Pre Calc Fun
When looking back on my educational journey the most memorable learning moments were when there were hands on activities or an activity that involved community building. When thinking about pre calculus fun may not be the first word that comes to mind. Having activities instead of lectures does not seem usual for math class. I always questioned how I would incorporate hands on, or fun activities for my students in math class that were still educational.
Around finals time I noticed the students feeling really stressed and just wanting extra time to study and get more help in preparation for the final. One thing I enjoyed in college was getting together with classmates and bonding over food and drinks while we studied the night away together. I wanted to provide extra time for my students where they could receive extra help on the review guide with peers and the teacher. We came together after school before our final day over hot cocoa and pre-calc. The girls were working all around the room with their peers as I walked around to offer extra assistance. It was such a success because the girls enjoyed coming to review while drinking hot chocolate and building a community together getting ready for the upcoming final. Cocoa and cram is something I will continue to do for upcoming finals.
I have found that when you give your students the opportunity to be the “teacher” they absolutely love it. Students also like to use technology and be creative with the assignment at task. I wanted to make use of flipgrid where my students can use this platform as a study tool. From the review packet I assigned each student a problem. They had to post a flipgrid of them doing the problem and explaining the steps. Now when students are doing their review packet and are stuck on a problem they could go to flipgrid and find that exact problem with a student explanation. The girls loved playing teacher and having this resource. I would look over the room and see math around the walls with smiles and laughter on the girls faces. Many girls mentioned how useful it was to have this resource when studying the night before the test.
Having an activity where students can have hands on materials and make a fun experience out of it will create a better connection with the material. Having a good experience will allow the students to have a better memory of what they did. In class I wanted to create a fun activity that was also educational. I came up with trig wars. I had flash cards with different problems they would need to solve. The girls would pair up and challenge each other. Through the period everyone was continuously playing and even if they did not know the material well it was a great opportunity to have the girls practice and work with other students. At the beginning I presented a prize for the student who makes it all the way to the top. This got them very excited and competitive where they wanted to participate and do well. You would see the girls cheering each other on and get very into the game. It was a game disguised with learning and it was a success.
Sometimes it takes thinking outside the box to create memorable activities for the students to enjoy. Just these few activities made the girls excited about learning math and being engaged. I felt sneaky because the girls had fun but they were really learning. I am going to continue to create and use these activities so I can make my students math education more exciting and memorable.
I love the idea of using Flipgrid where students show how to solve a problem on the review packet. Great idea!
Samantha, you've hit on something that I think is essential in the classroom. Students must be in a good social-emotional space if we want them to buy into what we are teaching. It's not enough to simply leverage rigor with the implicit threat of failure (or earning a B) as the driving motivation for what we expect from our students. We have to constantly message the usefulness and impact of learning to our students. The best type of learning happens when students are authentically engaged. This is a great blog post!
What a great idea, and thanks for the reminder about the study sessions. I think it would be an interesting idea to use an X block to have a school-wide study session or two where students could drop in on different teachers as finals approach, with cookies and hot cocoa for all.
Samantha, just finished Michael's blog and i feel that much of what he speaks about when he talks of book clubs applies to the study group too! It boils down to building community. I love your flipgrid system and I suspect it is a huge help!