As I've spent the summer preparing and planning for the upcoming school year, I felt like there were a lack of resources for the 3 classes I needed to prepare: Integrated Math 1, Financial Algebra, and Senior AVID Seminar. I thought if I was feeling this way, there had to be others out there? So, I'm hoping that by writing about my journey, it may stir additional conversations and offer others a place to gather some ideas. [DISCLAIMER: I am not an expert for these courses]
We are in our third year with Common Core Integrated Math. To be honest, we are really starting our 5th year since we are on a 4x4 schedule. The transition to Common Core and Integrated was tough, not for content but more due to parent and student resistance. I think it was more misunderstanding than anything. Seeing our students go through the 3 courses has been awesome - the level of math they are doing, the conversations they are having, the interest level! The past two years we were using the Mathematics Vision Project. In January, our three District high schools came together to discuss and choose one main resource that we were going to use moving forward (prior to this each school was using a different program). I highlight main resource because it was made clear that this would not be our curriculum; that our curriculum we would develop as we went and that we would have the ability to pull different resources together! Ultimately, we decided to go with CPM (College Preparatory Mathematics) as our main resource as we felt it would be more accessible to all students. While not ecstatic that we would have to change after all the time and effort my department had put in, I knew this decision would be for the best and I was still happy that I would be able to pull in my favorite MVP lessons. So I spent most of the Spring and Summer preparing for our upcoming school year. I've got 7 teachers teaching this course; 4 of them for the first time and 3 of those are brand new to our school (2 totally fresh teachers). It's going to be crazy this Fall. I'm excited at what resources we will be putting together and looking forward to the feedback our team has.
I spent a lot of the 2014-2015 school year working with another teacher in our District to get Financial Algebra as an approved course in our District. I'm a strong supporter of financial literacy in the classroom and wish more required it. At least this course would give a third year course option to our students and get them knowledgeable for the world they are about to enter. Since I was on Maternity Leave for 1/3 of last year, I decided to hold off on offering the course until this year. We got about 140 students signed up to take the class and will be offering 4 sections of it. I'm excited that I will have 2 of the sections and my former student teacher will have 2 of them. We have already spent several hours meeting and trying to figure out how we envision the class, what we want to cover, and how we can make it relevant and applicable to each student. More on this throughout the year!
Finally, I'll also be teaching Senior AVID Seminar. I taught Freshman AVID in the past for 2 years, so I'm excited and nervous about this switch to Seniors. Again, with our 4x4 schedule, curriculum gets crazy. I'm not sure how our school has managed this schedule (I know they have!) so I'm anxious about getting into figuring all that out. I'm also excited since my first set of freshman AVID kiddos are now seniors, so it'll be nice to see where they are now.
I'm planning on making an effort to blog at least once per week with my insights of these three classes. I'll post the resources I can too! I may write about a few other things too - as a BTSA support provider, department chair, sports enthusiast!
We are in our third year with Common Core Integrated Math. To be honest, we are really starting our 5th year since we are on a 4x4 schedule. The transition to Common Core and Integrated was tough, not for content but more due to parent and student resistance. I think it was more misunderstanding than anything. Seeing our students go through the 3 courses has been awesome - the level of math they are doing, the conversations they are having, the interest level! The past two years we were using the Mathematics Vision Project. In January, our three District high schools came together to discuss and choose one main resource that we were going to use moving forward (prior to this each school was using a different program). I highlight main resource because it was made clear that this would not be our curriculum; that our curriculum we would develop as we went and that we would have the ability to pull different resources together! Ultimately, we decided to go with CPM (College Preparatory Mathematics) as our main resource as we felt it would be more accessible to all students. While not ecstatic that we would have to change after all the time and effort my department had put in, I knew this decision would be for the best and I was still happy that I would be able to pull in my favorite MVP lessons. So I spent most of the Spring and Summer preparing for our upcoming school year. I've got 7 teachers teaching this course; 4 of them for the first time and 3 of those are brand new to our school (2 totally fresh teachers). It's going to be crazy this Fall. I'm excited at what resources we will be putting together and looking forward to the feedback our team has.
I spent a lot of the 2014-2015 school year working with another teacher in our District to get Financial Algebra as an approved course in our District. I'm a strong supporter of financial literacy in the classroom and wish more required it. At least this course would give a third year course option to our students and get them knowledgeable for the world they are about to enter. Since I was on Maternity Leave for 1/3 of last year, I decided to hold off on offering the course until this year. We got about 140 students signed up to take the class and will be offering 4 sections of it. I'm excited that I will have 2 of the sections and my former student teacher will have 2 of them. We have already spent several hours meeting and trying to figure out how we envision the class, what we want to cover, and how we can make it relevant and applicable to each student. More on this throughout the year!
Finally, I'll also be teaching Senior AVID Seminar. I taught Freshman AVID in the past for 2 years, so I'm excited and nervous about this switch to Seniors. Again, with our 4x4 schedule, curriculum gets crazy. I'm not sure how our school has managed this schedule (I know they have!) so I'm anxious about getting into figuring all that out. I'm also excited since my first set of freshman AVID kiddos are now seniors, so it'll be nice to see where they are now.
I'm planning on making an effort to blog at least once per week with my insights of these three classes. I'll post the resources I can too! I may write about a few other things too - as a BTSA support provider, department chair, sports enthusiast!
