Singapore Math

The other day I shared an article from PBS.ORG on Facebook entitled "Instill a Love of Math" by Laura Lewis Brown.  The article details the importance of instilling a love of math early, to "make math 'real' and meaningful by pointing it out in the world around you" (Brown, n.d.).  Parents are also urged to encourage children to work hard at math  by practicing their math skills but also to have fun with math by playing games which involve math.  Perhaps the most important suggestion, and one I echo as a math fanatic, is that parents should always "avoid talking negatively about math, even if [they] have no need for Trigonometry in [their] daily life" (Brown, n.d.).  Speaking negatively about math can lead to a self-fulfilling prophecy which could potentially hinder student learning in the future. 

The article I shared brought about a question from a parent (and friend) of two students in one of my first Math and Science enrichment classes years ago.  I thought I would share the question (and my response) here as a part of the Monday Math series.

Question (names, except mine, and locations are changed/omitted):
Thea, I enjoyed reading the article about math that you posted on Facebook. I was wondering if you have recommendations about math enrichment programs (workbooks, computer programs, etc.). Our new state's real estate is a lot more expensive than our old one was. We do not have expendable income to invest in tutoring, and our son could benefit from extra help. A tutoring company was helping him a lot with his non-verbal learning disability in our old city. Our daughter could also use a little enrichment. I don't want to go nuts and overwhelm them. There is no homework here at all, so a few minutes of math activities in the evening would be OK. Our son needs a math curriculum that reinforces what he is supposed to be getting at school. Repetition, "tricks," and learning strategies help him a lot. To be honest, I don't know what our daughter needs. The gifted math class in our old city was great. It challenged her problem solving skills within skills expected for her grade level. They're doing some great stuff in her new school too, but not so much in math. I want her to continue to be challenged and love math. Any suggestions? Thanks.

My response is first, to have a look at marcycookmath.com as I discussed previously here.  Secondly, I'd like to recommend having a look at the Singapore Math curriculum for its flexibility, affordability, and ease of use.

Let me begin with some background...

The Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study TIMSS highlights in Table 2 the average math scores of fourth grade students.  Table 3 highlights the average math scores of eighth grade students.

Please also have a look at this NY Times Article as well.

Start by visiting Singapore Math.  I recommend reading through the site at your convenience.  Then, administer the placement test for both children.  From there, you will be able to determine which of the books to order.  Currently, our son is in second grade and we are using the Singapore US Edition Primary Math Book 2B for his enrichment at home.  I have also used the Math Sprints series as well as the Challenging Word Problems series for my own children as well as tutoring and enrichment students.  

I hope you will find this information helpful, please let me know if you have any more questions!

Brown, L.L. (n.d.) Instill a Love of Math.  Retrieved from http://www.pbs.org/parents/education/math/math-tips-for-parents/instill-a-love-of-math/

The Arts - Greek Amphorae with Diane Garmire

Recently, I had the wonderful opportunity to participate in the North Idaho Winter Edufest for Gifted and Talented educators.  I was thrilled to leave the conference having received both personal inspiration as well as a wealth of knowledge for my toolbox.  I’ll be sharing much, much more about the conference during my upcoming Sunday Summaries posts.  For now, I’d like to highlight what I learned from an amazing artist and teacher - Diane Garmire – who taught a session called “Get Into The Arts, Get Into Creative”.

First, let me say that Mrs. Garmire possessed all the wonderful qualities of an art teacher.  She wore a long sparkly tunic, jeweled shoes, (probably) hand-made jewelry, and a dazzling hair bauble.  What she wore best, in my opinion, was an inspiring calmness that, along with her artistic prowess, makes her a wonderful art teacher and respected colleague in the field of education.  I was very eager to soak up everything she had to say. 

