Austin 2023 – Day 1

The hotel here in Austin looks good.

Longhorn in the Lobby

Waiting down in the lobby for the buses to take us to the conference site. There is going to be breakfast there, but the hotel restaurant has bacon cooking and the coffee shop has coffee brewing. I’m getting hungry.

So far so good, the buses arrived on schedule. And yes they are school buses.

Check out the luggage racks for backpacks.

All right I’m not going to bore you with the details of the meeting I’ll summarize later. But we got there at 7:45 for breakfast then went to our sessions. Lunch was nice. It was brisket and/or smoked turkey with potato salad, beans and a broccoli salad. After lunch it was back to the afternoon session for some more training. At 4pm the buses picked us up and took us back to the hotel.

After a few hours break; some of the people were going to go out and get burgers at 6:45pm for dinner, but I noticed there was a Barnes and Nobles nearby so I opted not to cuz well I wanted to go shopping and buy some new books.

So that’s what I did. I bought a couple of the new Brandon Sanderson books and a Neil Gaiman.

Then I walked back and passed by the Cheesecake Factory.

They had a drink I wanted to try the other night when we were there and I did not get a chance to eat cheesecake because I ate too much, so I ordered a whiskey ginger which wasn’t too bad but got a little too much honey taste at the end but the ginger was great and then I had a pineapple upside down cheesecake which was awesome.

I got back to my room by 8ish, and took a shower. I’m waiting for the world cup game to start soon.

Until tomorrow..

Published in: on July 24, 2023 at 8:45 pm  Comments Off on Austin 2023 – Day 1  

Austin 2023 – Day 0

Hello again. If you are here reading, welcome.

I’m taking another trip this summer but for work this time. I’m off to Austin for 3 days of IB MYP Math. Let me translate the alphabet soup, The International Baccalaureateยฎ (IB)ย Middle Years Programmeย (MYP). What’s that you say, well by the end of these 3 days I hope I’ve got a good answer for you. My understanding at this point is it’s a method of teaching with the goal of introducing students to global perspectives, growth mindsets and real world problem solving skills while concurrently teaching your state’s or nation’s curriculum.

Time to board the plane. Next stop Austin.

Published in: on July 23, 2023 at 5:00 pm  Comments Off on Austin 2023 – Day 0  
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Dallas 2022 – Half Day 3

Homework

Cathy Vatterott – Rethinking Homework

You need to be more responsible – essay on homework

Link to Journal Article about homework bias

Grading

Ta-Nehisi Coates book on grading

Is your grading fair? How do award bonus points (superficial or substantial) not all students have access to a Cricut Machine and fancy paper

Culture of the classroom

Dr. Ilana Horn – book on motivation in math classrooms

Teaching students how to stand up for themselves against authority (ie how to help them keep you fair in your grading and discipline.)

Published in: on July 8, 2022 at 10:54 am  Comments Off on Dallas 2022 – Half Day 3  

Dallas 2022 – Full Day 2

Next working session

AM Breakout Session – Motivating Students

Using Reports (4 types)

PM Breakout Session – Plan It Together

Engage in a lesson planning process…

All done in my notebook and provided handouts.

Take away from the session… Each teacher must DO the math of each lesson to decide what are the MUST DOs and what are the MAYBE/EXTENSIONS

Published in: on July 8, 2022 at 10:49 am  Comments Off on Dallas 2022 – Full Day 2  

Dallas 2022 – Full Day – Long Live Math

Off to a good start with a breakfast like this.

Developing Mathematical Reason – Keynote

Pam Harris – Speaker

  • Math is figureoutable
  • What do Mathematicians do at work?
  • Paul Lockhart – Mathematicians Lament

Show your work.. Does that mean the student’s own work or mimic the teacher’s work?

If not algorithms, then what?

Experience math – look for #MathStratChat on social media new problem every Wed. Follow Pam Harris on Twitter

AM Breakout Session

Matching activity

Description to Illustration

Course Scope and Sequence Link to Website

Lunch was great here at Omni Las Colinas Hotel. I didn’t get a picture because I piled on too many tacos, rice, beans, salad and tres leches cake.

PM 1 Breakout Session – Creative Ways To Your CL Resources

You can use a Mathia problem as a warm up or exit Ticket. Have a students enter the classes responds to verify.

Split students into groups

How to do partner problems
Pause to predict before calculating

Give students directions and hold yourself to the set times to complete. But be able to cheat the time: don’t show a timer.๐Ÿ˜Ž

Keep a growing anchor chart.

Anchor Chart Example
Take Aways From Session

PM 2 Breakout Session – An Effective Mathia Classroom

MATHia as a co-teacher

  • JIT – just in time hints
  • Allows for small group instruction
  • Customizable
  • Classroom routine is important
  • Reward success
  • Have a positive attitude the students will catch it too

And that is a wrap for the day. Looking forward to tomorrow.

Published in: on July 6, 2022 at 4:53 pm  Comments Off on Dallas 2022 – Full Day – Long Live Math  
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Dallas 2022 – Getting There

Here I am again traveling; however, this time I’m traveling for work. This is a rare thing because normally schools districts don’t have money, but we have partnered with Carnegie Learning for a new math curriculum. Hence this a future posts will be more focused on what I’ve learned at the conference in Dallas.

I’m flying American Airlines because someone else is paying. I don’t fly with AA much and I’m glad this is a short trip so I can bring carry-on instead of checked bags that cost extra. I’m also in the back of the plane in an isle seat. โ˜น๏ธ

Flying on a much smaller plane than what I normally fly with Southwest. Just checked the AA app to see how full the flight is and it’s fully booked. The flight is 1.5 hours or so. I wonder if they serve a snack?

Advantage at being at the back of the plane with people that don’t like Dr. Pepper.

You get the full can of DP ๐Ÿฅฐ

Took an Lyft to the hotel from the airport. An Uber cost twice the price.

Well, it’s not fair to do this but I’m going to compare my Dallas room to the NYC one… You could fit two of the NYC in this one room at the Omni in Dallas.

View from the 11th floor

Started to feel hungry and remembered I hadn’t had lunch an it’s 1:30 PM. So time to Google restaurants. Going to try out Cork and Pig Tavern. In the process of navigating with Google my phone overheated thanks to the Texas heat a lack of shade. I did find the place. I wish the inside could have lived up to its name. The tavern had too much of an industrial feel for me to call it a tavern. The wood oven pizzas looked good though. Now I was eating alone and really shouldn’t eat a whole pizza by myself even though I could. ๐Ÿคช๐Ÿ•Went for the Scottish Salmon and roasted broccoli.

Now to relax for a bit before the conference starts at 3:30 PM

The opening session was very good. This is the most organized conference I’ve been to in years.

For dinner tonight I went for a greener option. Salad with grilled chicken. Was pretty good salad.

Went for a walk around the lake. Glad the sun was low enough that most of the building blocked it’s direct heat.

Guess I should head up to my room and prepare for tomorrow’s sessions.

Published in: on July 5, 2022 at 8:25 pm  Comments Off on Dallas 2022 – Getting There  
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