoint. We've been working Mr. Mullins and I on designing our own lab routines, more stimulating and more in tune with the material covered thus far....(to be continued)

Teaching the Organelles

2008-11-16T17:05:00.001-08:00

This past Thursday, I tried two new activities as I taught the entire class for the first time this semester.

But first:
At the beginning of every class, the students typically have a journal question. On that day I asked each student to write down something related to biology, health, disease, or living things that they had a question about. I plan on answering 1-2 of these every time I come into class now, and may try to integrate my answers with the material they are covering at the moment. I have read their questions, and there are some really interesting ones (more on that in some other post).

On to teaching:
While preparing to teach the organelles, I was thinking about my Cell biology course during my undergraduate. It was during that class that I first enjoyed really learning about cell biology. I was going to try to replicate their teaching style - no powerpoint, no artificial figures, all chalk and chalk board, hand drawn pictures, and very straight talk. The more I thought about this method of teaching I though it may work very well because this is a completely different style of teaching than Ms. Papke. I knew I couldn't just talk to them though, and it would be better to integrate the class. I ended up teaching an activity where the students would tell me all of the rooms, components, and/or functions of a house and I wrote these on the board. Then we went through the list comparing each room or function to an organelle and its specific function in the cell. In general, I think the activity worked very well - some organelles worked much better than others. The second half of the class we watched the video, "The inner life of the cell" and I walked the students through certain organelles and processes within the cell. The students who were paying attention to the video got a lot out of it - I heard many students asking, " Is this happening in us? Right now? all the time?" Overall, I think the combination of board teaching and technology seemed to work very well.

Patricia

2008-11-15T15:25:00.000-08:00

I have actually not seen Patricia in class for the past two weeks, and I sense that can not be good. She was one of the students that had a significant amount of change over the previous 6 or so weeks. The teacher has told me about a lot of personal problems that Patricia had gone through, and this actually was not her first time taking the class. But she was surprisingly well receptive to my offers for help during class... More at my blog.

Midterm Progress in Biology

2008-11-10T20:04:00.000-08:00

Hello all, the semester has become increasingly busy - for myself and the students at YPSH. Two weeks ago Ms. Papke handed my students their current grades including all of the assignments, their grades, and what was missing. The day was needless to say, extremely hectic. The majority of the students were not doing very well at all. One of the most disconcerting observations I made that day - and I beleive Ms. Papke already knew - was that the majority of these "failing" students were very smart. Most of them had done very well on their graded homework; however, among these same students they all seemed to have trouble turning in assignments. I was also surprised by the amount of students who seemed to have no idea why they were failing and were not happy with the result. I spent the majority of that day - this was a make up day - comforting many students and trying to convey to them that they had plenty of time to fix their grade. I remember saying - "you're doing pretty well if you can turn some of these items in, you just have to start knocking away at this "to-do" list" or "here, start with this project, its not too hard and if you can turn in some of these project you have 0's on you will be just fine." I think many of these students - once past being overwhelmed - took the day to heart and worked diligently through the hour. There is always an exception though - a few students seemed to be turned off by their lack of success and failed to seize the opportunity to turn in work they had previously failed to hand in. I will find out tomorrow how many of these students were able to save their midterm grade.

Establishing Goals to Positively Impact Classroom Performance

2008-11-08T05:51:00.000-08:00

It was requested that each teaching fellow develop a unique set of goals for his/her appointment. The TFs conversed with their faculty affiliates to clearly define goals that would allow their partnership to bring forth maximum impact on improving student achievement while introducing engineering into the classroom.

Serge Badiane

Our goal (Mr. Mullins and Me) for this term and school year is to inspire our college-bound students to aspire to great things. Too many of our students are smart yet uninterested in the material which is offered. They simply go through the motions, shying away from intellectual challenges and ultimately rely on the grade curving game to get by.
My goal is to challenge them to learn the scientific method and marvel at its potential for discovery and intellectual stimulation. I want to reverse the culture of underachievement which is hindering the students abilities.
I have plans to get Ypsi High students involved in scientific competitions such as F.I.R.S.T. Robotics Competition (http://www.usfirst.org/what/frc/default.aspx?id=366) by next year.

Amanda Brecht

Make personal connections with at least two students per class.
Improve grades and/or attitude towards science of at least two students per class.
To prepare and lead at least one fun but content relevant hands-on learning activity for the students in Astronomy or Chemistry.

Monisha Brown

I will come in to the classroom 3 times a week (Monday, Wednesday, Friday) for first and second period and assist Mr. Sowder by helping prepare for labs, answering questions during labs, etc.
I will lead 3 labs each semester and present engineering and/or science disciplines to the students. On those days when I lead the labs and give presentations, I will provide the same material to Mr. Sowder's fourth and sixth period biology classes so that the four classes have covered the same material.
Form a mentoring relationship with the students (at least 4) to provide them with support and advice on graduating from high school and applying to college.

Julianna Evans

Algebra Classes:

Target 2 students in each algebra class not actively participating. Help these students with preparation (making sure they have a pencil and paper) and remind them when they should be writing notes or completing an activity. This will hopefully lead to these students learning more during the class period resulting in greater ease in completing their homework, more homework submitted, and better understanding for tests and quizzes.
Give informal presentations. These presentations will be a mixture of math and engineering applications and about college in general and will happen about once every three weeks to once a month. The engineering application presentations will show cool applications or the math that can solve basic engineering problems. The college presentations will range from easy things they can do to help them get into college, when to apply, what kinds of jobs you can get with a college education.

Calculus Class:

Help students with projects. I will serve as a pseudo-consultant that helps with choosing appropriate topics and help the students if they are having difficulties with their project.
Give presentations every couple of weeks about engineering applications tied into what the students are learning in class.

Steven Hoffenson

Give short, weekly or bi-weekly presentations that engage the class and spark interest in applications of geometry
Have at least two hands-on activities as part of these presentations
Add inspiration and motivation for students to think about college and future careers that use math.

Eric Jankowski

Increase student achievement
Maximize utility of the extra body
Use my knowledge to give some special presentations
Try some new things

Michael McDonald

Make sure students are actively involved in at least some small part of every talk. A great example of this was when I had the stats classes all flip coins for our normal distributions discussion. I also recently had students in the algebra class list their ideal careers on the blackboard and vote on which career we'd discuss in detail that day (being sure to fit in math along the way). Weaker examples of class involvement would be just asking students questions and getting them to answer, but I prefer active involvement with some sort of motion or task to be completed.
Get feedback from George after each class to see where he thought I was losing attention, needed to speed up / slow down, or if I missed any opportunities to work in class material.
Follow along in each class' textbook between visits to look for ways to relate discussions to class concepts. My best example of this was when I had the students flip coins and build bell curves just before the class talked about normal distributions.

Rachel Phillips

Expose students to engineering concepts through a U of M visit and inspiring presentations.
College discussions; including financial aid opportunities and how to select the right college/major.
Tutor students who need help.

Azarias Reda

As all the students are freshman, provide a good footing for their high school (and beyond) math career by inspiring students and making them understand how important math is.
Build individual relationships with at least a few students (especially students that seem to be having problems in class) and provide personalized assistance
[If possible] Take a trip to the university with some students to one of the fall events. I think that will be really cool, and especially appreciated and engaging for the freshmen.

Benjamin Reedlunn

Prepare and give a tour of North Campus, with demonstrations of technology in several labs, to a group of Mr. Tuttle's students after school.
Give a presentation of my research on Shape Memory Alloys to the class, making the essential concepts as accessible as possible.
Identify a student in each class to focus on during work periods. Chose students who either have behavior problems, but have shown an aptitude for math, or students who behave well, but are a little slow in math.
Work with Mr. Tuttle to design a lesson or two that fit directly into the curriculum.

Kiana Stringfield

Classroom Goals

Learn students names
Learn about challenges / struggles / excuses associated with algebra / geometry
Help establish a routine in the classroom to keep students more focused (have folders, worksheets ready to go when they start class)
Give weekly mini-lessons that pertain to the class material and that will help them on tests
Show students practical applications of the material they are learning (in mini-lessons)
Find tutoring resources for students who need extra help
Keep tutors up to date with class material

Mini –Lesson Ideas

Math riddles that pertain to relevant class material and will help students study for quizzes / tests
Information about different careers in mathematics / science / engineering
Information about my intended career path (Industrial and Operations Engineering)
College applications – It's not too early to start!
Organize a panel of student-athletes from U of M to speak about college and time management
Have a compiled booklet of all information covered in mini-lessons at the end of the semester / year
International outlook / Comparisons based on degrees
Group work problems

Tamara Tucker

To introduce and revisit the methods and application of THE SCIENTIFIC METHOD and scientific investigation as a way to answer questions and find out new information about the biological world. To reach this goal, most of the labs/ activities that are presented will focus on students coming up with their own questions and developing methods for testing and finding answers to this questions/ hypotheses.
To cultivate the ability in students to use the scientific method to answer questions and learn new information.
To build personal relationships with students in the hopes of being able to positively impact and advance their academic and social/ personal development.
To make science/ biology fun

Erik Yusko

Promote interest in the sciences through demonstration and hands-on Biology learning (i.e. lab or demonstration in every major theme).
Provide a basic understanding of the multi-disciplinary approaches within science (i.e. more examples of tools biologists use such as the microfluidics – but with a larger hands-on component).
Generate curiosity as to why life works (i.e. project excitement towards the unknown).

Mid-semester grades

2008-11-02T05:58:00.001-08:00

Grades for the first marking period (first nine weeks of the semester) have been released. For those students doing well in biology, there are no worries; they just need to keep up the good work. However, for those students not doing well in biology, things are starting to look discouraging. I gravitate towards these students and try to encourage; their first semester in biology is not lost. Just because they didn't earn a "C" or better doesn't mean that they are going to fail; it just means that they are going to have to work harder than they have been to improve their grade during the second marking period (second nine weeks of the semester) and do well on the final. I know it can be done, but I must convince them that it can be done. They have to believe that they can improve their overall grade by put more time and effort into their school work this point forward.

