Blog 3

Being able to go to the elementary school was a great experience! Any opportunity to work with students is extremely valuable. I feel that the lesson was well thought out and organized on paper, but many questions came up as we went. For example, some groups cut out two feet to measure, while others used one. While that is not major, there was still a level of uncertainty. It all worked out in the end. 

I saw a lot of mathematical thinking among the students. A question I asked frequently was when their foot did not land perfectly, whether they thought it was a half or quarter. Some suggested something without a prompt, while others rounded up or down to an exact foot. When I asked them to be more specific, they were able to determine a quarter or half. I also saw them struggle with converting feet to inches, including not knowing that a ruler equaled one foot (12 inches). To my delight, once they were reminded what a foot equaled, it was like a light turned on and they remembered. In addition, I asked them where the half inch hash on the ruler was, and from there, they could determine the quarter inch hash. All in all, they needed guidance, but were by no means completely lost.   

There are a couple things I would have done differently. To start, I would have rather had them walk heal-to-toe to measure certain things. While this could make finding perimeter difficult, I like the idea of keeping them moving and doing just the lengths of certain things. This could also move things along quicker so we could spend more time analyzing they data. Besides that, I wished we could have been outside, but no one can control the weather. Overall, I believe it was a great success and I give major credit to the people that took charge in the classroom, and also those who found other things to measure since it was raining outside. 

Growing up, I do not distinctly remember doing anything fun in math. It was rather boring and I think that stretches to now, because I do not enjoy math. What this has showed me, is that the experience is almost as important as the content. What I need to do next, is to consider ways to make math more interactive and memorable. They can have positive thoughts on their math experiences, and the content itself will be remembered better.

I am grateful to work with students at any point, and the staff was very friendly. These students were smart and had many good ideas. As I said before, they were no where near lost in the material, rather they just needed guidance. In conclusion, my largest takeaway is that when I have my classroom, I will strive to make a more enjoyable and interactive math environment. 

Writing 2

To begin, I had started using Venn diagrams at a young age. The purpose of them was rather clear to me, and I actually used it as a studying technique in elementary school. However, I lost touch with them throughout high school, and this class was the first time I had used them again. As I thought I understood their purpose, I interpreted it wrong my first time making my own. I thought the middle was an in-between level between the right and left circle, when in reality, it is a section designated for something that has the traits of both the left and the right circle.

My initial intention with writing this blog was to find a lesson plan using a Venn diagram, and describe its significance. Research led me to the link at the very bottom, where it reiterated what a Venn diagram was and its purpose. However, the example it used sparked an idea: I put too much time into my attribute cards for them to just sit in my binder. I used my cards for "On-Off the Bus," but now I realized I could use them to make my own Venn diagram and understand what I did wrong the first time. I decided to make my own diagram with Apple phone cords to show what I originally did wrong, and what it is supposed to be.

The picture above will not upload clearer, but this is the incorrect example. On the left there are mammals (giraffe, gorilla, kangaroo, dolphin), the middle are birds (toucan, ostrich, flamingo, parrot) and the right are reptiles (snake, lizard, crocodile, iguana). While these are organized in the correct categories, they defeat the purpose of a Venn diagram and the middle circle does not have shared similarities.

This is organized correctly and it reinforced to me the purpose of a Venn diagram. The left has mammals (giraffe, kangaroo, gorilla), the right has aquatic animals (shark, fish, seahorse), and the middle has sea mammals (dolphin, walrus, killer whale). The middle shares a characteristic with the left, which is having lungs, and it shares a characteristic with the right, which is that they live in the water.

Math is broadly defined as a subject in which we recognize patterns and categorize things. This could serve as a great activity for elementary math. Allowing students to make their own attribute cards would let them use their creativity, while using the Venn diagram can help them study and categorize. While it was used for science in this example, math was involved because there is an even number in each circle to categorize and place the cards in the correct place. Overall, the Venn diagram is a useful tool stemming from math, that can reach into other subject areas.

https://www.brighthubeducation.com/lesson-plans-grades-3-5/43208-lesson-on-using-venn-diagrams-for-math/