First Days of WIM

This month, I'm participating in a blog challenge called Blaugust.  To see the list of participating blogs, click on the logo above. I would encourage to you please cheer on our participants with either a tweet or a comment on their blog during this month. It can be hard to blog on a daily (or even regular) schedule! :)  If you would like to join the blogging challenge, you can still sign-up anytime!

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In Geometry this year, I am trying something new to me.  In the past, I've done something math-y on Day 1, then set up Notebooks and start teaching on Day 2.

But this year, inspired by my state's "Unit 0", which ties into Jo Boaler's Week of Inspirational Math, I am using some of the YouCubed Videos in my first few days.  (Note:  There are 3 "weeks" - I am using Week 1 for Grades 5-9+ because the Week 2 and 3 videos are just a bit too cheesy for me)

For Day 1 of Geometry, we pretty much did the WIM Day 1 lesson plan as written, other than starting out with Name Tents as a getting to know you activity.  We watched the first video and students filled in the paper at the left with 5 things they learned from the video and a question they had.  Then, we followed up with what good group work looks like and the 4 4s problem.

I did not know what to expect and how the kids would respond to a 4 minute research based video to start the year.  But to be honest, the thing that blew me away and what truly sold me on doing this in the future were the take-aways and questions the kids asked.  Here are some of my favorites:

Things they learned:

• The more you work your brain the more the brain grows.
• Stop practicing = your brain shrinks
• If you are not so good at Math but your friends are, you can catch them up by practicing more than they do.
• Nobody is born good at math, your attitude towards it is based on experience.
• If you review, stuff in your brain grows and stays
• The more you think and the harder you think, the bigger and faster your brain grows
• Synapses fire with every conversation, lesson, and experience
• Being a taxi driver in London makes you smarter for the time you're a taxi driver
• Your brain can rewire and grow from working on something for 6 minutes every day for a couple of weeks.

Questions they had:

• How strong can the rewire be, since we forget most things during the summer?
• Does age make a difference?
• How much can your brain grow?
• If our brain can grown, then does our head also grow as our brain grows?
• It is easy to be a math person if you put your mind set to it, however why is it hard to [put] your mind to it?
• I wonder what would happen to my brain if I started on math earlier in life.  Would I be more advanced?
• How many methods will we be given to accomplish this?  Will we work, therefore, in smaller increments , since the mind can, normally, really only access only so much at once?
• How do you make an experience stick for a long period of time?
• Why are certain people more determined in certain tasks?
• How do I become a math person?  
• Can your knowledge be limited depending on your brain size?
• How much does your brain change over the course of your life?
• If our brain grows and shrinks, how does your skill compensate for its flexibility?
• Why do some people brain work faster than others when it comes to math?
• Why do the taxi drivers brains shrink, shouldn't they have retained the knowledge?

I love that some of these questions will be things we are able to tackle tomorrow! :)