Week 6: Wrap Up

It's hard to believe that a couple of months ago I had no idea what Civco was.  Yes, I saw the building as I drove through town, but I never really gave it much thought.  Now I marvel at the many things that take place inside here.  What an eye-opening experience.  While here, I have had highs (collaborating with a great group of people and seeing some data come to life) and some lows (finding other things to work on while waiting for data to input).  All of those experiences though have really challenged me to stretch as an educator and reflect on how I can improve my classroom.


Before I list some of the changes I'd like to make in my classroom for next year, here are some of the results from the survey I gave earlier in the week.  I had the engineers that I have been working with take it in hopes to get a better understanding of their view of high school and the real world.

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Survey Results:

What was the number one thing you felt your pre-college education did to help you prepare for college?

Learning the basic building blocks of math to the point that I felt confident in my skills was crucial in order to master the fast-paced college environment.


Writing may seem less crucial for a science/math major, but knowing how to write well can set you apart from your classmates (in a positive way). 

Challenged me to think for myself but also helped guide me toward the right direction on how, not what, to think.

What could your pre-college education have done to better prepare you for college?

Been better with teaching how to look for/apply to college, how student loans work/how to apply for them, how to find/apply for scholarships, etc.

I think the major differences for me between high school and college was the deadlines. It is a unique experience not having someone question why you did/didn't do your homework, or having to turn your completed study guide in.  Even if you do have weekly homework assignments due (many majors do not require this, rather it is completing reading and taking a quiz), you still have the challenge of getting the semester projects, midterm/final exams completed while managing everything else.

Giving slightly more emphasis on Microsoft Office Suite programs would have been helpful, primarily Excel.

What was the number one thing you felt your pre-college education did to help you prepare for the job force?

It was a safe place to make mistakes before entering job force.

The group projects, time management, organization skills, and any work with Microsoft Office programs were probably the most valuable for the job force.  Having a skill set in Microsoft programs is vital for any job, and it is much easier if you don't have to start out from scratch.  

As frustrating as group projects can be in school, they are even more necessary in the 'real world'.  Also, you are always accountable for your time in the work force, even if you report to someone, so tracking and staying aware of how you use your time is very important.

What could your pre-college education have done to better prepare you for the job force?
Pushed or required more advanced job experience (I was pretty clueless about what people with college degrees did).  Basic overview info on what jobs are out there and what education you need for them would have been helpful.

I think giving the students visibility of how the knowledge they're learning in classes directly relates to the knowledge you use everyday at work would have been a big help. I know I had a hard time, in high school AND college, understanding how anything I was learning would ever be applied to the real world.  Likewise, if it won't apply to the real world (example: multivariable calculus requirement for industrial engineers), explain WHY the course requirement is there (to push your brain to work a little bit harder than you think it can, to show that you can problem solve beyond the level that most people can, etc.).

Resume writing in school would have been very helpful, especially at the end of Junior year before all the college applications are due.

How to think more creatively when solving problems. Often times the answer will not a straight solution like the ones presented in classrooms..

Now that you are in the work force, what would you like to see your future co-workers excel at?


Being energetic to accomplish (finish) problems especially unclear/difficult problems.  Finishing is important.

Group work.  Although you get a lot of practice in this through college, it never is the type of group work that you experience at work. For example, you generally work on a project where all individuals have the same knowledge of the subject matter (i.e. you are all in the same class, so you all know as much as the others regarding that class subject).  At work, you are working with all types of backgrounds--individuals that didn't complete high school, chemists, finance majors, engineers, marketing specialist, etc.  Therefore, in a school project when someone isn't upholding their end of the deal, you can do their part for them (we always resent this person, but they don't completely prevent you from completing the assignment), whereas in the work place, you simply cannot move forward with your project until you hear back from them (because you either don't have the knowledge to make the call, or don't have the authority). To understand how to be responsive to people in a timely matter is one of the most important things I've come across.

I think that communication is key - no one can truly know what they need to improve on, help with, or continue doing unless they have some feedback.

I would like to see co-workers who are good problem solvers and creative thinkers. A lot of people can analyze a problem but to find the best solution you have to be able to think on your own and try to find the best way to go about your problem.

