Category Archives: Growth Mindset

Uncertainty

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I quickly learned after arriving at the University of Iowa for my undergrad that taking religious studies courses was a popular thing to do. One professor in particular, Jay Holstein, blazed a trail at Iowa that included religious studies courses having 500 students in them and being classes that students would sneak into in their free time. A documentary was filmed in 2008 focusing on his work and a short clip from the film can be viewed below to understand the type of educator that he was day in and day out.

This fall marked his 50th year anniversary of teaching at the University of Iowa and they celebrated him with a live streamed event including former students, his family, and his Golden Lecture. To hear him lecture again was an absolute gift. One quote he said stood out to me the most and that was:

“Education leads to uncertainty. Things that were simple are now complicated… Don’t be afraid of uncertainty. Be suspicious of certainty.”

Through innovation, social emotional learning, growth mindset, and effective teaching, we are introducing our students to the complicated and the uncertain and we are teaching them to not be afraid. That curiosity and that confidence in questioning anything and everything will be valuable to our students forever.

Bravery and The Growth Mindset: Why is the Pool so Different from School?

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Today marks the end of the second week of spring sports.  As the JV swim coach I have a love/exhausted relationship with this time of year, but when I step on deck and get to engage with our students in this different arena, I am reminded why I keep coming back to it.

Now in my third season, my JV roster has increased from about 30 swimmers (in each of the first two seasons) to 50 swimmers.  For a reason I can’t quite identify, there was a huge influx of new swimmers this year, particularly freshmen and sophomores.  And, to be clear, when I say “new” I mean, “no swimming experience whatsoever”.

When I share my shock with people, the common reaction is, “Well then cut some girls.”  There are about 15 – 20 girls this year that are swimming competitively for the very first time and standard operating procedure would dictate that I cut them (suspending the reality that swimming is advertised as a “no cut” sport).  But I can’t do it.  I cannot bring myself to cut them.

First, we cannot minimize the vulnerable position a teenage girl is putting herself into by walking out in a swim suit in front of her peers and jumping in to try a sport that she has no idea how to do.  In a world that feels increasingly judgmental (especially of our young people), how and why are they able to muster this kind of bravery? … (and here is my connecting point) … how can I get them to be this brave in math class?  More often than not, when my students see a problem they do not know how to do, they shut down.  They say they don’t know how.  They say they were never taught.  They question my validity as a teacher for daring to put something in front of them that I did not explicitly teach them how to do.  And yet in the pool, they jump right in.

I am not exaggerating when I tell you, this group of swimmers knows next to nothing about how to swim.  Only a few know how to swim freestyle, a smaller few have attempted the other strokes before this season, and none of them know how to dive or turn.  THEY FAIL CONSTANTLY.  And yet, they keep trying.  They take every word I say to heart and I watch in awe as they try to incorporate my advice to the best of their ability.  I can actually see their brains churning as they try to figure out how the heck to do a flip turn and not come up in the adjacent lane.  They keep failing and keep trying again.  Over and over.  Belly flop after belly flop until finally they dive in clean.  It is everything I want to see in my math class.  How can I get them to apply to school the same growth mindset they have in swimming?

I am so proud of their bravery.  Cut them?  No way.

