Apologies for the um’s and ah’s, the blatant lie about when the end is near and the part where I begin to say something, stop and say the same thing again.  I fear that editing will detract me from the purpose of this post and hope that you can forgive my mistakes as, indeed, my pupils have to every day.

In case it doesn’t work – here’s the YouTube link.

Credits of a sort:

Royal Bank of Scotland – Facing Up To Finance;

I cannot find details of this package online any more. The link above is to their equally useful Moneysense site.

Bowland Maths;

Bowland provides project based maths lessons that can be used for introduction of new topics, consolidation of units or just as good old fun and problem solving.

AiFL – Black Box publications

These booklets have always been a great source of ideas about how to use formative assessment in the maths classroom – a great place to start, I often pick these up again to remind myself of new approaches.

HUGE THANK YOU’S to my whole PLN and particularly:

@mvass, @atstewart, @relativism, @jimhenderson, @daveterron, @islayian

for putting up with my endless pleas for advice and help.

Ok so we’ve been working on this for a while now and I’m aware that it all went a little quiet for about 3 or 4 months.  The motivation factor of using the DS’s in class wore a little thin – or rather the class got used to them and started finding ways to ensure they managed just enough work to be allowed them.  The game became more of a toy than a learning tool and I had run out of ways to use the results of our races with the tennis stars so they were locked away in the cupboard for a time.

Very slowly our charts began to fill up as individuals were allowed to play games as a treat or reward.  We also made it through 2 sets of assessments, Christmas mayhem, a whole school evacuation – not a drill – and several snow days.  It was now the middle of winter term and time to ditch the project or resurrect it.  3M7 have a lot to thank my PLN and Twitter for because it was comments from you guys that moved me forward.

As I mentioned our class races had come to a natural end.  Looking forward I wanted to use the information that we had collected in the individual races.  From the beginning we had been writing down the total time for the race and the fastest lap for each game.  This in itself proved to be a learning  experience as some struggled to identify the best lap and most struggled with the format of the time.

First task was to get the information onto something more usable in the classroom than the posters that were being completed on the wall.  So we had a class discussion about the format of the times and then split into pairs.  Each pair was allocated a character and given 4 coloured cards – one for each of the cups.  They wrote their character name on each card and moved around the classroom completing the race times on the cards, working together to ensure the format was indeed correct.

Race Cards

Finding Times

Next we collected all of the character’s cards for each cup together, split into 4 groups and used them as an ordering game – fastest to slowest.  After this was completed and the misconception that the highest number was the fastest had been shot down by the pupils and confirmed in a less confrontational manner by me we did the exercise again using 2 sets of cards.  When we put the Orange and Green cups together we found an overlap in the fastest lap for one and the slowest for another which raised a good discussion about why.  Perhaps one was longer than the other, or harder, or the drivers on the slower race were just rubbish!  Regardless of the reason or ensuing argument it was the project and the pupils’ own work which prompted the discussion and not a contrived exercise for which they had no passion or interest.

Sorting Race Times

Are you sure?

Moving on we met the trickier topic of Speed Distance and Time.  I was determined to use the race cards again.  The class is only expected to complete distance calculations given the speed and time.

We discussed the average speed of a journey from home to Inverness (30m/s) and the fastest average speed recorded for a grand prix win. (67m/s – from F1technical.com)  I had calculated both in metres per second for them to give some context and to simplify calculations but keep them realistic.  From this the class decided that our Karts probably had an average speed of 40m/s.  Their responses had a very wide range due to their perception of “kart”.  Some expected the karts to be much slower than cars and I was pleased that none suggested anything close to the speed of the F1 car.  I had to persuade them up to 40m/s to ensure the next part offered some challenge.

I explained that we would assume the average speed of 40m/s and use this to calculate distance for each driver in each race. “But, miss, the race is the same length for each driver!” Thank goodness. I heartily agreed and said we were going to estimate the actual length by using averages and the information we did have.