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So, lots of information in those responses!  I think a lot of their comments resonate with what I have been writing about.  I blogged earlier that I was considering letting up on the reigns in my class a little and having students take some control in their learning.  I think this would promote student independence and encourage them to foster some time management and organizational skills. Another area that was mentioned multiple times was group work (and communication works hand-in-hand with it).  I tend to shy away from assigning group work (perhaps from experiences in high school where I got stuck doing all of the work), but perhaps I need to figure out a way to make it effective.  I think there are valuable skills to be learned while working in groups; communication, responsibility, and commitment.

So, what do I see changing in my classroom for this upcoming year??  Let's see:

1. Sharing the experience (and the blog) with my students.  Encouraging them to try one of the internships/ job shadows our school offers.
2. Assign students topics and have them design the lesson/materials needed to teach that topic.
3. Work on organization and time management skills.  Such as, we are starting the chapter today and taking a test in 8 days.  We will be studying this many sections.  You need to read the text and complete the homework in those 8 days.  How will you do this?
4. Provide time for students to write and reflect on what they're learning.  This might be in the form of a journal or some other record keeping device.
5. Bring businesses into the classroom.  (See my Week 5 post)

I'm also kind of thinking of using the first 10 minutes of class (I am on block scheduling, so I have the time) for some of these events.  Hopefully I'll think of a catchy name to call it.  But here is a possibility of what we'd do each day of the week during those 10 minutes.

Monday- Organize/Plan for the week

Tuesday- Journal (Either on a topic I give or some math connection they choose)

Wednesday- Present a new career and math connections

Thursday- Real World Problems they can solve

Friday- Standardized Test Prep

If you have any other thoughts or ideas for me to incorporate, please let me know!  It's hard to believe that in 5 short weeks I'll be in my classroom with a bunch of kids staring at me- ready to learn.  I better get busy!

Week 5: Involvement

As I reflect on things I have learned these last 4 weeks, I think about how can I take them and bring them into the classroom.  I think one easy solution would be to provide students with the same experience I have had.  At my high school, we offer work experiences and internships for our students through the Workplace Learning Connection.  The work experience is typically a few hours to a full day experience where students can get a taste of different jobs.  The students that I've talked with who have participated have really benefited from the experience.  It opened their eyes to careers they were interested in and others that they were not interested in.  The internship is more of a committment.  Students go to the business everyday for an hour or so for 9 weeks.  This provides the student more time with the business and more experience in that job.  Students have created great connections and gained new skills.  I know that Civco hosts students in both programs.  Since this program is already going, I think the best way I could support it is to encourage more students to partcipate.  I wish that I would have had an experience like this when I was in high school.


Besides sending students out to businesses, I think we should also bring businesses in to students.  Our school hosts an annual career day.  We bring in about 30 different professions/careers.  Students sign up for three 30 minute sessions (each with a different career).  During these sessions, the presentor shares a little about his or her job, the type of education they needed, and the skills required for their job.  Students are also encouraged to ask questions.  I think this is a great way to expose students to careers and get their questions answered from the expert.  While I think this is a wonderful event, I need to take it one step further.  Why should students only think about future careers one day of the year?  I should be encouraging them to think about careers every day!  In the past, I have assigned students to research a career of their choice and design a brochure about their career.  They had to research education needed, skills needed, recommended high school courses, salary, majors associated with the career and a picture.  I think I will revigorate this assignment and allow students to do this again, but create any approved output they want.  Once completed, students will be able to browse other students careers.


Another way to bring businesses in to the classroom could be to have a local business of the week.  Each class period for the week, I could spend 5 minutes talking about the business, providing problems that someone in the business may need solved, have someone from the business come in and talk, Skype with an employee, or have students research the business.  I think this would be a great way for local businesses to be involved in the school, as well as for students to see the connections with school and the outside world.  The only problem that I could see with this is that I don't know a lot of local businesses.  Also, as a somewhat shy person, I am not sure I would be comfortable approaching a business for this type of support.  Perhaps I can work with other teachers (who have taught here longer than I have and have more connections) and we could pilot a program like this together.