There is also a new extra credit opportunity every week, and I will walk students over to the board to try it. Some of students will tell me that they can't get the extra credit, but they haven't even read it yet; for these students I say lets try it and once they read it (I may have to re-state it) and think about it, they get it.

2008-10-31T15:42:00.000-07:00

Student feature: Stephen

2008-10-19T14:18:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago, at the general TF meeting we had, there was a question posed to participants…"who is the best teacher you ever had?". In thinking about that question, I was able to reaffirm that the most important component of any teacher's experience was the personal relationship he/she develops with the students. It was no wonder that my freshman physics teacher from Mekelle University in Ethiopia was at the top of the list, and mainly because of the passion he had for his students and the length he went to have meaningful relationships with his students.

In that spirit, I wanted to do a series on some of the students I got to meet and know at Ypsilanti High. In the interest of privacy, I will change the names (may be Angela or Carol can tell me if it okay to use actual names..). So here we go, for the first installment... (More at my page)

Imperfect Interactions

2008-10-19T08:42:00.000-07:00

I'm sure others have had some bizarre interactions with students, so I thought I would post some of mine. I would say 90% of the time things go just fine when I try to help to students, so please don't take this post as me complaining. I just think these stories are interesting.

A number of students neglect to bring paper and pencil to class, so I often walk around handing out paper so they have something to take notes on. I walked up to one student and said, "Do you need any paper?" He blankly stared at me. I asked again, "Would you like some paper?" He continued to look right past me as if I wasn't even there. Getting a bit agitated, I asked, "Why are you ignoring me?" Still no response. Deciding that I need to chose my battles, I just left a piece of paper on his desk and walked off. In retrospect, I couldn't believe the nerve of that kid! I had never talked with him before, or even given him a disapproving look, so he had no reason to dislike me. Apparently, my being an authority figure is enough for him. Mind games...

Mr. Tuttle's 6th hour is often the craziest class. The students are understandably just itching to get out of their chairs after being forced to sit still all day. During a work period, one female student asked to go to the restroom and quietly said to Mr. Tuttle that is was an emergency. (On count day, students were not allowed to go use the restrooms during class, unless it was an emergency, in order to facilitate counting.) Another female student, saw her leave the classroom, and loudly asked, "Why does sheeee get to go the restroom!?" After having had a long day and being short on patience, I snapped, "Because it was an emergency!" She got a little miffed, but at the time I didn't care. Next week, I realized it'd be nice to apologize for barking at her, so during a free work period, I went over and started to say sorry. As I came over she saw me walk up, but she looked the other way, clearly distracted by something, and soon enough she got up to go check it out. I thought, ok, I'll try again later. About 5 minutes later, I started to say sorry again, but she was totally ignoring me and blatently looking the other way. Luckily this was aparent to a friend of hers, who was sitting right there, and said, "Hey, look at him, he's trying to say something to you." She then sheepishly looked at me, I apologized, and she mummered something unintelligible. She clearly felt uncomfortable about the situation. Weird! Perplexed, I later asked my wife, who is an elementary school teacher, what she thought. Her guess was maybe this girl just isn't used to adults saying sorry to her, so she felt awkward and didn't know how to respond.

In a previous post on my blog (http://ypsdtf-breedlun.blogspot.com/), I described how I try to approach students who are avoiding working. It usually works, but there are times when it clearly doesn't. One student who sits in the back, is almost always messing around on her cell phone during work periods. She doesn't usually bother anyone, so I don't worry too much about it, but recently I went over to ask, "How's it comin?" She said, "Fine." I asked if I could help her with anything on her homework, and she said no. I pushed a little more, "Are you sure there is nothing you're confused about?" This was too much for her, so while barely looking up from her cell phone she responded, "No, and if there was, I wouldn't ask you. I don't know you." A little flustered, I said, "Well, ok then," and walked off.

Since these 3 situations, and a few others I have not described, I now pay more attention to these kids. I just tend to gravitate towards the tough cookies because they are more of a challenge. I ask each of them at least once every hour if they need help with anything. So far I've just gotten turned away, which is acceptable since they aren't bothering anyone else. My hope is that they will eventually get used to me, soften up, and let me give them a hand.

Hand Shake

2008-10-15T17:02:00.000-07:00

An excerpt, for the entire post visit: http://ypsdtf-ecyus.blogspot.com/

. . . I had gone to shake a student's hand, and he wouldn't shake my hand. The concept was foreign to him - it wasn't the cool thing to do. After a few moments - I took his hand, put it in my hand, proceeded with the handshake, and said "That's how you do it." . . . On Tuesday I shook the students hand, twice, the student didn't object at all and seemed to enjoy the interaction. Even more surprisingly, we must have been observed by another individual in the class and she later wanted a hand shake. . .

Trial Post

2008-10-06T12:51:00.000-07:00

Hi all,

This is Serge Badiane, your fellow TF. Will you please let me know if you can view this post. Thanks.

Serge

First few weeks

2008-09-28T07:38:00.000-07:00

I've gotten a couple of nice notes that read the same way: "I like how you can write as much as you want on your own blog! I'm going to do that too!" Thanks for the kind words. What really happened is that I'm the slow guy who apparently didn't realize we're supposed to post here. Hehe. If you'd like to read about my experiences with Mrs. Colwell's advanced algebra 2 classes, well then come on over: ericteach.blogspot.com.

Embarking on a new semester

2008-09-25T20:34:00.000-07:00

New year, new class, new teacher. I am excited about another semester at Ypsi High. Last winter definitely was a great experience to learn from, and I can say it has shaped how I think about helping in the class room. This year I am working with Mrs. Porter, who was also with the program last year, and I am helping with sections of Algebra and Accelerated Algebra which both have freshman students.

I especially like working with the freshman students because it presents a unique opportunity to present students with fundamental outlook on Math, that they can possibly keep throughout high school and even college. If we are able to present Math as something useful and exciting, rather than just a class they got to pass, we would accomplish a lot. Mrs. Porter puts a lot of time in making sure that the students have got the basics down as the material tends to build on each other.

I wanted to share the goals that we would like to achieve through this partnership during this semster:
   1. As all the students are freshman, provide a good footing for their high school (and beyond) math career by inspiring students, and making them understand how important math is.
   2. Build individual relationships with at least a few students (especially students that seem to be having problems in class) and provide personalized assistance .
   3. [If possible] Take a trip to the university with some students to one of the fall events. I think that will be really cool, and especially appreciated and engaging for the freshmen.

I hope to report positively on our progress throughout the semester. Stay tuned!

Mr. Lancaster and Me, Week 2: 9/22/08

2008-09-22T21:44:00.001-07:00

As I've realized my blog postings are rather long, I've decided to shift them to a dedicated blog along the lines of last year's fellows'. From now on I will post the first paragraph here, with a link to the remainder of the post at my blog, Into the Fray.

Last week I mentioned that George is about one day ahead of his lesson plans in Stats, since he's never taught the class before. While this isn't the most convenient thing for me in trying to plan what I want to talk about, after preparing my talks for today I have a whole new respect for just how hard it can be to make a lesson plan. Especially when you have not one class but two different classes each day. I mentioned in my last post that I wanted to try to do two talks, one for Stats and one for Algebra. Stats is about to do normal distributions (aka the bell curve, with the 68-95-99.7 rule), so I knew I could make a talk out of that, but algebra was actually much harder. How do you come up with something interesting for Algebra I?

There's more...

Mr. Lancaster and Me, Week 1: 9/15/08

2008-09-22T20:18:00.001-07:00

(Writing from notes taken the first week)

We've settled on me coming in every Monday for hours 1-4, which is about 7 am – 12:30 pm. Mondays work for my schedule, and will never conflict with a test (weekends are anathema to short-term memory). Hopefully it will also give kids something to talk about to refer back to through the week. George (that's Mr. Lancaster to any student types who find this blog) teaches two classes of Statistics, an almost-AP course largely populated by seniors with a smattering of juniors, and two classes of Freshman Algebra, which is what the name suggests. As far as I've been able to deduce the math curriculum at YHS, they start freshman year with Freshman Algebra, then take Algebra II. Either simultaneously with Algebra II or subsequently, they can take Geometry. Most students don't double up like that, so I take that to mean that a typical junior is in Geometry, and a senior takes Pre-calculus or Statistics. I know there is an AP Calculus class, but I'm not sure how students can get to it by their senior year unless it's by doubling up as a sophomore. Moving on…

There's more...

Starting off

2008-09-22T19:32:00.001-07:00

Introductions first: I’m a third-year graduate student in Applied Physics and Aerospace Engineering. I originally envisioned becoming a Teaching Fellow to help out in a physics class, a plan which persisted right up to the pairing meeting, when I first realized that physics was not an option this year and that I was in the “math” group. Interesting…

There's more...

Going Back in Time..

2008-09-22T19:20:00.000-07:00

I am an Industrial and Operations Engineering student helping out Algebra and Geometry classes at Ypsilanti Highschool. My first day brought back so many memories as I parked my car and saw all of the students marching into school. As I walked to the cafeteria trying to find the classroom, it was obvious that I was an outsider and I could feel eyes on me as the students tried to survey a new face.

As the warning bell rang and students started filing into the classroom bright and early at 7:20 in the morning, their energy was off the charts and hard to contain. I don't remember being that energized so early in the morning, but its easy to feed off of their energy. I gave a brief introduction to the students and began observing the classroom and the students to get an idea of what to expect. My first day was more laid back since Ms. Mills and I are still trying to establish a routine and get into a groove.