A Call for More Community Reading

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One of my most important
responsibilities as an English teacher is to create conditions for books to be
read in community. Whether it’s whole class books, online book clubs, or just
the constant conversations about what my students are reading, my hope is that
these regular discussions will lead to a deeper understanding and a more
fulfilling experience. My students often report that they enjoy listening to
what their classmates have to say about books, that hearing others’ viewpoints
allows them to see things they do not notice when they read by themselves.
Sometimes I find myself wishing I had
more opportunities to read books in community like my students do. As an adult
with limited book club experience and very minimal social media presence (does Strava
count?), most of the interactions I have with others to discuss my own reading
seem brief and superficial. I sometimes worry that my own lack of reading
community might limit the potential impact of the books that I read. With
nobody to challenge my thinking or reinforce ideas, it’s hard to tell how much
of what I read just washes over me before slinking away.
I currently have 14 books sitting on
the desk in my home office. They sit in three different stacks and are loosely
organized in a sort of hierarchy, the top ones placed there to get my attention
first. About half of these are books that I have already finished, but I just
don’t feel ready to place on a bookshelf yet. I keep hoping some opportunity
comes up to share the experience with others before I get sick of the clutter
and find them a new home, somewhere out of my way.
Two of those books, Drive and Mindset, are books that I read earlier this school year, and can’t
quite let go. While reading each of these books, I found myself peppering some
of the ideas into my conversations with colleagues, but it’s hard to have a
substantive conversation about a book with someone who has either not read it,
or read it years ago. So before I cram them onto a bookshelf, I’m going to use
this blog to share a few of my key takeaways from these books, and invite
anyone who has read, or wants to read either of these books, to continue the
conversation.
When school started this past August,
I was talking to Tiz about intrinsic motivation, and she loaned me Daniel
Pink’s Drive. I found this book
fascinating and relevant, especially the overwhelming evidence that humans are
intrinsically motivated by nature, and that many of our most deeply embedded
societal institutions (work, education) have been largely designed under the
assumption that humans are motivated by extrinsic forces (money, grades). One
of the core principles that has stuck with me is the idea that all workers (and
students), desire autonomy, mastery and purpose in their work above everything
else, including money. Of course, it is necessary to make enough money to
satisfy basic needs, but research shows that the desire for more is not a
strong motivating factor, and does not produce better workers (or students).
When I finished Drive, I decided it was finally time to read Mindset by Carol Dweck. I devoured this book, half of it on a
flight back from London at the end of Thanksgiving break. Of course, all of us
are familiar with the term “growth mindset”, but I believe that this term has
been transformed and reinterpreted (sometimes falsely) over the years. My
greatest takeaway from this book was as a parent and little league coach to my
two sons. Lesley and I have recently begun talking about having my older son
Lucas try out for travel ball teams, and I have been making more time to
practice with both of my boys during the offseason. On every car ride to the
batting cages or to the field, I have been working the idea into our
conversations that we practice to get better, and that the very best baseball
players are not the most naturally talented ones, but the ones that work the
hardest. I also enjoyed the section of the book on relationships, as it
reminded me that growth is possible in so many dimensions of life. I know that
some of our students are sick of hearing the term “growth mindset”, and
interestingly see it as some sort of fixed mindset that they do not possess. So
while I show restraint in using that term, I do emphasize that you only get
better at writing by practicing writing, because it takes resilience and hard
work to get better at anything.
I am currently reading Make it Stick by Brown, Roediger and
McDaniel. The authors are cognitive psychiatrists who have done extensive
research on what methods of learning are actually most effective. Not surprisingly,
they identify that students and teachers often place too much emphasis on
memorization, which has limited benefits to deep, long-term learning. They also
make a case for frequent testing, and their research shows that being tested
after reading something is much more effective than rereading or reviewing
notes.
I would love for our faculty to figure
out ways to better coordinate our reading and build more reading communities. I’ve
heard great things about the Dare to Lead
book club, and maybe we can start other books club opportunities. I also think
it would be valuable if we had some repository (like a Goodreads-type platform)
where we could archive our individual responses to books and make
recommendations. We could also use Schoology discussion groups to hold online
book clubs, which is one of my favorite classroom tools.
I have always believed that reading
impacts us as human beings deeply, and that what we read shapes our lives in
ways that are not easily identified. While I still believe this to be true, the
reading that we do to improve our teaching practices should be shared, and it
is important that our own learning is happening in community. If anyone has any
interest or ideas about how we can continue sharing our reading experiences,
feel free to reach out to me – this is something I’d love to work on.

¿Cómo Se Dice, “Maths” en Español?: A Collaborative Vlog

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WATCH THIS VIDEO, YOUR WORLD WILL CHANGE….(probably not, but just watch because I put work into it) 🙂


So I don’t like math. 
I never have. I like being competitive and getting points on Alludo though,
which is why I ended up signing myself up for an online maths course for math
teachers. (Yes, I said “maths”). I really didn’t have any intention of getting anything out of this
course and I really did just take it to get more Alludo points, because who
needs sleep? I also wanted to know what my students go through on a regular
basis to see if I can adjust my curriculum according to their needs and how
they learn, so I gave maths a whirl.