I have asked some of my fellow workers at Civco to take a survey about their feelings toward pre-college education and the real world.  For any of you reading this, feel free to take the survey as well.  I will post the results in my final relflection at the end of the week.

Week 4: Classroom Implications

As I mentioned in last week's blog, I see a lot of classroom connections with my externship.  As one who always enjoyed school and excelled in school, it was hard for me to understand where some of my students were coming from.  Why didn't they jump at the chance to come up to the board?  Why weren't they here everyday?  After these last few weeks in a new environment in a field that I am not an expert in, it's a little easier to understand.  While I have enjoyed my time at Civco, I know that it is not the career for me.  I have a passion for teaching, not for crunching numbers.  With that being said, most of my students are not passionate about learning, therefore it is hard for them to be at school every day.  I need to find their passion and connect it to what we are doing.  This reminds me of a student I had last year in a Geometry class.  He really did not like school.  He struggled to be there and if he was, he wasn't always mentally present.  However, he had a passion for pool and billiards.  I knew this and also knew we'd be studying angles of reflection.  I told this student about two weeks in advance that we'd be using pool as an application of angles of reflection, and I'd need his help.  He was there every day we studied angles of reflection.  Just taking a few moments and finding my student's passion made such a difference in his learning.  I need to do that for every student.

I also think that it my job to help students find their passions.  Sometimes students just go through the motions, without reflecting on what they enjoy and why.  If I give students the opportunity to do this reflection, perhaps they will discover something new about themselves.  As a math teacher, I will also try to bring in more real world examples.  I am very excited for this next year, as we purchased new textbooks.  This material is much more up-to-date, with relevant examples.  But, I won't stop there; I will search out even more examples.  I will even assign students to find these connections.  I think it would be great to gather all of these examples and put them on one central place (maybe another blog??) so students could access these connections at any time.


It is my hope that students become more passionate about their learning and more passionate about math.  Math is not an old, boring subject that they will never use.  Rather it is integral to their lives and will assist them in their futures.

Week 3: Connections

Week 3 is winding down and I can see the connections with Civco and a math classroom.  When timing the various processes, we are measuring to the nearest hundredth of a second.  This connects with the Standard for Mathematical Practice: Attend to Precision.  Students must learn to calculate accurately and efficiently.  The workers in the clean room must measure lengths of material to 58 + 2 inches or even 10 + .25 inches.  Because of that, they need to understand what falls in those ranges.  This is the Standard for Mathematical Practice: Reason Abstractly and Quantitatively.  The workers must make sense of quantities and their relationships.  While using Excel, I am calculating the mean and standard deviation of that data.  While Excel does perform these calculations for me, I need to understand what they mean and what that means to our data.

Other major areas of connection I see have nothing to do with math, but important life skills: independent work and time management (21st Century Skills).  While working at Civco, I have been given a task and then basically left alone to do my task.  No one is sitting next to me, prodding me to keep going, guiding what I do.  I had to figure out the best route to take in working on the spreadsheets, organize my plan, and then execute it.  As a big list maker, that is right where I started- I made a list.  What did I need to do?  Did I need to do things before I could do other things?  This totally helped me feel better about my project and not so overwhelmed.  Then I thought- would my students do that?  Would they even know where to start?  Too many times (ok, almost all the time) I am dictating to students how to spend their classtime:
         Ok students, let's read p. 12-13 together...
         Follow along with me as I work through this example...
         You have 10 minutes to work on your homework, I'll be available for questions...
What if instead of telling students exactly how to spend their classtime, they took some ownership in that?  What if I gave them a topic and they had to figure out how to best learn it?  I of course would be there to help, if needed, but there would be a lot of power in choosing how they were going to learn something.  I believe this addresses a few of the Characteristics of Effective Instruction (Teaching for Understanding, Teaching for Learner Differences, and Student Centered Classrooms).

A final area of connection comes from the entire experience itself.  I have moved out of the classroom into a whole different world.  What a great experience to share with my students!  I want my students to challenge themselves and try new things- what better for me to do, than lead by example.  I can not wait to share with my students the nerves of starting something new and then the satisfaction of solving a problem and finishing a project.  I will also have more examples to add to my mental database for when students ask the inevitable question, "When will we ever use this?"