I think that I will be able to contribute a lot to this classroom mostly with providing a new perspective and hopefully more motivation to understand the practical importance of Algebra and Geometry. During my second week, I was a little overwhelmed because we were scrambling to find substitute teachers and I ended up partially teaching the class by myself. Although it was a challenging task, I got an opportunity to interact more directly with the students. I had a run-in with one of the students because I discovered he was cheating on his homework, and had to rip it up and make him start over. I already have more admiration for the teachers who endure this challenge everyday. After talking to a few of the students and understanding various excuses and reasons as to why algebra / geometry is not important, I am going to think of a mini-presentation that integrates real life problems with their class material. I think that taking the time to explain the benefits of learning basic algebra are just as important as learning the material itself.

Two Days and an Idea

2008-09-22T17:16:00.000-07:00

I’m a Biomedical Engineering Graduate student immersed in a 9th grade biology class at Ypsilanti High School this semester. This first week has been quite an experience for me.

Last week, Ms. Papke’s biology classes were charged with determining how well brine shrimp hatch/grow in different salinities (all prepared in Petri dishes). I later learned (through wikipedia), this experiment is very common as an introduction to the life sciences at the high school level. In addition, to keeping students focused I was trying to remember what 9th grade was like for me with my limited views of science at the time. I realized that any activity or concept that could relate what scientists actually do, what other tools they may have, and in general what types of questions scientists are really addressing may help motivate these students or at least elicit appreciation.

In my second class, I asked several of the students if they thought biologists did all of their work with Petri dishes. The responses varied: “No, they often go out into nature” or “No, sometimes they just watch animals.” How do I demonstrate – in a meaningful manner – what other tools biologists use?

Then it hit me - Microfluidic channels with a variation of the brine shrimp experiment. These devices are often being used in cellular cultures to study biological questions that cannot be answered in a traditional Petri dish. More over, these devices are tangible - the students can see them, touch them, and use them. Ms. Papke and I have developed two potential, very simple but elegant, experiments that we will try prior to a class demonstration. Hopefully, new tools will generate an interest in science and the many tools we have at our disposal.

First week

2008-09-21T08:08:00.000-07:00

9/15/08 (Day 1)
My day started bright and early at 7:20 am for first and second period biology. There was a quiz today on classroom policies; most of the students were not prepared. Then a review of the hydrologic cycle, river flow paths, hurricanes, and floodplains. The students have been learning about the scientific method, and last week went out to the nature area to make observations. Several of the students in first period were tired, while the students in second period had more energy. Some students are already showing patterns of excessive absenses and/or tardies.

9/17/08 (Day 2)
The students are learning the scientific method, and today they started "testing a hypothesis" or doing experiments. This was a simple lab; measure the mass of a rubber stopper, paper clip, air inside a balloon, 40 ml of liquid A, and 40 ml of liquid B using a triple beam balance and graduated cylinder. Some of the students progressed through the lab quickly while others struggled with the balance. A few of the students, in both classes, were bored with the lab and wanted to do cool experiments (e.g., dissections). None of the groups finished all of the measurements.

9/19/08 (Day 3)
The students went to the nature area to collect soil samples to measure the moisture content of the soil. Some of the students didn't want to participate; they let their lab partner(s) do all the work. Some of the students in second period weren't paying attention to the instructions; their was lots of side conversations. One of the students was upset because his lab partners didn't help him take measurements outside or collect the soil sample.

General Impressions
Most of the students are in ninth grade, so they're making the transition from middle school to high school. This biology class is a project/lab based course; however, some of the students haven't taken an interst in the labs yet. They say they are bored, and they complain about having to make measurements (mass and volume) or get their hands dirty. They don't see the point of these beginning labs, and they don't want to take the time to learn basic lab skills. They'll soon learn that these beginning labs are leading to their class projects, which will hopefully spark their interest in the labs that they're doing.

Unemployment Rate

2008-09-05T06:49:00.000-07:00

I found the statistics in this article about unemployment in Michigan somewhat surprising.

http://www.clickondetroit.com/news/17344166/detail.html

Probably, the statistic that is most pertinent to the work we do is:

"The unemployment rate for Michigan residents without high school diplomas hit 20 percent in 2007, according to the Michigan League for Human Services report. The jobless rate for those with a bachelor's degree or higher was less than 5 percent."

Our students are 4 times more likely to have a job in todays economy with a college degree.

Ran into a student...

2008-07-07T08:37:00.000-07:00

As an example of the attitudes of some of the students towards the Teaching Fellows - recently, I was grocery shopping and encountered one of the students I knew from Ypsilanti High. She was with her mother, shopping for their family. She recognized me and stopped to talk - asked about how things were going for me at school, what I was doing over the summer, that kind of thing. One impact of the program, at least in this case, is that she can see that someone who is in the engineering profession as a person just like her in many ways - not some remote "other", but someone you might encounter in the produce aisle. I'm not sure if the program's evaluations can effectively measure that - and I wonder what long-term effect it has. It's hard to know.

Ford Highschool Summer Internship Program

2008-06-23T10:58:00.000-07:00

Hi current and new Teaching Fellows!

I hope you are enjoying your experiences in the classroom this summer. I am currently working at Ford Motor Company as a Black Belt intern and found out about a highschool summer internship prgram here at Ford. I would like you all to share this information with the students you have over the summer and next Fall.

Details of the program can be found on the C-tools website under YPSD-COE Partnership Resources -->Teaching Assistants --> Teaching Materials --> Rachel

Also through the internship program I found out about the Detroit Area Pre-College Engineering Program (DACEP). DACEP has an in-school and summer program to motivate and academically prepare minority middle and high school student to pursue careers in engineering, math, and science. A link to their website can be found below. Please share with your students.

http://www.dapcep.org

Hopefully sharing this information will get more Ypsi Highschool students involved in these types of programs in the future.

Please do not hesitate to let me know if you have any questions.

Have a great summer,
Rachel Phillips
rachejp@umich.edu

Nervous System Lesson

2008-06-01T10:42:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago I while Ms. Hardy's Biology class was studying the nervous system I conducted a lesson and activity about how our brains can change while we learn. To try to keep the students attentive from the start, I began the lesson by passing around plastinated human brains. These brains were very graciously provided by Dr. Gest of the UM Medical School. Dr. Gest lent me four specimens-- two intact brains (one with a layer of dura), one hemisphere of another brain, and a spinal cord. The students could hardly believe that these specimens were actually real and not models made of plastic, and they were very intrigued by the brains and asked many questions. I think that starting the lesson with something so exciting and tangible was successful in engaging the students and they paid more attention throughout the hour as a result. Thank you Dr. Gest!!

Next I showed the students a couple short clips of various optical illusions from a video called "Inside Information - The Brain and How it Works". I then asked the students what optical illusions tell us about the way the brain works. The main idea I wanted them to grasp from this discussion is that the brain takes the information that is available to it and makes its best guess as to what is really there-- and it's not always right.

We also discussed that when we learn something new, our brains can change. What changes is the strength of certain connections between neurons (synapses). This is called synaptic plasticity. While the students had not been introduced to synaptic plasticity before, they had covered the structure and function of neurons, synapses, and neurotransmitters earlier in the week. I think that this was an appropriate concept to introduce to them to build on their basic knowledge and extend it to something practical, namely how they learn new information.

Our discussion of optical illusions and synaptic plasticity really set us up well to do the activity involving tossing bean bags. This activity was developed by a group of neuroscience graduate students at UM as part of the "NeuroKids" Program. NeuroKids is an outreach organization that visits local elementary schools to teach lessons about neuroscience. For more information or to get involved with their program please visit their website:

http://www.umich.edu/~nkids/Neurokids_Program/Welcome.html

Colin Stoetzner, the founder of NeuroKids, kindly let me borrow all the supplies for the NeuroKids Prism Goggles lesson (3 bean bag targets, 24 bean bags, and 3 pairs of prism goggles).
This is how I introduced the activity to the students (based on the handout developed by the NeuroKids):

-------------------------------------------
Today we are doing an activity that will change some of the synapses in a part of your brain called the cerebellum. One thing the cerebellum does is compare what you see with what your body is doing. When you throw a beanbag at a target, your cerebellum keeps track of how much you missed the target by and uses it to change the way your arm moves the next time you throw. When you play the beanbag toss game, we are going to move where the target appears to be, so you will end up throwing it further away from the target than you would expect. But if you take enough throws, your cerebellum will do the work for you and change the way your arm moves WITHOUT YOU EVEN HAVING TO THINK ABOUT IT. Your throws will get closer and closer. This is called IMPLICIT LEARNING.

The goal is to throw the beanbag into the target. Each student will have a turn at throwing the beanbags in the following way:

Take 5 practice throws at the target
Put on a pair of Prism Goggles. Prism Goggles distort your field of vision by about 20 degrees in one direction and make it very difficult to hit the target.
While wearing the goggles, take 20 throws at the target. At the beginning you will be missing the target badly. DO NOT attempt to consciously adjust your aim, rather continue to throw at where the target appears to be and "let your brain adapt to the situation".
Remove the goggles and take 5 more throws at the target

-------------------------------------------

Most students were able to get very close to the target on their initial 5 practice throws. If the students followed directions and did not consciously adjust their aim while wearing the goggles, they found that while they were way off to the right on their first couple of throws they got a little closer with each throw and eventually starting hitting the target again while wearing the goggles. However then when they removed the goggles and again threw at the target, they were now way off to the left!!! This demonstrated that their brain had changed and implicitly adjusted during the activity.

The students really appeared to enjoy this activity, and for the most part were well-behaved during it. Thanks Colin and the NeuroKids!!

We ended the hour with a discussion of the differences between implicit and explicit learning, and how some information may be best learned implicitly (e.g. foreign languages), while other information probably needs to be learned explicitly (e.g. multiplication tables). The worksheet I created to go along with this discussion, as well as the original handout created by the NeuroKids, are avaible at the YPSD Partnership C-tools site. Overall, I think this lesson was my most successful one so far in terms of keeping the student's interest level high throughout the entire hour.

