What I control

Lately I have been doing a large amount of reflecting on what I control in a classroom (working from Whitaker's 14 things great teachers do ).  I cannot control what a student does outside my door very easily, heck, it is hard to control them within my room (from a desire to learn perspective - from a classroom management perspective I do okay).

I control myself, the relationships I make, the passion I bring to the room.  If my class is boring whose fault is that!  I know math can be dry -- but I don't have to be. I control my room, my relationships and expectations, the projects we do, and what the students find important.

I cannot control others in the building, or other schools, or in the community or in the state legislature, I can only make sure that I make an environment where my room is a sanctuary of learning the math skills the world requires of today's students.  I try and create a place where we do things the students need to know to succeed - sorry Smarter Balanced Test.   Where students don't strive for an artificial grade but for real skills, real problem solving - skills that will allow them to succeed beyond the walls of my school.  I don't teach math for students to play school but to gain the ability to be successful outside the walls of my room.

Those are the things I control.  And everyday I know I have to approach my room with a desire and fire.  What we do within my room is greatly important.  We work hard to skip merely good and go for great.

I control that.

Summer School Math - Passion makes it fun.

So today was the first day of our school's summer Math class - a skill practice class.  I like the idea, coming in 12 days total scattered over 5 weeks for 90 minutes a session.  Just hitting up the things we had already worked on, it is a way to help them recall skills (build on some concepts) and just make sure the students don't backslide.  I did a little recruitment by saying it would be different than the school year (wasn't sure how though when I said it) and got a 1/3 of the 9,10 & 11th graders.
 
So I started with a "scavenger" hunt -- where the clues lead to practice problems that they completed in teams.  I ran the 2 classes with passion, I was really pumped up - and that in turn pumped them up!  They practiced math, ran the halls and overall had a relaxed first day.  I am following up with some relay games coupled to practice problems, then I want to do some sort of "math lab."  (That is the part I have not figured out yet - I have to create/find/steal some sort of math lab.  The lab needs to make sense to supporting/growing skills.)

But first things first, today went well.  Math was fun...