Working in an international school sometimes brings moments of hilarity. The melting pot of languages, sayings and sometimes misinterpreted British sarcasm can lead to misunderstanding, confusion and lengthy AOB discussions. I recently engaged in a restorative justice conversation with two year 7 students ending with, what I deemed as, a thought provoking comment of "remember girls, what Suzie says of Sally says more of Suzie than of Sally". We weren't sure what Suzie had said nor who Sally was.
Another one of my favourites is "it was like snow on a summers day"; surprising, unexpected and really rather lovely and that is exactly how I would describe my current go to resource...Desmos teacher tool.
The internet and teaching community is saturated with online resources, websites and tools with most being helpful for time strapped teachers and educators wishing to share good practice and use a range of new ideas. Maybe the use of "most" is generous as I am sure we have all experienced these vary in quality, content and cost. Desmos is one which I believe delivers exceptionally on all three fronts.
The quality of the activities are simply some of the best I have used in recent times. 'Marble Slide' is a prime example of the scope of skills and misconceptions covered in an hour long lesson on linear graphs. My year 11 intervention students who focus their attention on the actual drawing of the graph rather than interpreting and understanding the affect of gradient and y-intercept have the barrier of being embarrassed making mistakes removed and the rate of progress with students fluently using notations of both inequalities and domains is something I am yet to experience in paper based activities.
Another one of my favourites is "it was like snow on a summers day"; surprising, unexpected and really rather lovely and that is exactly how I would describe my current go to resource...Desmos teacher tool.
The internet and teaching community is saturated with online resources, websites and tools with most being helpful for time strapped teachers and educators wishing to share good practice and use a range of new ideas. Maybe the use of "most" is generous as I am sure we have all experienced these vary in quality, content and cost. Desmos is one which I believe delivers exceptionally on all three fronts.
The quality of the activities are simply some of the best I have used in recent times. 'Marble Slide' is a prime example of the scope of skills and misconceptions covered in an hour long lesson on linear graphs. My year 11 intervention students who focus their attention on the actual drawing of the graph rather than interpreting and understanding the affect of gradient and y-intercept have the barrier of being embarrassed making mistakes removed and the rate of progress with students fluently using notations of both inequalities and domains is something I am yet to experience in paper based activities.
The content in the activities is progressive, well structured and engaging. An excellent example is 'Pentomino Puzzles' in which from informal beginnings students are coaxed into finding a more efficient method and discover the value of an algebraic approach. I have also used with great success used 'will it hit the hoop?' with my year 12 IB students which I linked to Harlem Globtrotter Thunder Law's 2014 record breaking basketball shot and structured in the style of a maths IA. The shot prediction activity brings a tangible value to student knowledge and the extension of "how tall approximately is the shooter?" provides rich, thought provoking challenge whilst addressing a common misconception in both parabolic and real life graphs.
One of my favourite elements of Desmos as a resource as a whole is the control you have as a teacher. The overlay shows attempts at a question and with an option to pace the questions it really gives students experience of the time demands of an assessment as well as facilitating classroom discussion with unexpected students loving acting as an expert on a certain slide.
Finally the cost. It still staggers me to believe that this resource is free. The rich learning that happens as a result of participation in the activities far surpasses any I have experienced from other purchased packages and the frequent addition of new tasks truly provides scope and range of lessons ideas. I will certainly be building the individual activities in our schemes of work for September.
So thank you, Desmos, from us teachers, the students and our school budget holders.
One of my favourite elements of Desmos as a resource as a whole is the control you have as a teacher. The overlay shows attempts at a question and with an option to pace the questions it really gives students experience of the time demands of an assessment as well as facilitating classroom discussion with unexpected students loving acting as an expert on a certain slide.
Finally the cost. It still staggers me to believe that this resource is free. The rich learning that happens as a result of participation in the activities far surpasses any I have experienced from other purchased packages and the frequent addition of new tasks truly provides scope and range of lessons ideas. I will certainly be building the individual activities in our schemes of work for September.
So thank you, Desmos, from us teachers, the students and our school budget holders.