Last Two Weeks

2008-05-29T18:55:00.000-07:00

My final presention was last week, discussing nanotechnology. I feel that this is an important field that is already proving to have a tremendous impact on our lives, and the students should at least be familiar with the basic concepts. I discussed the definitions of nano and technology, then talked about some common applications of nanotechnology. I bridged this into a quick overview on a project I worked on as an undergraduate, where myself and 12 other students started a company around a nanotech-related product. I hope that this showed them yet another example of the opportunities available to them in college.

This week was their last full week, and my last day in class. The entire period was spent working on practice problems, so I was just there to walk around and help those who needed it. I found that many of the students aren't willing to raise their hands to ask questions, but if I come around and ask how they are doing, they will ask for help. There are still more who will not ask for help even when I offer, so sometimes I just look at their work to make sure they are doing everything correctly and offer suggestions when necessary. By this point in the year, I have gotten to know the students enough to know who falls into each category, and I think this strategy works fairly well in making sure that everyone in the room gets some extra guidance and encouragement.

So at the end of the semester, I can say that I am definitely glad to have participated in this program. I have picked up some strategies on teaching and presenting to high school students, as well as gained a perspective from "the other side", when I look back and realize I myself may not have been the easiest student to teach. Thanks OE^2 and YPSD for giving us this opportunity!

Hybrids and Polynomials

2008-05-15T17:00:00.001-07:00

During the last presentation I gave on the solar car project, I noticed through our discussions that the students didn't seem to know a whole lot about cars. I wanted to share more about automobiles with them, since it is a hot area that has a lot of opportunities for progress in the near future.

I prepared a discussion about hybrid cars, discussing the definition of hybrid, the hybrid cars that are currently on the market, how they are different from regular cars, and some thoughts on the prospect of electric cars. Toward the end, I asked them if they thought there would be fully electric cars within their lifetimes, and I was surprised that they all said "no" pretty quickly. I think for some reason they thought that "no" was the answer I was looking for. Either way, my next slides surprised them with the 2010 Chevy Volt, which is a plug-in hybrid that can go up to 40 miles between charges without using any fuel, and the 2008 Tesla Roadster, which is a fully electric car on the market. I think both classes were very engaged and interested during these discussions.

The next week, I came in with a presentation more relevant to the curriculum, which is polynomials. I centered my talk on the topic of "curve fitting", or fitting trendlines or curves to data. I got much of their attention early by introducing it as a technique for reducing the amount of work they have to do. My next slides provided some background information, including defining the word "trend" and showing what the graphs of polynomials look like (since they hadn't seen them yet). Then I showed two examples, both relating back to previous discussions of the Mshoe and the research I did with explosives. Through the examples, I showed how we could get a lot of information out of fewer calculations. Mr. Lancaster took off with this topic and talked for a little while about how he used curve fitting in his previous job, designing air bag covers.

I think this presentation was successful in showing them an important use of polynomials and a technique that's used often in science. However, I may have lost some of their interest when I spent a couple of slides on background and definitions. While this is important information for them to know, perhaps I could have kept their interest by discussing those issues while talking about the examples.

Quadratics and Solar Car

2008-04-29T13:07:00.000-07:00

Mr. Lancaster's Algebra class is now learning quadratics, which is a field that I see all the time as an engineer, yet it was still difficult to come up with an example to demonstrate to the class. I tried hard to come up with a relatively simple project that I've used a quadratic curve in, and couldn't come up with anything. Finally, while I was watching baseball the night before class last week, I had an idea of how to show a quadratic optimization curve.

I did some quick calculations to find the relationship between the angle that a baseball bat hits the ball and how hard you have to hit it to hit a home run. Intuitively, we all know that if you hit it at a really high angle (close to vertical), it will be a pop fly ball; also, if you hit it at a low angle (close to the horizontal), it will be a line drive and won't clear the fence. So, I wanted to find what the best angle is to hit the ball to minimize the force. I generated a curve with force needed to hit a home run (at 400 ft) as a function of bat angle, and found that the best angle was 45 degrees. I explained this whole process to the class and presented it as an optimization problem (which is my specialization). I showed the quadratic curve, which was probably the best way to show them how it related to the course. When I introduced the idea, I was surprised when no one could tell me the meaning of "optimal" or "optimize", but I explained it as well as I could. Some of them seemed interested in the results, but I think by introducing new words and talking in terms of functions, I may have lost many of them.

This week I came in with a presentation on the solar car team, which isn't directly related to the curriculum, but I've always thought it's one of the coolest projects that Michigan does. I introduced it by talking about the future of cars, and how no one really knows what future cars will run on, but there are possibilities in ethanol, fuel cells, and electricity. I then tried to show a video (in the first class) that I pulled off the Solar Car team website, but unfortunately it didn't work with the projector. While I was trying to figure that out, I think I lost some of their attention. After that, I presented the project and explained how it involves many disciplines, a huge budget, and a huge 2500 mile race spanning ten days. We talked about how with the current technology it isn't practical to have a solar car, but it could possibly be implemented in a hybrid or electric car.

Many of the students showed some genuine interest in this project, more so in the second class because I didn't fumble with the video. There were lots of questions in both classes, which I took as a good sign. The main lesson learned here was not to try to use multimedia in the middle of a presentation/talk (video, etc.) without testing it first.

Power and Scientific Notation

2008-04-17T20:10:00.001-07:00

Last week, during Ypsilanti's spring break, I had dinner with some parents and students who had been touring the engineering facilities. One of the fathers approached me and told me that his daughter had told him all about the Mshoe (the energy-harvesting shoe that I had done a project on last semester), and how it's going to be the next big thing in shoes. He went on about how she can't stop talking about it, and he had gotten really excited about the idea and had some questions, himself. His daughter is one of the quieter students in Mr. Lancaster's class, and it was really nice to hear that I had reached her and gotten her excited about engineering, even though it didn't seem like it during class.

Before Ypsi went on spring break, the Algebra I lecture had been on scientific notation and how to multiply and divide numbers in scientific notation. I thought about it for a while, and I decided to do some calculations on power, relating two of my previous discussions - the Mshoe and the solar house. In scientific notation it was really easy to compare these, and I added in a regular power plant as a frame of reference.

This week I threw together a PowerPoint that presented these ideas. I started the presentation with a picture of the nuclear power plant from the Simpsons, and I asked them if anyone knew what the picture was from. Thankfully, the Simpsons is still around, and they were able to answer my questions. We discussed nuclear power, and I explained to them that the white stuff coming out of the top of the plant is just steam, not harmful emissions like many of them had thought. This discussion went on to energy in general, how we produce it, and how we quantify it (in Watts). The class got into the discussion, and I was glad to have higher-than-average participation in both class periods.

I then presented to them the amounts of power produced by the shoe (~400 milliwatts), by the solar house (~2 kilowatts), and by a normal power plant (~1 gigawatt). Next, I asked how many Mshoes they thought it would take to create the power that the solar house, and their guesses were all under 100. I put up the calculation and showed them how easy it was to divide in scientific notation, and we found that it was actually closer to 5,000. We did the same thing comparing the solar house to a power plant (500,000), and finally the Mshoe to a power plant (2.3 billion, or about one-third of the world's population). I closed with a few more examples of scientific notation that we use in our normal language and might not realize it (gigabytes, megahertz, nanotechnology). I think this was good to give them a perspective on the amount of power used in the world, as well as the importance of scientific notation in comparing these types of numbers.

Overall, I think this was my most successful talk. The students were engaged, and they seemed to be interested in what we were discussing. I think it may have to do with the fact that they are getting more comfortable around me, but I'm not the same face that they see every day trying to teach them lessons and discipline them. Mr. Lancaster said it's like I'm a guest lecturer that comes in every week, and they like the break from the routine. I will try hard to keep this up through the end of the term.

I definitely have learned a lot through these experiences about teaching at this age level, in terms of capturing their attention early and not boring them with too much detail. I felt really good at the end of the second presentation when I asked for questions, and one of the girls in the front asked me "why don't you teach?"

Design Expo

2008-04-10T12:11:00.000-07:00

I just finished taking several students around the Design Expo here at Michigan. They came over on a field trip, and a few of us (three teaching fellows, plus an additional volunteer) took them around in small groups to see the Expo. My group consisted of three freshman boys. They started out kind of quiet and didn't ask a lot of questions, so I started taking them up to projects that I thought would interest them and asking the teams staffing the tables to tell them about the projects. As the afternoon went on, they did start to ask a few more questions themselves. One table where we spent a lot of time was the one for the ME 250 projects. While they don't have the "oh cool" factor that some projects did, they were closer to something that the boys could see themselves doing - the students who did those projects are sophomores at Michigan, so they're about 5 years older. College seniors are quite a bit older and may seem more remote. In this case, the projects for ME 250 were flash drives integrated with laser pointers, with a variety of different types of housings. Some of them looked like they'd be cumbersome to use, but others were extremely well done and very attractive, and we were able to discuss the tradeoff between use - ergonomic, easy to hold, etc. - and appearance, such as the one shaped like a duck.

When I asked them what their favorite project was, they all seemed to like an EECS project involving a guitar. That team designed a system, sort of like "Guitar Hero", but with a real guitar, which would teach someone how to actually play the instrument. One of the boys said he played trumpet and a little bit of guitar, so he could identify with that one. They also thought it had the potential to be successful - it was something they could see themselves buying. Another project that they spent some time looking at was the crashed car (design of some brackets to increase crashworthiness), and the hydraulic regenerative braking on a bicycle. After seeing the car, I told them a little about things like drop testing, and they seemed to think that it would be fun to get to break things for a living.

We didn't get through the entire expo - there was a section over in the Chrysler building that we didn't visit due to time running out. I wasn't concerned with getting through the whole thing, though - I was more concerned with making sure they asked questions and got something out of what they did see. I think running this kind of field trip is a great idea, and it's certainly something we should continue doing with Ypsilanti High - and perhaps expand to other schools in the future, if that's feasible. It's a great advertisement for U of M to these students.

