A Commencement Thank You

I was very surprised and honored when I recieved a message asking me to submit an outline for a graduation speech on behalf of the Apple Valley 16 chapter of education graduate students from Saint Mary's University.  I didn't know if I really had anything profound to share and it turns out that I didn't since my submission didn't get chosen.  I thought that I would share it with all of you anyway just to say thank you for all that you have taught me over the past 20 months.  You have all truly made me a better teacher!

Good afternoon.

Benjamin Franklin once said, “Without continual growth and progress, such words as improvement,

achievement, and success have no meaning.” We are all here today because we had a desire for

improvement, achievement and success. Over the past 20 months, we have experienced growth and

progress in many ways. For some, we have seen our families grow with new family members entering the world. For some, we have grown spiritually as we have had to say good bye to loved ones. For all of us, we have grown professionally.

We have had to be open to new ideas and methods in order to accept the notion that we can improve our practice. Those of us in the M.Ed. program have learned many ways to improve our ability to teach by becoming learners ourselves. We have learned how to reflect on our practice in order to make it better. I am sure that this is not much different than those of you in other programs.  Achievement and success have meaning for all of us. We are here today because of all that we have achieved. When this program began, I wondered if I would make through the 19 or 20 months that it would take.

We have all likely heard at some time or another that anything truly worth doing isn’t easy.  When I began this program, this realization really hit home. I knew that I would be spending my weekends, and many evenings, working on research, reflections, and communications. Like all of you, I would be making many sacrifices in order to further my education.

But anything worth doing is never easy. Each of us deliberately and intentionally engaged in a process of re‐formation, made possible by a university committed to academic excellence and the support of our family and friends. These people helped us to make today possible. I wish to take this opportunity on the behalf of the graduating class of 2011 to say thank you to all of you here today who supported us, cheered us on, and tolerated the time, sweat and tears that we have experienced.

We all have classmates who made today possible for us. Personally speaking, I owe a debt of gratitude to classmates who were patient and generous with their wisdom and experience. Any one of you could be standing at this podium today giving this speech. Through you I learned how much I did not know, and you challenged me to perform to the best of my ability. You have become good friends and I thank you.

Our growth and success was made possible by dedicated facilitators and administrators who have

guided us along this journey. We all thank you for your guidance, patience, and expertise. We are all better professionals today because of you.

May the master’s degree experience that we complete today give us inspiration to continue learning tomorrow and the next day and the day after that. As Newton D. Baker once stated, “The man who graduates today and stops learning tomorrow is uneducated the day after.” I hope that we all will leave here today so satisfied with the achievements of the past months that we continue to  grow and learn inorder to become leaders in our professions and communities.

Class of 2011, let today be the beginning of a new era of learning in your lives. Thank you all for helping me through this program. Good luck to all of you as you begin the next phase of your educational journey.

Accomplishments

As a finale to my M.Ed. program for Saint Mary's University, I took part in the education conference and presented a session based on my action research project, which began nearly a year ago.  Needless to say that I experienced a lot of anxiety the day drew nearer.  I hoped that I would present a seminar that was worthy of the work that I had put into its preparation.  I grew more and more nervous as the day wore on and I waited for my turn.  When it was finally over, I felt simply exhilarated!  I was so thrilled not only to be finished, but especially to know that I had done a good job.  For nearly a year, I spent all "free" time researching and writing and learning about my topic in preparation for this presentation and now it was over. 

I began to wonder if my students have ever felt the joy of accomplishing something like that. Certainly if they had, they would have a true love for learning.  Now I realize that high school students can't be expected to spend a year preparing for one big event.  However, they ought to be able to know the feeling of working hard toward a goal and the thrill of achieving it.  How do we get teenagers to care enough about thier progress in school that they work hard and appreciate all that they might accomplish?  I am certain that if they did take ownership of thier work and had clear goals to work toward that they would get hooked on learning. 

Looking for some fun vocabulary builders

Well, over the past weekend, I was at the SMU M.Ed. Conference in Champlin Park.  One of the sessions that I attended was on vocabulary building in the math classroom.  The presenter had some great ideas.  I found this interesting collection of math vocabulary terms:  http://www.mathwords.com/  It is pretty cool for a lot of math topics and levels.  I will post a link to it on my class moodle pages as well.

The presenter at Champlin Park also used some interesting smart board tools for some of the games that he demonstrated.  It made me start to think about applications for the smartboard.  Where can I find some good resources for reliable smart board applications?

One of my favorites

I thought that this might be a good opportunity to share one of my favorite websites.  It is jam-packed full of fabulous tips for everything related to teaching!  It is from Honolulu Community College.  I simply stumbled upon it a few years ago.

http://honolulu.hawaii.edu/intranet/committees/FacDevCom/guidebk/teachtip/teachtip.htm

Real-Life Learning

One of the main goals of this blog is to look for some ideas for bringing real-life relevance into my math classroom.  Many students seem to find math difficult because they don't see the connection to the real world.  It seems that every moment in the classroom is so full of teaching the ever-growing lists of standards that students will may be tested on that we don't have much time for projects or activities that might lend relevance to our lessons. I try my best to incorporate activities and problem sets that are authentic, but I would like more ideas in order to reach more learners. 

I teach geometry.  While there are many real world applications, it seems difficult to work within the constraints of a classroom, particularly with over-filled classes.  I have taken classes outdoors to estimate heights and distances using trigonometry.  I have brought in manipulatives.  We visit websites that are relevant.  It never seems like enough.  I am looking for good project based learning ideas.

I also teach a college algebra course.  We focus a lot on trigonometry.  The students tend to be college bound but not calculus bound.  They can really use a dose of real life math!  They often have struggled with math because they do not see the usefulness of it.

Welcome to Lightning Strikes

Hello!

This is my first blog entry ever so I am going to take some time to introduce myself.  My name is Judy Hoffman and I am a math teacher at Eastview High School.  Eastview is in Apple Valley, MN, a suburb of Minneapolis.  We are the Eastview Lightning!  I am in my 8th year at Eastview.  Prior to EVHS, I taught in the far western suburbs of Chicago off and on for about 15 years.

I am nearing the completion of my master's degree through a program at Saint Mary's University.  I have done action research projects on formative assessments, reflect on learning, and grading practices, all topics that I am very interested in.  As part of our culminating activities, we are being asked to begin a blog related to education.  So I am going give this a try.

I hope that this blog can be a space for me to share my ideas and thoughts about things going on in my classroom and world of education.  I hope that I can also learn from others as well.  I am currently teaching Geometry and College Algebra/Probability and Statistics (CAPS).  We are in the Statistics portion of CAPS which always results in many questions on my part. 

I have found that many students who have a difficult time with math don't really see the relevance in it.  They simply see math as a series of problems that have single correct answers that are near magical in thier appearance.  These students fail to see the creativity in math.  They don't find the beauty in it. 

What kind of projects can I incorporate into my lessons that will help students see that math is relevant amd elegant?