My project is about S.T.E.A.M. education and Gifted/Talented students.  The Arts play a very important role in the way all children learn.  In her session, Mrs. Garmire asked the following what ifs:

• What if we actually accepted the research? 
• What if we believed that the arts help students learn and are the reason that many students succeed in school and later life? 
• What if we paid attention to studies that prove arts education improves test scores?

Mrs. Garmire maintains that the arts are grounded in Science, History, and Mathematics.  She insists that the Arts should be a part of every classroom.  Diane was careful to remind us that an activity printed from Pinterest is not equivalent to a fully-vested art lesson.  To highlight her point, she shared with us a project she was working on this year – archaeology – with her group of gifted and talented students.  One of the stops on the year-long journey was Ancient Greece.  Mrs. Garmire shared her lesson methods with our group.

First, we watched a video from Khan academy which provided necessary background knowledge for the project: 

Next, Mrs. Garmire explained to us how the students used their projects in their creative journals.  Students first discovered the meaning of an anachronism (a chronological inconsistency).  After, they utilized their chosen anachronism to create Greek Amphorae upon which they created scenes starring their anachronism and mythological heroes and heroines.  Students were limited to using only shades of red or black on their Amphorae because those were the two shades discovered and used by the Greeks.  Although, Mrs. Garmire showed us an image of one student’s work which included a drawing of a horse with pink nail polish because the heroine in the story finally succeeded in creating pink nail polish (the anachronism)!  How funny!

After the Amphorae were done, students wrote creative passages highlighting the depictions on the front.  The Amphorae were mounted into student creative journals with the writing included on the next two half-pages as shown:

It was absolutely amazing to see art, history, archeology, and creative writing all knitted together around one project.  I was inspired to learn more about Greek Amphorae and try this project for myself:

Mrs. Garmire led us through cutting out our amphorae out of manilla file folders (which took the remaining time in our session at Winter Edufest).  I brought my plain cut-out home and began to think of an anachronism.  I chose triathlon racing as my anachronism and decided to use Ionic Greek Letters to represent the first Roman letters of Swim (Sigma), Bike (Beta), and Run (Rho) on my amphora.


I sketched my design and tea-stained the manilla paper...I used camomile tea bags but might consider a red tea, such as cranberry or raspberry, for next time:

I decided to use chalk pastels for color:

We had these pastels on hand from a previous project which encompassed the study of Earth's Magnetosphere and Aurora Borealis. 


Voila!

There are two extra anachronisms in my amphorae...can you spot them?  

I plan to use this project for a summer vacation study with my own children (always a teachers best laboratory test subjects!)

Next time, I’ll be talking more about the creative journals pictured here.  After receiving a grant from Crayola, Mrs. Garmire and several of her colleagues initiated the use of creative journals.  Somewhat serendipitously, I started my own creative journal this year (which I used to house my Amphora)!  See you next time for more about creative journaling across the curriculum!  

iMovie from There to Here

Last summer I completed the required course C & I 515 "Computer and Technological Applications in Education".  Before I tell you about my experience in that course I'd like to concede that prior to enrolling in the course, I was a self-proclaimed 'life scientist' whose favorite tech supports were 1) to turn it off, wait, then turn it on again or 2) unplug it then plug it back in.  I would snicker to myself at the people moving about with their "apps for this" and "apps for that".  Sure, I knew my way around Microsoft office and my brain can imagine Excel Spreadsheets long before my fingers can finish typing into the cells.  Nevertheless, I embarked on my journey of Computer and Technological Applications in Education as a skeptic.  Furthermore, when we were assigned to collaborate via the Google universe I must admit to wondering what in the world was going on at first!

I'm happy to report, even in my case, an old dog can learn new tricks.  Completing the course changed my entire view on technology, applications (apps), and education.  In fact, I was in a meeting a couple of weeks ago with my professor, Martin Horejsi, and we were discussing whether or not technological applications interface equally with their non-technology counterpart.  We used readers (Kindles, etc.) to highlight our comparison.  I have very strong feelings about the kinesthetics and dog-ear-ability of paper pages for my research which I will share with you at a later time.  In any case, Professor Horejsi encouraged me to evaluate what it is that I'm trying to convey with technology and reflect whether the message would be equally effective without it.

