Gay A's

Today after school I was helping some of the 10th graders on Algebra 2. I spent a long time with A., one of my former students, working on revising his final exam. A. has more than a few mathematical difficulties, especially when it comes to the grunt work of math problems. He understands concepts fairly well, but has a terrible time with calculations and simplification. Other relevant things to know about A. are that he's gay and hilarious. Less relevant (but still awesome) things are that he has bright red hair and frequently wears bright red pants. Just in case you were wondering.

Today was no exception on the hilarity. First, as we were correcting his mistakes, he could do most of the problems without much difficulty. He definitely gets stressed out during tests, which, coupled with his frequent calculation errors, leads to low scores. I was coaching him on how to calm down and slow down so he doesn't make so many minor errors.
A: "I need to figure out how to calm down before math tests. I think I need to take like half a percoset."
Me: "Umm... let's think of something else. Breathing exercises?"
A: "I need to take one of those classes for women who are going to have a baby."
Me: "You should definitely take a Lamaze class to help with your math tests."
A: "I would, like, birth numbers right out on to the page."
Me: "That mental picture is making me uncomfortable... How about yoga?"
A: "I don't do yoga.  Ms. L, you see how tight my pants are.  They would like rip open!"

Later on A.'s teacher was re-calculating his new grade based on re-doing some of the problems.  I was super-impressed that he ended the semester with an 89%, especially given that I'm pretty sure he never got higher than a B in my class.
Me: "I'm so proud of you!"
A: "Oh no, Algebra 2 is my only B. I only want A's. A for A________. Thank god my parents didn't name me Francisco."
Me: "You should be proud of your 89. Algebra 2 is one of the hardest classes in the school. An 89 is awesome."
A: "No, I want all A's. Gay A's. Not straight A's. Gay A's."

Signs of Aging

This morning our faculty community building was a game of "Celebrity" with names of teachers at our school. When we got to the gestures-only round, someone was doing the "time out" motion with his hands. Nobody knew which teacher he was referring to, so someone jokingly guessed "Zach Morris." Everyone had a good laugh... until one of the student teachers asked "Who's Zach Morris?"

I don't feel that old, but apparently my cultural references indicate otherwise.

I Resolve to Not Make New Year's Resolution

True, I'm not making any per se, but there are always things that I tell myself I am going to do or want to start doing more regularly.

If I were to make a New Year's resolution, I would definitely inspire myself with one of these amazing designs from something call the "To Resolve Project."

http://motherlanddesign.blogspot.com/

http://www.fuelyourcreativity.com/to-resolve-project-phenomenal-new-years-resolution-inspiration/

I'm having trouble finding all the submissions compiled in one place, but they're definitely worth looking through. Any maybe setting as your desktop background just in case you need an aesthetically pleasing reminder of what you promised yourself you'd do.

Return to School

Teacher 1: What time is it? 

Teacher 2: 10:15

Teacher 1: Weird, it feels like it's 12:15. Because I've already been up for 2 hours. 

Coming back from breaks might be the worst thing about being a teacher. 

Merry Christmas from the Pressminarayanan Household

To you and yours from me and mine:

(Sorry, this was last year's Christmas card that I forgot to put up). Note that the Christmas sweaters are imported from Michigan. You just can't find that level of sequined detail out West.

And this year's card: Sarah and I at the Foster City Tree Lighting Ceremony. This was a big one, folks--the first year that they lit a real tree instead of tree-shaped lights out on the lagoon. Personally I liked the lagoon trees better because they were so representative of the FC, but I guess that budget cuts and/or the illusion of "going green" are reasonable excuses to go with the live tree. BTW, it wasn't actually that cold nor is it actual snow (it's California after all), but don't we look so much more festive in cold-weather gear?

Here's to another lovely Christmas with my California families, both blood and surrogate. Just as exciting, here's to the end of another Christmas season and the return of parking lot sanity. 