Solar House

2008-04-01T21:23:00.000-07:00

Based on the success of the last presentation, I put together a short talk on a project that some of my friends did as undergrads - the Solar Decathlon. I always thought this was a really cool project, where the students design and build a house entirely self-sustaining on solar power, so I made a powerpoint and told them about the project. I emphasized how the students design and build a house, and how it's not just engineering, but there are other disciplines involved in making it happen. I also threw in a couple of slides about the technology, just to bring out the engineer in me.

The first class was a lot more rowdy than normal, and with Mr. Lancaster out again, the student teacher and I both had trouble getting them to listen. I gave my presentation at the beginning, and was disappointed that many of them were blatantly not listening or not interested. I spoke with the substitute teacher and with the student teacher between classes, and they were more positive about the presentation, pointing out that there were many students that did show genuine interest and asked questions. We all agreed that I needed a better attention-grabber at the beginning to get them interested.

Since the first class was so rowdy, especially with the student teacher during his lecture, he had a quick talk with the students in the second class about expectations, how we expect them to listen, and how they can expect us to help them to succeed in class. I was surprised with how effective it was, and the students, who are usually more wild than the first class, were quiet and appeared to be attentive to me while I talked. I also started out with a more exciting intro, which may have helped as well. I think it went fairly well, and the students asked questions about it afterward. I'll be preparing a similar short presentation for next time.

So, key points: grab the students' attention early and hang on to it, and occasionally remind them that we are here to help them succeed.

Actual Uses for Math

2008-04-01T13:43:00.000-07:00

For those of you working with math teachers - I'm going to be giving a short presentation on Friday, on uses for logarithms, in an advanced algebra class. I've also made up a short worksheet to go with it - just a question or two about what I'm presenting, to encourage them to listen, plus one to get them thinking (asking about the advantages of plotting things on a log scale). If anyone else wants to use or adapt it, feel free - I put it on CTOOLS.

Also, if any of the students are fans of the TV show Numb3rs, there are some math activities designed to go with the show that might be helpful - either to use as they are or as a springboard for new ideas. They're posted on the web at http://www.weallusematheveryday.com/tools/waumed/activities_season3.htm

Diane

Math in Computer Engineering

2008-03-26T10:41:00.000-07:00

This week in class, I had a presentation about how Computer Engineers use some of the mathematical concepts that the class studied in last couple of weeks. We started out by establishing the different aspects of Computer Science and Engineering, and how it fits in to the different things that we do everyday. I tried to introduce the various branches of CSE, and gave examples from hardware, software, artificial intelligence and theoretical computer science. I then talked about two specific projects/applications in CSE.

I have noticed that most of the students in the class know and use facebook. So, I thought it would be cool to talk about a service like facebook and what goes on behind the scenes to make it available. I encouraged students to think about the millions of people on there, the billions of connections between them, billions of pictures etc, and think about how that is all managed. It is a lot of data and analysis! I started out by showing them a snippet of what some of the code for a service like facebook might look like, and explained how it takes a series of computer level instructions to get things done. At the heart of these programs is Mathematics. From logical expressions, to sorting, searching and any kind of operation you would care about has math in its background. We saw an example of that in the snippet. I also told them the similar trend in any software application they have ever used. We finished that section by talking about the fact that at the very low level, computers understand only 0's and 1's, and every program has to be converted to these binary numbers, which I believe they will be studying soon.

I then told them a little bit about the study of artificial intelligence. They were particularly interested in the story about Deep Blue, the chess playing program from IBM research that beat Garry Kasparov, the world chess champion in 1997. We also talked about robotics, and how mathematics is used to model different aspects of robot motion, force, control etc. All in all, the students seemed to be interested in the material, and paid attention during the presentation.

In the regular class material, we are now covering powers and exponents in Algebra, They are learning about simplifying expressions with exponents and graphing exponential functions. In geometry, we are moving onwards to studying triangles. With the passing of the semester, students are getting familiar with geometric concepts and having an easier time solving problems in the field.

Fun Engineering Projects

2008-03-19T17:25:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I gave a powerpoint presentation to my Algebra 1 classes about some of the fun engineering projects I've worked on, and how math was important to the success of them. I started out the first class with a few slides on different uses of math and what engineering is, and then I talked about two of my more exciting projects in engineering.

The first was about the research I did as an undergrad that looked into the dynamic effects of explosives. As soon as I mentioned that I got to play with TNT, the class got very attentive and seemed genuinely interested. I had their attention as I talked about the experiments I had done, how the Navy was paying for me to do the project and would be using the results, and how I had to use mathematical equations and knowledge of Algebra and Calculus to get my results.

Their focus continued through the second project, which was about a design project where my team designed and built a running shoe that converts the motions involved in running into electricity to power an iPod or cell phone. I briefly showed them how it worked, passed around the prototype, and showed them some of the math equations I had to use to design the product. They asked some questions about both of the examples, which I think was a sign that they were interested.

I wrapped up the presentation with a quick example of a real-life linear systems problem (because they just finished the unit on linear systems). That went okay, but I could see them losing interest toward the end. That example was much drier than the previous projects, and I understand why they reacted the way they did. I was only planning for the presentation to take about 10 minutes, but I think it went a lot longer (maybe 20+ minutes). For the second class, I cut out one of the intro slides and the linear systems problem, which I think was a good choice to make it shorter and more exciting overall.

My goal here was to show them how they can do some cool things with math, and I think it was pretty successful. After I finished up in the second class, a couple students came to me individually and asked me questions about college and engineering. I'd like to give a talk in the next few weeks about college in general, and how important and fun it is to go to college. I think it would have been a good idea to do something like this the first day I was there, following up every week or every other week with a brief presentation on another cool project in engineering (solar car, human-powered submarine, solar decathalon, etc.). I will talk to Mr. Lancaster about doing more frequent, shorter presentations like this through the rest of the semester. I'll definitely try to start out like this earlier next term.

Engineering Statics is all about solving equations!

2008-03-16T17:06:00.001-07:00

A couple of weeks ago I gave the students a 3-question survey to better understand what majors they would like to pursue in college. I informed the students that I would use this information to design different activities for the class as well as a college prep course. I found that their were quite a few students who were interested in Engineering, Business, and Science. Based on that information I have decided to create a series of examples that related to their interests that would help the students understand how the lessons they are learning in algebra relate directly to their future majors.

Since Mrs. Porter has been teaching our Algebra classes how to combine like terms and solve equations, I decided that this would be a great time to solve a simple statics problem for the students. While doing the example I explained to the students how engineers utilize statics to build bridges and other structures. During the in class exercise many of students seemed extremely interested and asked several questions related to engineering. I felt like the students were really engaged and wanted to learn more.

Additionally, I found a great computer based activity (Connectfour) that requires the students to work in pairs to play the game. During the activity the students would be required to solve a simple algebra equation within a certain time limit. If they get the question right they will be allowed move one piece. The game continues until one of the students connects four pieces in a row. For the activity I intend to purchase small prizes for the winners of the game to encourage all of the students to participate and work together. Ms. Porter and I plan to hold this activity this Thursday. I anticipate that it will go well.

During the past week I also held a lunch tutoring session for the students in the classes I work with. Only a few students came so I am not sure at this point if I will continue with the lessons.

Lung Simulator

2008-03-16T08:25:00.000-07:00

Last Wednesday the lesson in Ms. Hardy's class presented a great opportunity to relate engineering principles to the study of biology. The class has been studying the Respiratory System, and the students were to build a model of a lung using some simple materials: a 20 oz plastic bottle, a balloon, a rubber band, and a sandwich bag (the procedure followed can be found at http://www.smm.org/heart/lessons/lesson7.htm). In 2nd hour, we handed out the instructions to the class when we were introducing the lesson and they were able to build the models very quickly. So in 4th hour we tried a different approach. I first talked to the students about the relationship between science and engineering (science tries to understand the natural world; the goal of engineering is to solve practical problems based on the knowledge that scientists develop). Often this involves developing technologies, products and processes that are the result of engineering design. When I asked the students what biology is they responded "the study of life", then together we came to define biomedical engineering as "solving challenges in human health and medicine." The class had studied the scientific method earlier in the year, and the students remembered it well (they came up with Observation, Hypothesis, Experiment, and Conclusion). I then introduced a version of the engineering design process to them: Identify a Need or Problem, Research/Analyze the Need or Problem, Develop Possible Solutions, Test and Evaluate the Solutions, Communicate the Solution.

Then I tried to illustrate this process with an example from biomedical engineering. For the "Identify a problem" stage, I gave the students a statistic-- last year 1,054 people received lung transplants, but 477 died while on the waiting list. Clearly there is a need to bring this into balance so that all people who need a lung transplant can get one before it is too late. To "Research/Analyze" this problem, the students said they could talk to doctors and nurses, read about it in the library and on the Internet, and so on. I then asked the students to come up with some possible solutions. The students were not as involved in this part of the lesson as I was hoping they would be. Only a handful of students seemed to really try to come up with answers on their own, and a few students had their heads down on their desk or weren't paying attention at all. To try to get things going I suggested one possible solution: increasing the supply of donor lungs by educating people about and promoting organ donation. None of the students have driver's licenses yet, so I informed them that when they get their driver's license they will have an opportunity to decide whether or not they want to sign up as a potential organ donor.

Another possible solution to the problem that the students came up with (after a substantial amount of prodding/leading) was to decrease the need for donor lungs by encouraging people to live healthy lifestyles (not smoking, exercising, etc.). Another solution is to develop an artificial lung that will allow people on the waiting list to live long enough for a transplant lung to become available for them. While all 3 of these are great solutions that deserve attention and effort, the 3rd one best exemplifies a typical engineering solution so it is the one we discussed further. We talked about a basic classification of two types of artificial lungs: machines external to the body that help people breathe and devices that are implanted into a person's chest. I told the students about a company based in Ann Arbor (Michigan Critical Care Consultants) that is a leader in this field and is working on a device called "BioLung". This device has a very clear design requirement guiding its development (supply 100% of a patient's oxygen by using the heart's own pumping power), and the company has been going through iterations of the engineering process and redesigns of this product for 8 years to meet their design criteria before bringing it to market. This brought us to a discussion of how to "Test/Evaluate" solutions, and we came up with a list including simulation using the computer, building models or prototypes, and eventually clinical trials.