With that in mind, I'd like to take a moment to appreciate the iMovie app that now exists on my all the iPads and iPhones in our home.  I was first introduced to this app in C & I 515 last summer.  I had such a good time with it that I shared it with my kids and their friends.  Before long, the kids were writing, directing, and performing in their own movies!

On the weekends and in the summer, iMovie is a wonderful enrichment tool which can be used to combat boredom and what I call "game-brain-rot" (too much game time on any device) around the house.  However, just recently, iMovie allowed for an opportunity that would never have existed before.  My oldest daughter attends an online virtual academy.  We have many reasons for having her there, chiefly because she is identified as a Gifted/Talented student and we needed her to have the ability to work at her individual pace.  When the S.T.E.M. science fair came up at her online school, she was excited to participate with the help of iMovie.  Student projects had to be submitted via a two-minute video.  She was able to complete her research, create a visual display board, direct how she wanted to filmed, and edit the piece to meet the time requirement.  Her summertime experience with iMovie turned out to be time well-spent. 

Here is her final product:

iMovie is a very useful tool for traditional classroom teachers and students as well as virtual classroom teachers and students.  My initial uptake with the goings on of the app was, perhaps, longer than most folks' experience.  However, my kids caught on at lightning speed!  I recommend iMovie for any academic environment.  I don't think my 6th grader's experience in an online S.T.E.M. fair would have been the same without the use of iMovie. 

Math - Marcy Cook

I'd like to introduce one of my favorite Math folks to know:  Marcy Cook.  I first learned of Marcy's expertise when I read Teach Like Your Hair's On Fire:  The Methods and Madness Inside Room 56 by Rafe Esquith.  If you haven't read it, I highly recommend doing so!  Rafe provides a seemingly endless list of resources and options to consider for classroom curriculum and enrichment as well as heartwarming inspiration for teachers across all types of classrooms, especially those in low socioeconomic environments.

I followed Rafe Esquith's lead over to Marcy Cook's website where I was blown away at the many options Marcy has created for students in all areas of mathematics.  I am especially fond of her Tiling Tasks for students in preschool through 8th grade.  The Tiling Task packets contain 20 separate task cards that teachers can assign for students to complete.  The task cards provide:

• dynamic independent or group learning opportunities
• ability for teacher to differentiate learning within a varied-ability classroom
• opportunity for extension and enrichment 

(Image from marcycookmath.com - "Algebra Exploring Tiles")

The tiling tasks are affordable ($15 for a set of 20 cards) and easy to use because they come with tracking sheets, suggestions, and answer sheets.  Marcy ranks the Tiling Task packets on a "challenge scale" of 1 - 3 where 1 offers specific solutions, 2 offers some probing, and 3 offers more open-ended and challenging problems.  Each student will need a set of numbers 0 - 9.  Marcy sells Quiet Number Tiles for $1.00 but students could make a set of their own numbers on cardstock which could be stored in a zip top baggie in their desks.

I have had great success with Marcy Cook's Tiling Tasks in my classrooms and tutoring sessions.  I found it very useful to have a class set of cookie sheets (available at Dollar Tree) so students can have their Tiling Task cards and Quiet Number Tiles spread out for use both during class time and when they have extra time available (the whole cookie sheet can slide under their chair or be moved to a storage shelf when they aren't actively working but haven't yet finished a particular Tiling Task.)  I've used the Tiling Tasks as a "warm up" for a tutoring session, as a dynamic portion of standards-based math curriculum, as an enrichment activity for accelerated learners, and as remediation for low-level math students.  

Read more about Marcy Cook here, and find out more about her upcoming math seminars (including the option of course credit for teacher professional development) here.