 Much to my surprise, it wasn’t really a course about math,
(maths) in the videos that I watched (on double speed to save time), but rather
a philosophy on teaching and learning that can be applied to various realms and
curricula. While I watched the videos I noticed language pertaining to “fixed
mindset” and “growth mindset”, and the concept of “yet.”
 Students in these
videos stated “I’m not good at math” “I’m just not a math person” “This isn’t
how my brain works”, and I began to make some connections: I noticed many of my
own students in Spanish saying similar things “I’m just no good at languages” “My
parents weren’t good at language, so neither am I” “I had bad teachers in middle
school, so I’m not very good”. I started to create a correlation between
Spanish teaching and learning and math, and when I approached Lesley Schooler
about this connection, she agreed that there might be some similarities. Like
math, students in Spanish are afraid to make mistakes, they put an obtrusive
filter on producing and speaking the language because they’re afraid they will
make mistakes and not be precise, so they just don’t speak. I found the
neurological studies in the math online course through Stanford to be
fascinating with the connections that I could make with my students in Spanish
class. I realized that the material needs to be slower and more attainable for
students, and not penalize mistakes, but point out mistakes, and allow students
to correct them (this is where the brain grows) and they shouldn’t be marked
down for making mistakes, but they should fix them so that they enjoy the process
of learning. The videos present the idea of the journey and process in learning. Students try and think aloud and defend and explain their findings rather than simply right and wrong and they move on. I am inspired to incorporate more of this style into my classes. The conundrum that I’m having is, while this is a great way to encourage learning and brain growth, I want to know that I am preparing students for college, and upper level learning where there might still be an institutionalized, systematic fixed mindset that they also need to be able to navigate. Would I be doing my students a disservice if I don’t require precision as well? I’m not sure. 
I shared these thoughts with Lesley and we made other
insights and connections as well. I think this is a good course to take, even
if you don’t teach math because a lot of the principles can be applied in many
fields of study. Also I actually learned some math, and I don’t hate it as much
as before. Yay!

Math Program version 2.0

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Last year was an exciting and exhausting year for the math department.  We implemented a huge change to how we teach Algebra and it resulted in moments of happiness and frustration.  While we are extremely proud of the first version of the program, we always knew it was only the first iteration.  We knew we would go back and reflect on what worked and add modifications for the next version.

On Wednesday we had the opportunity to share out about our program to faculty and staff who wanted to learn more.  It was wonderful to see almost every department represented and many staff members as well.  Here is a link to the presentation we shared if you were unable to attend our session but would like to learn more. 

We initially started out with 3 goals for our program: 

  • de-track students
  • increase student agency
  • encourage collaboration and communication
Our program overall was successful in implementing these goals and we are continually refining what we’ve created.  We’ve created more opportunities for break out direct instruction every week.  We are tracking students’ progress more than ever through exit tickets, goal setting meetings, check ins with their lead teacher, and attendance at Math Power Hour.  In addition we’ve modified our Algebra Challenge Exam for incoming freshmen to make it mastery based.  Freshmen also had the opportunity to come in over the summer and get a head start on the Algebra curriculum and over 50 took advantage of this.  As a result we have over half of the freshmen already into the Algebra curriculum which will increase the likelihood of them beginning Geometry this year or give them the opportunity to slow down and focus on depth if needed.  
There are a lot of misconceptions about our program and I think they can be summarized here.  
It was wonderful to have the opportunity to share out with our community something we are really proud of and I hope other departments will do the same.  I would love to have the chance to learn more in depth about some of our other classes and programs.  

What if we treated academics like athletics?

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Hear me out.
As long as I’ve been teaching French, the rhetoric has always been that learning a language should be taught similarly to how we teach sports to children: You aren’t going to be Michael Jordan the first time you pick up a ball, utter a French sentence, play an instrument, or try to solve a difficult problem. 
These skills require honing through lots and lots of practice, dedication, repetition, encouragement, and passion from the instructor/coach. I’ve always tried to instill this mantra in the minds of my students, but it never hurts to keep coming back to it.
So when I opened my browser while lounging over a cup of coffee this morning, I was delighted to see an NPR interview with former-NFL player-turned mathematics Ph.D. candidate John Urschel (From The Gridiron To Multigrid Algorithms In ‘Mind And Matter’) touting his new book Mind and Matter. Then I fell into a rabbit hole, reading all I could about how Urschel is trying to change the way we talk about teaching and learning in American education. Then I stumbled upon his NY Times Opinion column “Math Teachers Should Be More Like Football Coaches,” and despite not teaching math, I greatly identified with much of what he’s saying. I ventured even further into the rabbit hole by perusing his Twitter account and had to share his story with some of my math teacher friends.
I feel so empowered to keep doing what we’re doing with role models like Urschel in both our and our students’ lives. He is giving students of all different walks of life access to an educational outlook they might not have otherwise held. And these lines really spoke to me, reaffirming my own goals as an educator of both young men and women from so many different backgrounds, social milieus, religions, family structures, political beliefs, mother tongues, home countries, you name it:

I recognize that because I’m a mathematician at MIT and I play professional football, I’m in the spotlight. And I have a responsibility to use this platform to show people the beauty of mathematics. To show people playing in the NFL, this isn’t your way out. You can do something mathematics. You can do something in STEM, even if you don’t necessarily look like what the majority of people in that field look like. 