At this point we were ready to move on to the hands-on portion of the lesson and build our own very crude artificial lungs. But this time instead of telling the students how to do it, we simply gave them the materials only and asked them to try to figure out on their own how to build something that "breathed" in the same way that a real lung does. This was quite challenging for the students (as it would be for adults too I believe), and they were resistant at first. This type of task requires very different skills from following a written protocol, and skills that perhaps aren't stressed as much in their education as they need to be. We really tried to not give the students much guidance for the first few minutes and let them work it out in teams of two. Many of the students came close, and some I think may have had the model correct but didn't realize it and then changed to an incorrect model. After a few minutes I got the class's attention and tried to help them by talking about the importance of using the knowledge they have of the respiratory system to guide their approach to problem solving. For example, many of the students were attaching the balloon to the bottle opening with the balloon external to the bottle. But when I asked the students to draw analogies between the activity materials and the body parts involved in breathing, they were able to correctly identify that the bottle represents the chest cavity, the balloon is the lung, and the sandwhich bag is the diaphragm. I then asked the students whether the lung is inside or outside of the chest cavity. This way of thinking helped them to see that the balloon should be inside rather than outside the bottle. We reviewed the breathing process again (when inhaling the diaphragm contracts and moves down, allowing the chest cavity to expand and the lungs to fill with air due to a difference in internal and external air pressure) and the students were able to see how to model this by pulling down on the sandwich bag and watching the balloon fill with air.

All in all, I think this lesson was very successful in getting the students out of their comfort zone and introducing them to engineering principles in the context of their biology lesson on the respiratory system. My only regret is that I was not able to keep the students as engaged during my introduction to the lesson as I was hoping.

Connections

2008-03-14T08:31:00.000-07:00

The last two weeks have been great at Ypsi high. Students were fresh off their breaks and often in their good behaviors. In geometry we have been continuing our study of angles, and studying about how congruent angles can result from transversal lines. The students have been understanding the concepts and doing well in their homework and quizzes. In Algebra, we finished up studying system of linear equations and inequalities, and this week we have started looking at exponents. The students had an easier time learning about exponents that the previous section.

The seats in the class room have been rearranged so that students are seating in groups of three or four. This has made it easier for me to go around and talk to students group by group. Students also have been more willing to ask questions in their groups rather than the class as a whole because they don't feel like they are being put on the spot light. Communication has got better as I am learning most of their names, and they are growing at ease with me being in class.

Mrs. Lewis had been sick the past couple of weeks, so most of the regular teaching is done by the student-teacher aide. When I am in class, we coordinate our efforts to reach out to all the students. I think the most meaningful help so far has been when I work one on one with students. This week I have spent chunks of the class time working with a few struggling students, and I am pleased by the results. In geometry, for example, I worked with a student who has been trying to catch up with the class material. After spending about half an hour with him covering the lessons from the week, he took the quiz and did really well.

All in all, things seem to be going well, and I am especially enjoying the personal relationships that I am developing with the students. Frankly, I think that is what really matters. After all, Mrs. Lewis and the student teacher do a great job presenting the lesson, and I think the best help I can provide is give an additional dimension to the material, and make connections with students.

Inequalities in Engineering Design

2008-02-26T10:59:00.000-08:00

Today was my third day at Ypsi, and Mr. Lancaster was out due to some meeting here at U of M. However, the student teacher was there to teach most of the class, and there was a substitute there as well. Both courses are Algebra I, and since they had just finished the unit on inequalities, I decided to talk them through a design problem that involved inequalities, just to try to make the concepts a little more real for the students. The 3rd period class was very receptive to my example: we briefly discussed the concepts of engineering and design, and then we talked through the design of a simple chair. We came up with several inequalities constraining the number of legs the chair could have, the minimum and maximum height of the chair, the minimum width of the chair, and the minimum strength of the chair; I then explained that the objective of a business was the minimize production costs, and I told them how I would solve the problem. The students were very attentive and receptive, and the student teacher agreed that it went well.

The 4th period class had a lot more energy, and most of them were having trouble paying attention and being quiet. I tried to go through the same chair design problem with them, but only about a third of the class was listening, however hard I tried to include everyone. This was less successful, but I pushed through it, and I think the handful of students that were listening enjoyed the example. I would really like to see these students listen better, because I see them acting this way with the teacher and the student teacher as well. When we get to the in-class problems, the students that were being disruptive instead of listening were (surprise, surprise) lost, and needed our help more than anyone else. If they could settle down and pay attention, I think they would be able to do really well in class. My main goal in this class is to motivate them to focus in class.

Now the class is learning to solve systems of linear equations, and I will be trying to think of another example to walk them through next week. I'm looking forward to doing a better job engaging the students in my activities, particularly in getting the entire 4th period class involved.

-Steven

Second week, survey

2008-02-22T22:28:00.000-08:00

This week was my second week at Ypsi high. I am getting used to the classes, the students and the environment. I help with Algebra in the second hour and geometry during the third hour. The students were coming back from a 5 day break on Wednesday, so a lot of time was spent reviewing material from the previous week and getting them back on track. In the Algebra class, there was a test on Thursday, so the students were given a practice test. I helped students who had questions with some of the problems. In geometry class, we covered two more new sections, which were a continuation of the study of segments and angles.

The 3rd period is a little harder to manage. This came especially apparent today as the main teacher was performing other duties in the school, and the teaching aide took over the class. Well over half of the class was spent trying to bring quite and discipline. This really makes me appreciate what teachers do everyday. It simply is not easy.

We administered the initial surveys from the Partnership at the beginning of the geometry class. I did not get a chance to look deep in to the results, but from what I scanned over, there were quite a few interesting things. I was especially pleased that a lot the responders said that they intend to go to college right after high school. I would have to say, however, the highest point came when I helped a student spell 'computer engineering' for the question that asked 'what are your top five career goals?' I could hear my self saying 'atta boy, great choice!'. Of course, I might have been a little biased.

In the beginning.....

2008-02-19T17:45:00.000-08:00

I have now been in the classroom for a little over two weeks and it is amazing how quickly I have become reacclimated to this environment that I have not seen in almost a decade! The first day on the job as a "Teaching Fellow" (Assistant was fine, but Fellow has a little more kick) required a much longer commute than expected due to inclement weather. The result was more time to ponder this upcoming experience. Walking through the doors was a little eerie as I was greeted with the unforgettable chatter of teenagers in a cafeteria. This definitely brought back some fond memories of my days in high school. As this was Stephan's prep time, I was trying to slide in as many of the thousand questions I already had about the students that I had yet to meet while trying to be considerate of the many tasks that he needed to complete prior to the next class. Finally, that ominous sound over the loudspeaker appeared which meant I was only seconds away from meeting my first student. Of course there were many perplexed faces to see me sitting in the classroom when they arrived. Questions like,"Mr. MacGregor, who is he?" or the more direct approach from some of the students who entered and immediately asked "Who are you?" The funny thing about the last question is that I had been going back-and-forth- for a while about how to best introduce myself. Do I have the students refer to me as Mr. Lucas or do I allow them to call me Brandon? Should I give a formal handshake or greet students with a more contemporary version? Of course I want to be the cool guy but I don't want to set myself up to be potentially mistreated by teenager who may not understand boundaries. The result of this indecision is that I used both Brandon and Mr. Lucas as well as multiple versions of a handshake. When I was formally introduced by Stephan, I told the students that I was there for the sole purpose of helping them. Didn't get a rousing ovation but I think they heard me:-)

I was a little surprised by the amount of time it took them to settle down at the beginning of class. However, this allowed me to observe the wit that Stephan uses to get his point across to the students who are being disruptive. IMPRESSIVE! I have now started compiling a list of expressions for all the possble situations and retorts that one witnesses in the classroom:-) The first couple of classes consisted of me walking around and helping students individually. I have found in my few days in the classroom that I am considerably more effective by being nosy and identifying which students need my help by looking over their shoulder at their work as opposed to asking them if my help was needed.

I definitely look forward to connecting with more students moving forward. Hopefully, I can effectively utilize many of the techniques that we learned in our training to build a solid rapport.

Steven's First Day

2008-02-17T20:05:00.000-08:00

My first day at Ypsi High was last Tuesday, and I was pleasantly surprised by how receptive and welcoming the students were to my presence. I am working with Mr. Lancaster in two of his Algebra I classes, who already has a student teacher from Eastern helping out in the classroom. In our initial meeting, we discussed the class and expectations, which left me with the understanding that he wants me there to help out with the in-class problems and occasionally lead some brief activities that help bring real-life applications to the work that the students are doing. So the first day I wanted to ease in and get a feel for the class before I tried anything fancy.

I showed up in class and got to introduce myself, then for the most part spent the class periods walking around and individually helping students work through problems. The first class started with a warm up prior to any teaching, and the material was basic inequalities, which I am very comfortable with. I found a girl near the front of the class who was struggling with one of the problems, and I started to walk through how I would solve that particular problem. Mr. Lancaster started teaching before we could finish talking through it, which was a bit disappointing for me because she still didn't seem to understand how to do it. I paid close attention to the lesson, and I saw that they were being taught to work the problems in a totally different way than what I was telling the girl! After learning their methods, I felt much more useful in subsequent interactions with the students, and in the future I will try to flip through the book and see what they are being taught BEFORE trying to teach my own methods.

