by jphilo | Oct 1, 2009 | Out and About
Who’da thought this math-phobic would do back-to-back posts about statistics? But this one has nothing to do with the Amazon book sale stats. (Though if you really want to know, Different Dream is now #60 in the category where it’s been wrongly placed.)
This post is about a math project Jeff Wells, a high school math teacher in our school district, and I created during my teaching years. We called it Stat Buddies. Each fall, my fourth graders collected data on twenty-odd different things: how many light bulbs in their houses, how tall they were in inches, how many blocks they lived from school, to name a few. Once the data was all in, Jeff and the students in his Probability and Statistics class would come to our school. They used the data to teach fourth graders about median, mode, graphing, estimating, and so forth.
The project was a win-win situation for everybody. My students learned statistics from people who understood them instead of from their teacher who didn’t. Because the seniors had to teach kids about statistics, they had to know their subject matter thoroughly. But the benefits went far beyond math. Both age groups were engaged in learning. Relationships developed between students. Behaviors improved.
A few weeks ago Jeff emailed and invited me to come see what Stat Buddies has become. It’s part of the fourth grade curriculum now, he said. All fourth grades in the district participate in it, he said. You gotta come see it, he said.
So this morning, I visited three Stat Buddies classrooms and was tickled pink to see the project working better today than it did six years ago. But what tickled me most was seeing some former students teaching a new crop of fourth graders about statistics. One of them is in the picture – the guy in the purple hoody. Another ran up and gave me a big hug.
As a result, I’m on a statistical, humble high, the kind that comes when you see how your bumbling attempts to mask your weaknesses (in my case math skills) impact others in positive ways.
Thanks, Jeff, for the invitation. You made my day. And thank you, God, for working through my weakness.
by jphilo | Feb 14, 2008 | Reflections on the Past
There are some days when all you can be is grateful. Today’s one of them for me. Not because I’m anticipating a Valentine’s gift from my husband. We’re pretty low key about those things. I’m grateful because I’m not doing what I did every Valentine’s Day for twenty-five years which was to supervise a classroom crammed with love-crazed elementary students eating their ways to a sugar high. The kids in the picture above are high school seniors this year. When I see them at their graduation celebrations, they’ll barely recollect how goofy they were on Valentine’s Day.
For me those high energy days are unforgettable. So I’ve been thinking of my friends who are still in the trenches in the district where I once worked. For them, this is a triple whammy day. It’s Valentine’s Day, it’s the beginning of a three day weekend for kids because of teacher inservice tomorrow, and the temperature is dropping like a rock as the wind shifts from south to north. Weather changes make kids crazy.
And here I am in my very quiet living room, working at my keyboard, living my dream. Every now and then, little bubbles of guilt rise to the surface of my consciousness. I try to pop the bubbles by offering prayers of gratitude. My method is marginally successful.
I’m looking for new ways to ease my guilt. I’ve toyed with the idea of nominating all elementary school teachers for sainthood and write the Vatican. If the pope spent one day, preferably a party day, in a classroom he’d see teachers working miracles by the minute. Approving the nominations would be a no brainer. But since I’m not Catholic, he might not listen to me.
Maybe you can help. Today, do something nice for the elementary teachers you know. Tell them thank you. Speak softly as they are suffering from PTVS (Post Traumatic Valentine’s Syndrome). Give them chocolate, lots of chocolate. If you’re married to an elementary teacher, give your spouse flowers and lots of chocolate.
But don’t tell them I put you up to it. Just show them how much you appreciate them. They deserve to know.
by jphilo | Oct 11, 2007 | Out and About
Yesterday, I spoke to a group of third graders here in town. I last taught kids that age a dozen years ago before I moved to fourth grade. But not much has changed in the intervening years. The halls still smell of floor was and books, the teachers still work hard, and the kids still get bored after fifteen minutes.
Most of all, third graders still think the same. They’re devoted to their families. They think everybody should follow the rules. They all have stories to tell – about pets, vacations, brothers and sisters. And third grade is when they gain enough skill to put some of their ideas into practice. It’s a very exciting age to be.
I’d forgotten how much effort it takes to contain the excitement and energy of 20+ students. My feet hurt when I got home, and I was tired I slept really well last night. But I was happy too, for the hour spent in a world clearly defined by pets and family and rules. I was thankful for the teachers who show those students how to navigate their way into a much bigger world.
I’m pretty sure their feet hurt a whole lot more than mine did. And I’m hoping they slept well, too. They need it.