And I have to say, okay, if you look at the field of mathematics, if you look at elite American mathematicians, there’s almost no African Americans. There aren’t many of us in PhD programs, there’s not many of us as undergrads, and what you’re sort of left with is the sad realization that there are brilliant young minds being born into this country that are somehow being lost — either because of the household they’re born into, or their socioeconomic situations, or sort of the social culture in their community. And this isn’t just a disservice to them, this is a disservice to us as a country.

Even at the end of the school year when I feel completely out of sorts, exhausted, and at times even ineffective as an educator, I needed this bit of reaffirmation to help me refocus and guide the students into the final stretch, the fourth quarter, the bottom of the ninth, or any other applicable sports metaphor you’d like to insert here:

A growing body of research shows that students are affected by more than just the quality of a lesson plan. They also respond to the passion of their teachers and the engagement of their peers, and they seek a sense of purpose. They benefit from specific instructions, constant feedback and a culture of learning that encourages resilience in the face of failure — not unlike a football practice. There are many ways to be an effective teacher, just as there are many ways to be an effective coach. But all good teachers, like good coaches, communicate that they care about your goals.

This speaks to what so many of us have been doing all year. And I wanted to end the year on a note of appreciation and gratitude for being part of such an innovative and supportive community of passionate educators!

Odyssey of the Mind Update: We failed and it was awesome!

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Odyssey of the Mind was this past Saturday and our inaugural team of five did amazing!  Everything they planned was executed perfectly. It went as well as we could have hoped for.  Yet, we lost big time, I mean BIG.  Our competition blew us out of the water.  Even more surprising, we still advanced to the State tournament.  Have I hooked you to keep reading?

In the Math department we make a big deal about celebrating mistakes and failure, because that’s when you really learn.  Our first attempt at this Odyssey competition was a perfect example of this.  Our first failure came when we had to weigh in our structure.  The structure had to weigh less than 15g and there was a 5 point penalty for every .1g over.  At weigh-in our structure weighed 15.6g.  That was a 30 point penalty.  Ouch.  Instead of just penalizing our team, the judges were amazing and started a dialogue about what the team might do to correct this error.  It was raining that day and the girls talked about how the damp air might have made the structure heavier.  From this they got the idea that they might be able to dry it out with a bathroom hand-dryer.  One of our team-members ran over to the nearest bathroom but unfortunately there was only a paper-towel dispenser.  The judges continued to press.  What else could we do to lower our weight?  While they didn’t feel they could remove any pieces without compromises the integrity of the structure, another member thought that they could perhaps shave off a layer of the pieces.  They spent 20 minutes in a corner shaving and got the structure down to 15.2g.  Much better!  I loved the learning that happened in this exchange. 

Then came the performance.  Their competitors went immediately before us.  I decided to watch it.  The girls decided to pass as they had to perform right after.  Let me tell you about this team we were up against:  they were clearly a well-oiled Odyssey success team.  Their set was sparkly and glittery and full of motorized parts and blinking lights.  While we built a low-resolution “lacrosse stick” to toss our structure, they built an air rocket!  Here’s a still shot from our performance.  I love it’s raw quality but in contrast to our competitor, it didn’t match up. 

But what was most devastating was when it came time for them to test the weight of the structure.  My jaw kept dropping as they put on more and more weight.  Their structure held 655 lbs!  I’m still amazed by this.  How much did our structure hold, you ask?  60 lbs.  Here is Olivia testing our structure for strength:

While they obviously killed us with the weight held, we actually beat them at the Spontaneous problem component of the competition.  We also tied them for style.  Our girls talked to the judges a lot at the end and understand better now how to build a stronger structure (apparently our main flaw was in the glue used.  And the girls were already buzzing with ideas for new designs that would be stronger as well).  Again, look at all of this learning from our failure! 

Obviously, they took first place and we took second (yes, there were only two teams in our division).  By default, we both advance to the state tournament.  Another team might decide to just pass given this initial defeat, but not our girls.  Even though we only have three weeks until the state tournament on March 30th, our girls are going for it.  They’re determined to build a stronger structure and beef up their performance to get more points and give that other team a run for their money.   When faced with failure, they’re choosing to learn from it instead of accepting defeat.  Look forward to another follow-up post after the State tournament!