Other than that, the students were very receptive to my help. I remember talking to one girl and referring to Mr. Lancaster's lesson, to which she frankly replied, "I wasn't listening". That brought me back to my days in high school, college,... , hmm, even now, when I don't listen in class. I laughed with her and told her that I do the same thing, and I showed her how to work out the problems, which I think she appreciated. Many of the students seem to have problems listening, but most of them legitimately try to do the work when they are asked, which is encouraging. I am really looking forward to continuing to get to know the students and contributing to their appreciation for math and its applications.

The Skeletal System

2008-02-13T13:37:00.000-08:00

In Ms. Hardy's class we are currently studying the various systems of the human body. Last week we covered the integumentary system (skin, hair, & nails) and this week on to the skeletal and muscular systems. Today I helped lead an activity where the students learned about the different types of joints in the body. We had them articulate a variety of body parts (e.g. elbow, shoulder, etc.) and record their observations about the range of motions possible. Then based on their observations the students were supposed to identify each type of joint according to a classification system used in their textbook (e.g. hinge joint, ball-and-socket joint, etc.). Most of the students seemed to get the hang of things pretty quickly, but unfortunately a few chose not to participate.

One thing that helped keep their attention were some biomechanical models I brought in that I had borrowed from Prof. Chaffin of the IOE Department. He was very generous with his resources and provided detailed and life-like plastic models of a spinal column and pelvis, a knee joint, and a shoulder joint. The students seemed to appreciate having something 3-dimensional to touch and pass around. The models also showed some of the musculature around the joints, which I think was a good way to introduce the students to the muscular system which is their next topic. Thanks Dr. Chaffin!!

Background Check Required!

2008-02-12T12:41:00.000-08:00

It has come to our attention that while working in the YHS classrooms, although you will not need to be fingerprinted, you will need to fill out a volunteer form for a criminal background check. This is free. You can contact Lois at HR at 714-1210 or you can walk across the YHS parking lot to the administration building (facing the school, the white house to the left of the school) to obtain and turn in the volunteer form. Let me know if you have any questions regarding this.

So, what's all this stuff for?

2008-02-11T09:11:00.000-08:00

For anyone who wants a longer account, I've posted it on my blog - http://ypsdta-dlpeters.blogspot.com/ - but I'll give a brief summary here of the most notable event today. I gave a short talk today to Ms. Colwell's Advanced Algebra class on how imaginary numbers have real uses. I talked about how they're used in both electrical engineering and controls systems - the challenge was to convey the information that they really are useful in cool stuff without losing them in the details. Many of the students think in very concrete terms, and can't really grasp the concept of an imaginary number.

For any other TA's who'd like to see what I did, to give them ideas, I've posted the presentation and accompanying worksheet on our YPSD CTOOLS site. It's under Resources -> Teaching Assistants -> Diane -> Miscellaneous Presentations. You can feel free to look over anything I've put there, and borrow what might be helpful. I'll continue posting stuff there that I create. Lots of details will be on my blog, but I'll also put a few comments here when there's something particularly notable.

"So, how can I help you?"

2008-02-11T08:09:00.000-08:00

Last Wednesday was my first day at Ypsi High. I have been assigned to work with Mrs. Lewis, who teaches math to freshman and sophomores. I was a few minutes early for our appointment, so I got to sit in the back and observe how the class was going. This particular class, I learned later, is sort of a catch-up for grade 10 students who did not do very well freshman year. The course this semester is intro to geometry.
The real surprise, however, came later after the students had left. When I started to talk to the teacher, almost the very first question I got was, "So, how can I help you?". I was caught a bit off guard as my understanding was that the teachers were well aware of the program and informed about its details. I tried to explain about the partnership between the CoE at umich and YPSD and the outreach program. Another almost unexpected question was "What is your objective in doing this?". I stated the underlying motivation is to help students understand the significance of the basic math and science principles they are learning and to introduce some real life applications and connections. By doing so, I intend to encourage students to do well in the STEM fields and get them enthusiased about college.
I should be starting regular class room attendance this week. I plan to assist in algebra and geometry, and figure out how best I can help the students.

My first week as a YHS Teaching Assistant!

2008-02-06T18:57:00.000-08:00

Meeting with Molly --

I met with Molly on Wednesday to work out my teaching schedule, expectations, and activities for the students. Molly expressed to me that she would like me to assist her with students who were re-taking algebra this semester. She said that she needed me to help her with motivating the students to complete their homework and attend class. To solve this problem we brainstormed a couple of ideas and came up with having a few engineering/science students to come and speak to the class.

Later I spoke with Meghan D. who was a previous teaching assistant last year she explained that she did a college prep session for the students that the kids really enjoyed. I am hoping to also do a similar session for the kids this semester as well.

My first day in class--

I have to admit I was a little nervous at the beginning of my first class. When I introduced myself to the class I wanted to make sure it was clear to the students that I was here to help them with any questions they had. I then walked around the room and helped the students with their starter quizzes. Most of the students in my first class seemed to know most of the quiz material. They only needed small help with multiplying correctly and perimeter questions. Most were attentive but their were a few students that were disruptive during Ms. Porter's lecture. Even though she handles the disruptive students well, I am hoping that their are some activities I can come up with that will engage the students more. In my second class I found there were a few more students that struggled with the Math work. I found that I needed to help each student more with the basics.

Overall my first day was great and overwhelming at the same time. I guess I am putting alot of unnecessary pressure on myself, because I really want to make a difference in theses students lives. Right now I am trying to take everything one day at a time. I have already sent out an email to the NSBE general body to see who would be interested in speaking at the school. So far one person has come forward with an interest. I am hoping more will show an interest and maybe we could put together a panel for the school. I am also looking into other engagement activities that will motivate the students.

Upcoming TA Workshops

2008-02-03T17:16:00.000-08:00

Hello TAs!

Some important information regarding upcoming partnership workshops – please read through:

PEDAGOGY WORKSHOP: February 14, 2008

Although we will not be having a pairing workshop as initially intended, we still plan on holding a pedagogy workshop (which was to take place during the afternoon portion of the pairing workshop). This is very important since as TAs, you will be spending a significant amount of time in the classroom without formal training. Highlights of the workshop will include:

Marzano method, working w/ students, discipline, motivation, role models, lesson design, projects, home link, engaging students, phone calls, parents, peers, high expectations

This workshop will take place on Thursday, February 14, 2008 from 11:30am – 3:30pm in the LurieEngineering Center (Rm 2210). Lunch will be served at 11:30 with the formal presentation to begin at noon.

Please note that this workshop is optional for returning TAs; however, new information will be presented and returning TAs are strongly encouraged to attend. All new TAs are required to attend. I believe all new TAs confirmed that this date would work.

GINSBERG WORKSHOP: Date TBD (see below for possible dates)

A representative from the Edward Ginsberg Center for Community Service and Learning will be conducting a workshop just for you! Here is the workshop description:

Workshop Description

Understanding one’s social identity and its connection to meaningful service learning are fundamental for relating to, understanding and improving motivation in today’s high school student. This interactive workshop includes identity self-analysis exercises, discussion of the lives of Ypsilanti High School students and its connection to motivation and achievement, and techniques for improving motivation.

We have two possible dates for this workshop. The morning of Monday, March 17 or Friday March 21 (please specify your availability on March 21). Of course, food will be served at this workshop.

Please respond back to me with your date preference for this workshop (March 17 or March 21) if only one of the dates work or if you prefer one over the other. If I don’t hear back from you by Wed, Feb 6, I will assume that both options are fine with you.

I look forward to hearing from you! Here’s to a successful semester!

Update on Winter 2008 Pairing

2008-01-29T20:51:00.000-08:00

We have resolved the dilemma of non-matching schedules! In the interest of getting our 2nd Term of the UM CoE/YPSD Partnership up and running, we have matched Teachers and TAs based on collective expertise in the subject areas to be taught this term.

Returning TAs: please note that we attempted to keep last term's pairings intact. However, there are a few changes, most notably that we have tried to assign one TA per teacher. There is one exception -- Diane Peters is still assigned to two teachers.

New TAs: please contact your assigned partner teacher via email at your earliest convenience and set up an initial meeting so that you can begin working in the classroom as soon as possible.

***IMPORTANT NOTES:

***Before you contact your assigned teacher, read all TA instructions located in earlier posts to this blog carefully:

***All TAs: If you have not already done so, you must sign your offer letter sent by Leigh McGrath (check your email inbox) and return the signed original to either Jill Andrews or Leigh McGrath. You must do this BEFORE you contact your teacher and begin work.***

Your teachers will have been contacted with this information as well.

If you have any questions, please contact the (OE)^2 staff.

Teaching Assistant Blog

2008-01-07T07:15:00.001-08:00

The YPSD-UM CoE K-12 Partnership Teaching Assistants (TAs) should log onto the TA Community Blog at:

umk12tas.blogspot.com

TAs are welcome to create their own individual blogs if desired; however, this “community” blog offers an easier way to record experiences in the classroom and program, without going through the time-consuming steps of creating your own template and site. It also provides a single venue for others, such as tutors, program administrators, and our teacher consultant to provide comments and suggestions.

The purpose of the blog is two-fold: first, to encourage TAs to reflect on their experiences at the school, to provide an easy means to communicate the role that the TA is playing in the classroom, and to allow the YHS tutors to gain an understanding of the material being presented in the class. Second, the blog will be part of the qualitative assessment and evaluation process, and some of the stories or anecdotes will be incorporated into future proposals for funding.

TAs should add an entry to the blog on a weekly or bi-weekly basis. Examples of topics that teaching assistants can write about in their blogs include:

• Experiences with students
• General observations or thoughts on secondary education
• What you did as a teaching assistant in the class that week (lesson plan development, demonstration, partial lecture, etc.)
• Lessons/pedagogy learned from the teacher
• Ways that you might incorporate this experience into your future plans
• You are encouraged to take pictures/videos of classroom activities, demos, etc. to visually capture your experiences and your classroom impact

For ideas on what you should write, view other blogs by TAs from Fall 2007, which can be found through links on the community blog.