Back to the problem of the format of the times – a quick revision on rounding to the nearest whole number and the cards were split up again.  I handed out worksheets to help the pupils organise their work and we split into groups around the 4 different cups.  We moved around the class writing down all of the fastest laps rounded to the nearest second.  Once they were all completed we calculated the distance.  Working together they managed to solve the problem of multiplying by 40 without my input and they flew through close to 32 calculations complete with working in minutes.

Calculating distance.

Still working...

From here we will do calculations to find the mean distance and time.  I hope this will prove some of our earlier discussions about some courses being longer or more difficult than others.

There are still gaps in the scoreboard which leaves more room for discussion and opportunities to reward pupils.

Moving forward I am looking forward to completing a similar exercise with the power car.  I would like to use this to calculate speed using the distance we know from work already done.

In a real life context we are far more likely to know the distance and time or the distance and speed – I am going to try something similar to extend the course, it can’t possibly be considered a waste of time even if it is not defined in the SQA arrangements.

This is a project that the whole class are involved in.  As long as I can continue to move it forward then they will probably remain engaged.  All the better if I can keep it linked to work that is prescribed by the curriculum.

For now, the motivation to play games may well have dwindled but Mario continues to keep them hooked for all the right reasons.

The Longest Journey Starts With A Single Step

I am spending some time working my way through my rather neglected Google Reader feeds. Each and every one included has value in education and has been added by me because they have provided an insight or an idea that I have been grateful for.

Reading them is not a chore, fitting the time in has become a problem. But only because I spend too much of that trying to plan what to do with it!

So, first step to taking control of my time and information flow – Reader will be checked every morning. Instead of watching adverts and personal stories of variable quality on TV over breakfast I will open up Google and have a quick flick through what’s new.

Time found!

I’ve bust my shoulder falling on the ice so I’m home and attempting to amuse myself.  The tv’s on and my laptop is open.  Now that’s just any normal evening – the only reason I feel the need to justify it tonight is because it’s Friday and I feel that I ought to be out somewhere.  Who am I trying to kid?  I’ve got TMBett201o streaming live, courtesy of Twitcam and @eyebeams , Facebook is providing a constant stream of news concerning the weekend exploits of friends and family and Twitter is giving me live updates from the education world and beyond.  All of this from the comfort of my sofa with a cup of tea and a heat pack on my shoulder.  I’m as happy as I could be right now.

So what’s wrong?

Once again I am receiving more information than I can handle.  There are too many things to try and I want to do them all at once.  TeachMeet is adding  to this list, so as well as inspiring me with tales of excellent classroom practice and fabulous new learning and teaching tools, my mind is once again trying to find a space to store all of these ideas or more accurately – a way to fit them all in next week.  So to get started I went to the Glow login.  That’s when I realised that this post was necessary.

The trouble is I find it difficult to focus on one thing at a time.  My head is full of projects that I can’t start because I cannot choose which one to try.  I believe this is more about not wanting to put all the other ideas on hold rather than not being inspired enough by one.

This is really a reminder to myself that I need to set goals and targets at the beginning of each term.

Time to regroup and prioritise again.  I haven’t done this properly since I had to write personal profile statements for GTCS.  Tomorrow I am going to keep a log of all the ideas floating around, conceptions or projects already in progress.  Then on Sunday I will set my own targets for the rest of the term.  Hopefully if I can see in a straight line then my classes will benefit from a more consistent effort.

Will keep you posted.

I’m doing a presentation on Tuesday and one of the key phrases that I am going to say out loud is that assessment is not the million dollar solution to Curriculum for Excellence that we are waiting for.  Now, I’m going to wear my waterproofs to protect me from the rotten fruit and veg bound to head my way but nothing’s going to stop the glares and looks of absolute disbelief.

The great thing is though:

I finally believe it’s true.

For a long time I have wanted to believe that the abolishment of external, final exams is the right thing to do.  I have always felt that it is fundamentally wrong to test pupil’s knowledge and 12 years of learning with 1 hour summative assessment.  On the flip side I have been unable to conjure any idea of what assessment should look like.  To be honest I’m still struggling with that but I can now look forward to the challenge because I finally understand my own role.