Here’s a link to their performance. 

Starting a Rugby Team at Carondelet Is Like Teaching a Course No One Has Heard Of

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I won’t bore you with my background with Rugby, or even with the steps I had to get enough girls out to practice to learn the game. Rather I want to share my experiences with teaching a game that no one knew how to play.

Think about it, you have in depth knowledge of something, you want others to enjoy what you’ve enjoyed, but every time you explain something you find you’re using words they’ve never heard of (lol, it sounds like my classroom). Wrapping in the tackle is extremely important, as is protecting the ball in the ruck, but these words become meaningless without an understanding of the game. So we began with some fundamental basics and built upon it.

Our first practice we had one football (Rugby not Gridiron) and we were practicing catching and passing. It was funny because the girls didn’t want to pass the ball backwards (everyone want to pass forward like in American Football) and more balls were dropped than caught. Fast forward one month and you’ll see a team of young ladies and one or two dropped balls a practice. It has become quite amazing. And so we conquered a skill that is imperative to the game, and we moved forward.

Rugby is a contact sport and so tackling is something that has to be taught. Imagining that tackling is a natural skill is foolish. It can be dangerous to not position your body correctly, so again we started with basics. Now we are at the point where we are playing games against each other and they are doing really well. These skills are important, ordering jerseys is exciting, but the biggest victory is seeing that the girls are seeing growth in the game.

After the first practice we brought the team in to a circle to give a team cry (the cheering kind) on 3. Instead of the usual, “Cougars on 3”, one of the players came up with something different that has become somewhat thematic. She called out “Potentials on 3”. I thought this was cute. They realized they didn’t know how to play the game, but they saw potential in each other. Two practices ago this changed. I expected the potentials on three again (sort of like our unofficial name), but our team captain thought differently. She recognized that the team was actually playing the game, not just having the potential to. So the new cry became, “Skills on 3”.

These labels might seem small, but this shows what the girls know. and their growth. They’ve taken ownership of the team, which is the goal. I’m there to facilitate, but I’m not the one playing, they are. They’ve done what I can’t. They’ve made themselves a team and they’re proud of the progress that they’re making.

I’m excited for our first official game to see what these girls can do, but regardless I’m proud of the small family that they’re creating. I also excited for what comes after “skills”.

New Year, New Mindset

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I’ve never really been one for New Year’s Resolutions. However, I read an article back in the fall (Mind/Shift: “Changing How Educators See Negative Experiences in the Classroom”), and I’ve been thinking about it non-stop over the past few months. The article is actually excerpted from a chapter of Patricia A. Jennings’ book The Trauma-Sensitive Classroom: Building Resilience with Compassionate Teaching, and what better time to put ideas into action than the start of a new year/semester? To me, returning from the holiday break is always a time to reset with my classes, try something new, or switch things up from the normal routines we’ve fallen into. 
As teachers, sometimes we are our harshest critics. I personally have had countless days in my career where I feel as if nothing I’ve done went well in the classroom. Oftentimes, my perception of my teaching is way off base from reality. Every now and then, yes, things don’t go according to plan, but it seems to be the exception more than the rule.
The light at the end of the tunnel for me lies at the completion of each of my units. I’m always taken aback when I read my unit surveys; my students are setting achievable goals for themselves, learning, and most importantly, having fun in the process. I constantly feel blown away by their projects, essays, videos, or final exams. They are getting it, they are improving, they are thinking creatively and critically, and they are communicating in French — and it’s because of my class, my curriculum, and my lessons. So why can’t I see the forest for the trees? 
When I first stumbled across this article, I couldn’t help but think it was written for uniquely for me — this is the exact same issue I’m struggling with in my own teaching. But that also means I’m not alone in my imposter syndrome as a teacher: “Evolution selected for a negative attribution bias that makes us tend to dwell on the negative and ignore the positive. During a typical day, 10 great things may have happened and one horrible thing. When we get home and our partner asks us how our day went, typically we focus on the one horrible thing, forgetting about the 10 great things.” 
So how can we change our perceptions about our teaching and day-to-day experiences? 
Jennings offers a simple solution: “Each day, after your class is over, write down all the good things that happened that day. You can even include your students in this process by putting up a paper on the wall and inviting everyone to write good things that happen each day. At the end of the day, look at the list with the class and review them.” 
Since I’m in my ninth year of teaching, enter my teaching resolution (if you will) for 2019. This blog post is the first actionable step I’m taking towards taking time to think about the positive in my daily teaching life. Once we dive back into the routine of the school day, I want to try this exercise personally on a daily basis whether on paper, quietly in my own head, or in daily conversations with anyone from colleagues, to students, to non-teachers in my life. 
My goal is not to drastically change what I do, but to change how I see and evaluate my daily experiences and to feel more empowered and more confident in what I am already doing well. I hope you’ll join me in my quest to dwell in positivity this year!

