Why Are There Green Beans in an Area Project?

My 6 weeks of teaching little brilliant, hormonal, over dramatic, hilarious, 7th graders has ended. I assigned 6 Homework Violations, 2 Detentions, and made 3 kids cry. I'd say it was productive. And really, one of the kids cried because she was sad I was leaving. I was startled and didn't really know what to say. Another kid came to me crying because he got a detention from another teacher who was going to give him one anyway, but had heard that he had argued with me earlier in the day. In all fairness then, I wasn't the one to make him cry. He was the obnoxiously gifted kid who had argued that I didn't understand how to find the area of his shape, a simple octagon. He's a sweet kid and he understood why I graded him harshly after I showed him some of the other kids' work. The third kid burst into tears when I gave him a detention, but after that we were cool. In fact he's the one who put the green beans in the area project.
What am I talking about?

Well, about 3 weeks ago after the students had taken a test, I decided to try an experiment that I had learned about in my Differentiated Instruction class (my favorite class so far). I had the students write down 3 things they were proud of in math class, 3 specific things they were going to work on over the next two weeks, and 3 suggestions they had for making their learning experience better. While the entire 3rd period class felt their learning experience would be better if I threw candy at them and didn't assign any homework, they had some really great ideas. One of those ideas was to have a bright and colorful room.

So I searched online and found this website. Under Chapter 9.1 is an area poster project in Microsoft Publisher. I printed it off with a rubric. Basically, I asked the students to create a complicated shape that could be broken down into smaller shapes that we already know how to find the area for. The shape had to be colorful, complicated, take more than half the size of the poster, and the problem had to be stated in words. Then on a separate sheet of paper the student had to find the area of their shape, neatly showing all their work, and state in words how they found the area. For an additional 5 bonus points they could find the perimeter.

Kids are creative.


And some kids are overachievers.

Naming the shape seemed to cause some problems.
I thought the dumpster was a hilarious illustration of how one girl felt about the project.
And perhaps I may have worn my purple sweater a few times too many...
On my last day, I hung the area posters around the room. Now, the children are back with their regular teacher in a room full of colorful posters.

But what are the green beans? Well, the students were having a hard time understanding that just because the length of the side of the trapezoid is given doesn't mean that that number is used to find area. If you'll remember the area of the trapezoid is found by ½·h·(a+b) where a and b are the bases (the parallel lines) and h is the height (indicated by either being perpendicular to the bases or by a dotted line).
So that side length kept confusing the kids because they felt that if there was a number it should be used. I asked them if they were baking cookies and they had sugar, flour, and butter, what would they do with the can of green beans? They'd leave them in the pantry. The term green beans caught on and it worked to help them figure out area.

Ironically, I love green beans.

Extra Extra?

A little while ago, we had an assignment to write a newsletter for my Instructional Technology class. Because I'm a long term substitute, I've been teaching the same class of 7th graders for 6 weeks. We also are just coming to the end of a unit on area, perimeter, and circumference so I knew adding a table would be easy. I would create a little cheat sheet of sorts.

The problem is, who was I supposed to write the newsletter for? I aimed mine towards the parents to facilitate a discussion at home about how area is used in everyday life. I had just given the students a quiz and one of the bonus questions was to give an example of a practical application of area, or why they had to learn it. So I included a couple of the best answers from the students. I also introduced myself to the parents.

The problem that I had with this particular assignment was that I just couldn't shake the feeling that this would be better received in a larger city at maybe a public school. I think newsletters to the parents are an excellent way to keep the parents involved in their students learning, but at a private school in a small town, I am confident that the parents are already fairly involved. And I wasn't sure they wouldn't just scratch their head at what the new teacher was doing.

And as for introducing myself, I was torn. I am an outsider to my pleasant little town. I was born in Michigan, which one of the students thought was similar to his mom being born in Argentina. The small town culture eludes me on most days. But I do know that the great majority of my students know that my father in law is the local veterinarian. And some of them know that my husband's law firm is across the street from the post office. Introducing myself then seems sort of silly. Most parents already know who I am.

In the end, although I packed up the hard copy of the newsletter that I had printed up the night before and took it to school with me, I never did make copies for the students. I lost my nerve.

Try to Stay in a Group

In my Curriculum Development class tonight I learned that Aristotle and Plato and Socrates taught their students by walking along while lecturing and the students followed along behind them. In the midst of learning about this I couldn't help but break into a giggle. I imagine that if I were to walk along lecturing about how to find the area of parallelograms to my happy 7th graders that a couple things might happen: Some kids would wander off in groups and get distracted by things like icicles or mud puddles or any kind of wild critter. One boy would push another boy and eventually all the boys except for the obnoxiously gifted boy would be entwined together in punching wrestling arms and legs. Or, the students (especially if the boys were not intent on strangling each other just because it's cool) would be running around wildly. I think the theme music to a 7th grade math class taught this way would have to either be The Flight of the Bumblebees or perhaps the 1812 Overture.

Because I am truly a dork, I would probably have a hard time learning this way as I would either trip and need yet another knee surgery, or I'd be completely stressed out that my notes are incomplete. Yet another reason why incorporating technology in the classroom is a good idea. There could be no strolling with laptops...

And why is it so hard for little boys to keep their hands to themselves? I suppose I should be grateful they aren't seething masses of hormones yet and they're only touching other boys and not the little girls.

School Starts Again!

The new semester of school has started and I'm finding myself traveling back and forth to go to school, and also teaching a bunch of rambunctious and hillarious 7th graders. For my new semester of going to school I am seriously hoping I enjoy it as much as I did last semester. But we'll see. So far I've been late to one class and another was cancelled because of snow. go figure.

One of my new courses is an instructional technology course and one of the assignments is that I maintain several blog postings. At first I thought, AHA! this will be easy, I'll just post on Shazam in the Kitchen the mandatory three times and be done with it. But then I thought about things and decided that people who are oohing and ahhing over fancy bread with salami and cheese embedded in it aren't terribly interested in what I have to say the challenges of creating a desktop movie will be. Well, maybe one brussel sprout loving person or two, but for the most part, probably not other than an occasional amusing anecdote.

So I created a new blog. It will be linked to the other and more delicious blog, but this one will contain my reflections that are assigned for the course as well as what I find to be interesting tidbits about my experiences with teaching. And like my other blog, I will continue to maintain anonymity for my husband and my small town and probably those students that I might mention. SO hang on. This could be an interesting (and I meant that in a good way) ride.