School curricula for too long has focussed on the goal being to pass as many exams as possible, the elite head to uni, the middle to college or apprenticeships and the bottom plough through and hope for the best from their handful of foundation grades.  Great improvements have been made with the continued implementation of vocational and practical courses.  The emphasis, however, has remained on channelling as many as possible down an academic route and adding extras for other learners.  Curriculum for Excellence goes one step further and asks teachers to provide learning suitable to every learner.

How do we know what to teach if there is no final goal?  A war cry from those, and until recently me, who need assessment to be fixed so that they know “what” to teach.  This is my real revelation to date because I have realised that:

 I know what to teach regardless of the final assessment. 

Nobody has ever suggested that we should be changing the content of our courses.  Indeed it would be difficult to create a brand new maths syllabus, the nuts and bolts of number, algebra and geometry are not changing and are essential to future learning.  Each step leads logically to the next and the extent of learning is now limited only by the ability of the pupils.  I agree that a structure must be imposed to learning to ensure that pupils are gaining a breadth of learning and that records of achievement for each pupil are essential and I’m not sure how that will look either but I am now confident that I have the tools and resources to move forward.

In my toolbox I have textbooks, worksheets and schemes of work, all of which offer comprehensive structure to suit learning maths through relevant age and stage levels in an ordered manner which builds upon previous learning and provides essential numeracy and mathematical skills.  In addition I have a plethora of ICT and interactive tools including games, concrete apparatus and links to real life.  Add to all that co-operative learning and formative assessment strategies and chuck in a bit of investigation, outdoor learning and fun and I reckon I might just make it through.

If I use all the tools that I have and maintain the pace and challenge I now believe that I can ensure that the learners in my classroom will be ready for whatever the National Assessment Resource can throw at them.

My first foray into using the video camera to engage pupils in mathematics.

image from http://www.flipcamera.co.uk/

My department recently purchased a Flip video camera from Amazon at my request.  My head is full of ideas about self evaluation, presentations, pupil interviews, screencasting, etc – the trouble as always for me is where to start.

So here’s what I’m going to do first.
The main aim is to engage pupils in their learning by making them believe that maths is all around us and truly important to our everyday lives.  My target audience is S1-S3.

The plan is to video various scenes in and around Thurso and set the pupils discussion tasks to answer the title question.

I’m going to start with the obvious;

• Retail displays including offers, discounts and deals.
• In the supermarket I’m heading for the fruit and veg aisle for weights, budgets, conversions, ratio.
• Off to the estate agent window for rent and mortgage info which I will follow up with household bills.
• The bank will provide some negative numbers, personal finance and some complicated percentage calculations in the form of compound interest and APR.
• Off down the river for an introduction to vectors which I learned about teaching the cadets last month.
• A wander in the park to look at Fibonacci, the golden ratio and maths in nature courtesy of Marcus du Sautoy and Teacher’s TV.
• Finish with a closer look at some of the buildings and architecture in Caithness – this may well be worth a trip to Dounreay to get the dome close up.

The more I think about this, the more excited I get – again, it’s an idea that has been bubbling around for a while.
If all goes well, I’d like to then send the pupils on a mission to record their own videos – around the school to begin with and then further afield.

What have I missed?  Your ideas to enrich this project would be more than welcome.

Many thanks to Tom Barrett and his amazing Interesting Things series.

.

As a teacher and a volunteer at a youth organisation I am in the enviable position of being able to learn alongside young people.

Just because I am older does not make me the expert. In many ways I have a better capacity to interpret new knowledge because I am often more aware of my own learning preferences and I have many more experiences with which to associate and compare new situation. In many ways I am at a disadvantage, previous misconceptions need to be overcome, it is often difficult to find a place for new information and I find it difficult to learn new practical skills.

Together my S3 class and I learned how to play Mario Kart – on Wednesday they beat me soundly – again!
Tonight I learned how an Air Speed Indicator works collaboratively with a group of cadets – although I’m not sure any of us know exactly what the Pitot tube is I know that they could offer explanations regarding pressure differences as well as me now.

Tonight I feel privileged to work with these people and tomorrow when they anger me I will try to remember writing this!