Exam Review Success!

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It’s that time of year again when we are wrapping up our courses and expecting our students to be reviewing and solidifying all of the material we covered in preparation for the semester final exam. At this point, we as teachers are really burnt out and it’s so tempting to just provide free periods and a review packet. That’s what I did last year, and the results weren’t pretty. I really underestimated my student’s ability to self-motivate and handle a large body of information all at once.  They’re as burnt out as we are and with the flexibility of free periods, many wasted the periods or used them really ineffectively.

This year I was determined to push myself to try something different and to not leave my students to handle review on their own.  I wanted them to have to complete tasks and achieve a certain mastery goal per chapter, before moving on to a new chapter. In talking casually with Kristina Levesque, she mentioned that she had used a passport style of review before and this idea really resonated with me.  I want my students to feel that learning math is a journey, an experience, so what better analogy to this is the idea of having a passport to document their journey back through the chapters we’ve covered.

I created a passport with a combination of three components each chapter:  [1] Make a Chapter-specific study guide, [2] Correct any errors on the chapter test, and [3] do an online review problem component.  [In AP Statistics there was an added component to do an online free response problem per chapter]. I gave them a full week class periods and no additional homework to complete the passport with a due date of Friday December 14th.  

Here’s a little more on each component:

[1] Study Guide:  Each day I offered an optional workshop of a review of a chapter we had covered.  If they wanted to attend the workshop, they could write down what I said and call that their study guide.  These workshops were quite brief, however, and most students found success making their own study guide beforehand and then filling in any gaps covered in my workshop.  I put the to-be-covered topics on the board at the beginning of class with the time my workshop would start.




[2] Test Corrections:  While some teachers require their students to correct tests upon their return, I’ve never been organized enough to coordinate that.  But, I think this ended up being a blessing in disguise! It was so great to watch students go back to old tests and wrestle with their errors, with the not being fresh in their mind.  Another neat (frustrating?) component was that if a student had lost their test, I gave them a blank test to do again.  I told them this was like losing their parking garage ticket: they have to pay full price. But, as I told them, think of how lucky they are to get to do all of that practice!

[3] Online practice:  This was probably my favorite component.  There are so many great online platforms and I was able to find different ones to meet the needs of all of my different classes.  In PreCalculus, I used MyMathLab which we use anyway as a homework supplement. This program had pre-made Chapter posttests which I was able to edit based on what we had covered.  In AP Statistics, I used Kahn Academy which has instruction, quizzes and tests already made for our course topics. I assigned the topic tests for each of our topics. In Algebra 2 I made my own quizzes using GoFormative.com, a super easy (and free!) platform to create auto-gradable quizzes and practice.

What I like about all three of these is that they all promote a growth mindset: students are given immediate feedback (and in some cases hints) and they can try as many times as they’d like until they achieve mastery (which for me was around 70-80% depending on the course).



What I love about this passport system is that it motivates all types of students.  I told them that I would enter a test grade based on how far they get through the passport.  If they did it all on time, they get a 100% test grade. If they don’t get very far, they could get as low as a 50% test grade added in right at the end of the semester.  Those with high or low semester averages had a reason to complete the passport on time.

I know we’re too busy to be visiting each other’s classrooms in this final push, but I wish you could see the energy and focus of my students as they use these class periods so productively.  They have pride as they ask me to sign off on their achievements. They’re coming in during lunch, after school and yesterday my x block was hopping with students learning from their mistakes and trying to solidify their knowledge of Algebra 2 concepts.  I’ve never seen them work so hard!

I plan to give them a survey after the exam to see how they liked this process.  I also want to see how their exam grades are related to their progress on the passport.  I’ll follow up here with those results. For now, even though I’m exhausted and every period is super busy as I balance giving brief chapter reviews and check off each student one by one, I feel like I’m finally serving my students and giving them a really tangible way to do final exam studying which can otherwise be really daunting.  And hopefully, if this all worked the way it was supposed to, they’ll simply have to review their already gathered materials from the passport experience the night before their exam. They’ll come in feeling rested and ready. Stay tuned!