Is She STILL Talking about Asilomar?

Yes, I am. Partly because the conference is always amazing and inspiring and partly because I just now finally got a chance to upload these pictures. This is what the Asilomar conference grounds look like. So even if the conference had been professionally useless, at least it legitimately counted as a weekend away.

By the way, these are actual shots of the conference grounds and Asilomar State Beach, which borders the conference grounds. Unfortunately there was so much rain this year that I didn't get my usual session-long walk on the beach. I opted for napping to the sound of crashing waves instead.

Asilomar Reflections: Jo Boaler

I should preface this by saying that I have a pretty major bias in favor of Jo Boaler's work. This is not for reasons of blind faith, but because of how I have been "raised" as a math teacher. The teaching methods I've learned and successfully used have been the study of her research, not to mention that most of my math teaching heroes were either her research subjects or worked/studied with her at Stanford.

But regardless of all my biases, Dr. Boaler always has interesting things to say. Her doctoral thesis was a study of two schools in England, one using traditional mathematical teaching methods and one using "reform" methods. The differences between the two schools were startling. The students at Phoenix Park (the reform school) had much better conceptual understanding as well as a more positive and productive attitude towards math than the students at Amber Hill (the traditional school). There's more in her thesis if you want details. The same study was repeated at similar schools in the United States. The results were published in the Phi Beta Kappan under the title "When Leaning No Longer Matters," if you're interested. And you should be interested.

A couple years ago Boaler was giving a talk about her England study and a man in the audience asked if she knew what had happened to those students. It turned out that he happened to be a rich oil tycoon who was willing to fund her to go back and find out. So she did, and presented the results at Asilomar. Again, the results were fascinating. Part of her general thesis is that math classes literally traumatize and leave life-long scars on students. All math teachers know this anecdotally from the reactions we get upon telling people our profession. "Oh, I hated my high school math classes." "Wow, you're brave! That was my worst subject." "I actually like math" (as if that should come as a surprise).

So how would adults feel about math if they came from a reform background? The Phoenix Park students (now in their mid- to late-20's) definitely had a more positive attitude toward math, both as a general interest and in how they used it in their jobs. Dr. Boaler asked both groups what they do when they come across a math problem they can't solve. Most Amber Hill (traditional) students said something to the effect of, "I would ask someone who's good at math." One Phoenix Park student responded, "Why wouldn't I be able to solve it? If I didn't get it I would just keep working until I did." As a math teacher, that warms my heart. Even my "smartest" kids struggle with persistence more than pretty much everything else. I definitely believe (and lots of research has shown) that persistence and belief that you are capable of succeeding in a math problem are key factors in how well people do on tests.

For those who don't care about the wishy-washy how do people feel about math, Dr. Boaler had some pretty stark numbers. Both groups of students she interviewed were coming from similar socioeconomic backgrounds. For the Amber Hill students, their range as adults got wider, meaning that some did move up to higher levels, but just as many fell. The range of the Phoenix Park students stayed the same width, but moved up, meaning that very few, if any, students ended up at a lower socioeconomic class than their parents. That in itself is impressive and also has serious implications for raising low-income communities out of poverty.

In the age of high-stakes testing (I know this is how so many sentences in education writing start off...), there is so much pressure to teach to the test, to jam facts into kids' heads so they'll remember them for 2 hours in April. It's so tempting to teach them stupid tricks and drill them to memorize formulas without any reasoning behind it. It's definitely easier to write a worksheet of 100 drill-and-kill problems than it is to come up with one good groupworthy one. But Dr. Boaler's talk was definitely the reminder I needed that teaching conceptually, getting kids to talk about math, and helping them value different ways of seeing are such worthwhile goals. It's hard when my standardized test results don't seem to demonstrate how smart I think my students really are, but if they can go into their adult lives believing that they are capable of math and having the habits of mind to think mathematically, I'm a little less worried about their CST scores.