Tutoring / Mentoring at YPSD

2008-01-07T07:14:00.001-08:00

Ypsilanti Public School District-UM College of Engineering Partnership Project
Winter Term 2008

TUTORING
General Information
The UM – National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE) Chapter has run an after school tutoring program at Ypsilanti High School for the past two years. The YPSD-UM CoE partnership will leverage previous tutoring/mentoring efforts to continue the evolving, collaborative approach to tutoring. NSBE leaders agree that the best approach is to align the tutoring program with the Teaching Assistant (TA) program (described below). NSBE will recruit two or more tutors per teaching assistant; tutors matched with TAs will be better prepared for the after-school sessions and better able to develop enrichment activities for the secondary students. Ideally, the secondary students will see the same group of tutor(s) consistently, which will promote development of a mentor/protégé relationship.

2007-8 Tutoring Schedule
To be determined. We will post information on the TA Blog as well as send out a notice via email when we have a firm schedule.

Role of tutors
Each team of 2-3 tutors will work with a TA on specific classes/topics. They will provide a consistent weekly presence after school and assist secondary students with one-on-one homework/classwork/study skills support and attention. This structure enables tutors to better serve as mentors. Tutors will also be responsible for providing necessary feedback to the TAs via the TA blog site (umk12tas.blogspot.com) and/or other forms of communication. Each tutoring team will also coordinate among themselves to ensure that at least one tutor from the tutoring team is present each week.

Role of teaching assistants
Each TA will communicate what the class curriculum, topics, and goals are for his/her class to partner tutors. The TAs will also ADVERTISE the tutoring sessions in class and when appropriate, discuss with the teacher which students in class should be encouraged to attend the sessions. To encourage communication among tutors and TAs, at least one workshop will be held during the term, where open discussion of best practices and new ideas can take place.

Program Elements
• Tutoring includes, but is not limited to helping students with homework
• Tutors will help provide support related to material that students may have missed in class. This will help close learning gaps
• Tutors will become familiar with classroom concepts (via meetings/conversations with classroom TAs and/or teachers) so they know what the learning expectations are
• 2-3 tutors will be matched with each TA and are solely responsible for the TA’s subject
• Continuous dialogue between TAs and tutors will help with cross-checking student participation in tutoring program (especially challenged students)
• Mentoring will inadvertently occur during the tutoring process, especially with long-term consistent presence of tutors
• Activities of tutors will supplement classroom work
• Tutoring of students in non-TA classrooms is also encouraged
• Tutors should refer secondary students to other tutors who might be more knowledgeable in a subject area

Advertising
Teachers and TAs will encourage student participation in the tutoring program. NSBE tutors will benefit from

Instructions for TAs, Winter 2008

2007-12-17T07:15:00.000-08:00

The (OE)2 K-12 Partnership Teaching Assistant positions are held primarily by graduate students from the College of Engineering, although the program also recruits graduate students from science and mathematics disciplines in the College of Literature, Science and the Arts. As a classroom teaching assistant (TA), you can help facilitate more engineering-related classroom projects and increase individual attention received by students. TAs bring deeper content knowledge to the classroom, based on individual educational experiences in a particular field; provide links to other educational resources; and serve as role models for pre-college students.

TA-Teacher Teams. TAs are paired with one or more science and/or mathematics teacher(s), work in the classroom for two classroom periods per week, and expend an additional two hours of preparation work per week outside of the classroom. Specific tasks TAs will perform while in the classroom are determined by each pair. The resources and interests of each graduate student TA will be tailored to best suite those of a particular subject teacher. The partnerships provide an environment in which to experiment with new mechanisms of enhancing collaboration between secondary and post-secondary sectors. Some similar partnerships have involved TAs who assist teachers with labs, group work, and class discussions. Others have involved the development of projects, labs, lectures, and demonstrations by TAs for their classes.

Inside and Outside the Classroom

Inside
For each class assignment, each TA will spend two periods (period = two hours) in the classroom per week (eg. 10am-12 noon on Mondays and Wednesdays or 10am-2pm on Tuesdays). This schedule will differ for each teacher/TA pair and should be determined by each pair. For example, a TA might execute a three-day demonstration in a given week and will be in class for three days; and subsequently might attend class only one day the following week (instead of two days). Please remember, however, that consistency is KEY!

At the beginning and end of each term, TAs should ensure that the Program Surveys are administered for evaluation purposes. While Carol Cramer and the YPSD Teachers are responsible to administer the surveys, TAs should encourage students to fill them out, help their Partner Teachers administer the surveys if requested, and provide any other support that seems appropriate.

Outside
TAs are expected to spend time (one to two hours, depending on the number of classes) outside the classroom in preparation for classroom activities.

TAs are strongly encouraged to meet with partner teachers on a regular basis to discuss activity ideas, curriculum direction, updates, etc. This could be done during the teacher’s free period, lunch, etc. Outside time also involves preparation time for demonstrations, activities, etc. The outside preparation time could fluctuate as well – during weeks of preparation for a demo, for example, the time could be more significant, as opposed to other weeks.

Blogs. Each TA commits to contributing to the community blog:

umk12tas.blogspot.com

The blog serves two key goals for the program. First, it allows TAs to reflect on the experiences at the school, to communicate the level of impact in the classroom and to allow the YHS tutors to gain an understanding of the material being presented in the class. The Partnership Teacher Consultant, Carol Cramer, will use the blog to provide helpful suggestions on best practices. Second, the blog will be incorporated into a qualitative assessment and evaluation process, and blog insights or anecdotes greatly enhance grant proposals. TAs should go online and contribute to the community blog either weekly or bi-weekly.

TA-Tutor Teams. TAs will be paired with one or more volunteer undergraduate tutors who work at our partner schools to provide homework guidance and study skills assistance to secondary students. The tutors, who are affiliated with the UM Chapter of the National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE), will be reviewing the community blog to monitor classroom activities and content. Doing so will aid them in providing a more holistic approach to helping the students grasp classroom concepts ideas pertinent to their academic success. TAs and their partnering NSBE tutors should arrange to communicate regularly via email, personal meetings, and the blog. See Tutoring/Mentoring Component document for more information on this.

Workshops. Over the course of the TA appointment, attendance will be expected at key workshops. These serve as a forum for interaction among TAs, afford the opportunity to communicate with teachers and tutors on classroom progress, and share best practices. TAs will also be requested to participate in discussions/meetings with potential donors and other parties interested in learning more about the program.

Other Specifics:

BACKGROUND CHECK INFORMATION
On your first day at the school, contact Lois Knowling (734-714-1210) in order to complete a form for Human Resources. This is routine, but must be done before you begin assisting in the classroom.

DRESS CODE
No specific dress code exists at YPSD; however, please remember that TAs represent the University of Michigan. Dress can be casual (no coat and tie required, for example); avoid ripped blue jeans, tee shirts with questionable logos or clichés, etc. Students are not allowed to wear head gear (hats) at school; please be considerate.

IDEAS FOR CLASSROOM ACTIVITIES / ENGAGEMENT
• www.HowStuffWorks.com
This website explains hundreds of subjects, from car engines to lock-picking to ESP, using clear language and tons of illustrations.
• Many field-related professional organizations (eg. INFORMS - http://www.hsor.org/, http://www.informs.org/article.php?id=596&p=443) have educational resources (modules, demos, etc.) at varying K-12 levels. It might be worth exploring professional organizational web pages for these resources (IEEE, ASME, ASEE).
• The K-12 Partnership CTools website contains a Resources link where TAs can access teaching-related resources.
• Use fellow TAs! Some of the UM CoE TAs have prior teaching K-12 experiences and might have math/science-related demos/activities that have worked well in the past. Please share and post on the Ctools website.
• The CoE offers a Teaching Engineering course (Engin 580) taught by Dr. Susan Montgomery. It is now offered on a frequent basis (usually every semester). It might be a good idea to look into this course, which covers different learning styles, among many other useful topics!

TRANSPORTATION
TAs without a personal vehicle should contact (OE)2 to discuss transportation options to get to the school. Several options are available, including Zipcar and carpooling.

REIMBURSEMENTS
TAs will be reimbursed for all Partnership-related expenses such as transportation to and from the school (mileage is currently over 50 cents per mile), supplies required for classroom demos and activities, etc. It is best to contact the ADAA business administrator (Leigh McGrath) prior to making purchases as the CoE receives discounts from several vendors. Don’t hesitate to contact the (OE)2 if there are any questions about purchases or reimbursements. This will be discussed in more detail in meetings with the business administrator.

MISCELLANEOUS
• There is no parking permit required to park at Ypsilanti High School and TAs can park anywhere adjacent to the school. Information on parking at other K-12 partner schools will be provided as necessary.
• There is no badge necessary to gain entrance into the school. All the TAs names will be provided to the school so there should be minimal difficulty in gaining entrance to the school.
• If serving as a TA satisfies any outreach requirements (fellowship, departmental), do not hesitate to let the (OE)2 know. The (OE)2 can provide the necessary information to write about the partnership.
• TAs are encouraged to bring their students to campus to tour labs or participate in on-campus activities that are in line with the Partnership vision. TAs should discuss such opportunities with the teachers. All the logistical elements for such trips will be supported by (OE)2.
• Also please feel free to share such activities and opportunities with (OE)2 so that it can be placed on the (OE)2 blog.
• Ideas for improving the TA program or the Partnership should be shared with the (OE)2.

Questions regarding TA and Tutor experiences should be directed to:
Joy Oguntebi (ogunjoy@umich.edu),
IOE Ph.D. Candidate and (OE)2 Outreach Assistant
Angela Dixon(dixangel@umich.edu),
BME Ph.D. Candidate and (OE)2 Outreach Assistant

Questions on financial considerations or for more information on our K-12 partnership programs should be directed to: Jill Andrews (jillha@umich.edu)

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