Category: Motivation
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Keeping Students Accountable
I had the absolute privilege of attending a week long workshop this past summer funded by the Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship Program. The workshop was entitled: Math Unit Fixer Upper! and was led by Dr. Sherri Martinie and Dr. Michael Lawson. The workshop was focused on how teachers can make units of study more engaging…
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How Posing Purposeful Questions Transforms Learning
Since beginning my math education journey, something I’ve prioritized is giving my students opportunities to work through sense making and problem solving mathematical puzzles. One that I developed for my Algebra 2 class surprisingly had application across all ages of students that I teach, including my 6th graders whom I introduced to the puzzle on…
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How to Lead Students to Discover Exponent Multiplication and Division Rules
It’s no secret that you’re much more likely to remember something that you figured out on your own. Math discoveries are much the same, though they are less common. One of my favorite parts of teaching is taking the time to carefully craft learning opportunities that guide students toward finding patterns and discovering math rules…
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Building Math Skills Through Short Tasks
I used to laugh at, and repeat all the jokes about math and numbers. You know – “there’s an infinite amount of real numbers – why make up imaginary?!” Or the “I liked math until they started adding letters!” and so on. I thought that, after I scraped by Calculus 2 in college with a…
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Why I Use Greek & Latin Root Study in Math & Science Classes
I was one of the lucky ones. Reading came easily to me, and I loved to do it. Learning naturally followed – I spent my later elementary years reading to learn rather than learning to read. I didn’t know it until I began working on my Master’s of Education in ESOL, but my own ease…
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A Fun Activity to Start the Year
When I learned I would be teaching math for the first time, I wanted to do something different. Teaching math seemed to me to be all of the least fun parts of teaching: lecture, worksheets, and the worst of all….. grading. If your kids can add, subtract, multiply, and divide, they can do this activity.…
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Teaching STEM: Navigating a Path to Success Part 2
Welcome to Part 2 of my series of blog posts in which I discuss a few tips which I feel have been essential to building confidence in your teaching sprinkled with tidbits from my own experience. If you missed Part 1, check that out below. Promoting Inquiry-Based Learning: Strategies for Engaging STEM Students Incorporating hands-on…
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Teaching STEM: Navigating a Path to Success Part 1
Do what I like to call taking the ‘temperature’ of the class as students enter the room each day. No, I don’t mean that you should literally measure their bodily temperature as they walk in (thank you COVID for that flashback to the 2020-2021 school year).
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Voices From the Field Panel – Noyce Summit 2023
I love to share about small town America, and about how many opportunities are available to those who live there, even if those opportunities aren’t immediately obvious. In June of 2023, I was invited to speak on the Voices From the Field Panel at the NSF Noyce Summit with 5 other Noyce Fellow teachers. We…
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The 2023 Noyce Summit
I was a shy child. I remember feeling incredibly frustrated with myself whenever someone would try to talk to me because instantly my tongue would feel as though it was stuck to the bottom of my mouth and I could only mumble a few words quiet filled with spoonerisms (e.g. a chy shild rather than…
The Small Town STEM Teacher 