Friday, May 6, 2011

We began with our assessment over Solving Rational Equations (key, pdf).

Today's lesson (pdf) was the first half of our review over first semester (#1-17, 38, 39 key).

Your homework for Monday is:

1. Check the portal for the results of your assessment, fill out your student checklist with your results, and make a plan for retake (if necessary), including making an appointment.
   
   
2. Review.
   
   
3. Make a plan for when, where and how you are going to study for the Algebra final exam on Monday, May 16th. Be specific and write down your plan (people who do this are much, much, much more successful than those that don't.)

Friday, April 29, 2011

We began by taking our assessment over Adding and Subtracting Rational Expressions (key, pdf).

Today's lesson (pdf) was on how to solve rational equations.

Your homework for Monday is:

1. Check the portal for the results of your assessment, fill out your student checklist with your results, and make a plan for retake (if necessary), including making an appointment.
   
   
2. By no later than midnight tonight, read about our next Skype session and submit at least one question.

Wednesday, April 27, 2011

We began by taking our assessment over Multiplying, Dividing and Simplifying Rational Expressions (key, pdf).

Due to the very short class, today's lesson (pdf) was just a couple of review problems.

Your homework for Thursday is:

1. Check the portal for the results of your assessment, fill out your student checklist with your results, and make a plan for retake (if necessary), including making an appointment.
   
   
2. By no later than midnight on Friday, read about our next Skype session and submit at least one question.
   
   
3. Complete the Adding and Subtracting Rational Expressions online pre-assessment.

Friday, April 15, 2011

I apologize for being out today - my daughter is sick.

You began by reviewing the quadratic formula (Thanks Mr. Rottschafer!). Here's the key (pdf) to the worksheet.

Then you took your Quadratic Formula assessment (key, pdf).

Your homework for Monday is:

1. Check the portal for the results of your assessment, fill out your student checklist with your results, and make a plan for retake (if necessary), including making an appointment.
   
   
2. Watch the Simplifying Rationals Video. Please be sure to do the self-check problems. The Rational Expressions unit will be our last one - let's finish strong.
   
   

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

We began with our Graphing Quadratic Equations assessment (key, pdf).

Today's lesson (pdf) was reviewing the use of the Quadratic Formula and then exploring the use of quadratics to model a basketball shot.

Your homework for Thursday and Friday is:

1. Check the portal for the results of your assessment, fill out your student checklist with your results, and make a plan for retake (if necessary), including making an appointment.
   
   
2. We'll be taking the MAP test tomorrow. Please report directly to the Media Center Computer Lab. Please get a good night's sleep and get here on time so that you can do your best.
   
   
3. We'll take the Quadratic Formula assessment on Friday. Please complete the Quadratic Formula Online Pre-Assessment tonight. If you have any questions, please get some help sometime tomorrow before the assessment on Friday.

Thursday, April 7, 2011

We began with our Pythagorean Theorem assessment (key, pdf).

Today's lesson (pdf) was finishing up from yesterday graphing y = ax² + c and then starting on how to graph y = ax² + bx + c.

Your homework for Friday is:

1. Check the portal for the results of your assessment, fill out your student checklist with your results, and make a plan for retake (if necessary), including making an appointment.
   
   
2. Watch the Graphing y = ax² + bx + c video.
   
   

Friday, April 1, 2011

We began with a quick review and then our assessment over Simplifying Radicals (pdf).

Today's lesson (pdf) was learning about the Pythagorean Theorem.

Your homework for Monday is:

1. Check the portal for the results of your assessment, fill out your student checklist with your results, and make a plan for retake (if necessary), including making an appointment.
   
   
2. Work on the two problems (Distance from home to second base, HD TV dimensions) that are at the end of the lesson (pdf). You should be able to figure out the distance from home to second base, the HD TV one is harder.
   
   
3. Watch the Pythagorean Theorem video.
   
   

Thursday, March 31, 2011

We began with our assessment over Solving Quadratic Equations by Factoring (pdf).

Today's lesson (pdf) was a review of simplifying radicals. Keep in mind the key (pdf) to the worksheet from yesterday - worked out step by step - was already posted to the blog yesterday. Did you work on the worksheet? Remember I asked you to do all the first page, as many on pages 2 and 3 as you needed to until you got the hang of it (and no more than that), and then work on the last page. I have a feeling that I spent more time on your homework then some of you did - why is that? Did you look at the key and try to figure out any you got stuck on? That would be an excellent way to review tonight.

By the way, the video? You know, the one you were supposed to watch sometime between Monday and Wednesday's class. The one that takes you step-by-step through how you simplify radicals. It's still only been watched 18 times since class on Monday. Even if that's 18 different students from our class and not someone else or someone in our class watching it more than once, that still means that at least 8 of you haven't watched it.

Your homework for Friday is:

1. Check the portal for the results of your assessment, fill out your student checklist with your results, and make a plan for retake (if necessary), including making an appointment.
   
   
2. Prepare for the Simplifying Radicals Assessment on Friday. There are a variety of ways to do that including, but not limited to: review the online pre-assessment; review your notebook and/or the openers and lessons posted on the blog; review the video, work some practice problems in your textbook or that you find online. You can, of course, also get help from me, another math teacher, a teacher in the Study Center, a peer tutor in the Study Center, or a parent, sibling or friend. Do whatever works best for you, but make sure you're prepared. The expectation is that you should all be able to do very well on this assessment.

Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Today we took our midterm (key, pdf).

Your homework for tomorrow is:

1. Check the portal for the results of your assessment, fill out your student checklist with your results, and make a plan for retake (if necessary), including making an appointment. If you need to re-assess, I would highly recommend re-assessing on Thursday or Friday (before spring break) while this is still fresh in your mind. You'll need to re-assess on only the problems you missed - they'll be listed on the portal (these may include some you got partial credit on - you'll re-assess on those as well).
   
   
2. Organize your notebook (if necessary).

Monday, March 7, 2011

We began with our assessment over Special Products and Factors (pdf).

Today's lesson (pdf) was to go over the review worksheet from last Wednesday.

Your homework for Friday (next day we meet) is:

1. Check the portal for the results of your assessment, fill out your student checklist with your results, and make a plan for retake (if necessary), including making an appointment.
   
   
2. Organize your notebook (if necessary) and start reviewing for the midterm (which will be on Wednesday, March 16th).

Thursday, March 3, 2011

We began with our assessment over factoring ax² + bx + c (pdf).

Today's lesson (pdf) was a Carnegie Hall Day: practice, practice, practice.

Your homework for Monday is:

1. Prepare for the Special Products and Factors Assessment on Monday. There are a variety of ways to do that including, but not limited to: review the online pre-assessment; review your notebook and/or the openers and lessons posted on the blog; review the video, work some practice problems in your textbook or that you find online. You can, of course, also get help from me, another math teacher, a teacher in the Study Center, a peer tutor in the Study Center, or a parent, sibling or friend. Do whatever works best for you, but make sure you're prepared. The expectation is that you should all be able to do very well on this assessment.
   
   
2. Finish the worksheet I handed out yesterday.
   
   
3. Continue to practice adding and subtracting polynomials, multiplying polynomials, factoring by grouping, factoring trinomials, and factoring difference of squares.

Monday, February 28, 2011

We began with our assessment over Multiplying Polynomials (pdf).

Today's lesson (pdf) was reviewing factoring ax² + bx + c and then exploring special products and factors.

Your homework for Wednesday is:

1. Check the portal for the results of your assessment, fill out your student checklist with your results, and make a plan for retake (if necessary), including making an appointment.
   
   
2. Complete the Factoring ax² + bx + c Online Pre-Assessment.
   
   
3. Watch the Special Products and Factors video.
   
   
   
   
4. Finish your parent/teacher conference reflection by midnight tonight.
   
   
5. Continue to practice with polynomials.

Thursday, February 24, 2011

We began with our assessment over Adding and Subtracting Polynomials (pdf).

Today's lesson (pdf) was reviewing factoring by grouping and then exploring factoring trinomials using Algebra Tiles.

Your homework for Friday is:

1. Check the portal for the results of your assessment, fill out your student checklist with your results, and make a plan for retake (if necessary), including making an appointment.
   
   
2. Complete the Multiplying Polynomials Online Pre-Assessment.
   
   
3. Watch the Factoring ax² + bx + c video.
   
   
   
   
4. Between now and Monday, do some factoring ax²+bx+c practice, as well as factoring by grouping practice.
   
   
5. No later than by midnight on Monday, complete your reflection for parent/teacher/hopefullystudent conferences. Like last time, you should do this in a Google Doc.
   
   a) Create a new Google Doc and title it "Your Name 2nd Semester Conferences Reflection."
   
   b) Write to the following prompt (but don't be limited by it - you can write about additional stuff as well if you feel it's important):
   
   Parent/Teacher Conferences are coming up next week. Since these conferences are about you, I think you should be there. It makes very little sense to me that we should have a conference about you and you’re not there, so I’m encouraging your parents to come and to bring you with them. Please bring your Algebra notebook as well, so that we can look at your work if we need to.
   
   Whether you end up attending or not, I want you to spend some time thinking about what you want your parents to know about this class and how you are doing. Here are some questions for you to respond to (all in terms of second semester):
   
   What’s going well for you?
   
   What’s challenging for you?
   
   What could I do as your teacher that would help you be more successful?
   
   What could you do as a student that would help you be more successful?
   
   Is there anything your parents can do to help you be more successful?
   
   Is there anything else you think your parents should know about this class or about how you are doing in this class?
   
   Please be thoughtful and specific in your responses, and please don't wait until the last minute, as I want you to put some real thought into this. The more you put into it, the more valuable it will be for you, me and your parents. Thanks.
   
   c) After you've completed your response, simply drag and drop the document into our shared folder (Algebra-Fisch-YourName) - you may have to expand (by clicking on the arrow) "Collections shared with me" first in order to see the shared folder. If you need help, please ask.

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

We began with our assessment over Perimeter, Circumference and Area (pdf).

Today's lesson (pdf) was exploring area models to model multiplying polynomials.

Your homework for Thursday is:

1. Check the portal for the results of your assessment, fill out your student checklist with your results, and make a plan for retake (if necessary), including making an appointment.
   
   
2. Complete #1d and #2b and c from today's worksheet lesson (pdf).
   
   
3. Watch the Multiplying Polynomials video.
   
   
   
   
4. Work some practice problems from this page and this page (a few from both). Write them down in your notebook.
   
   How many problems? That's up to you. Do enough until you feel comfortable you've mastered multiplying polynomials.
   
   Note: You do not need to type anything on the website. Simple click the "Give me a problem" button. It will give you a problem. Write it down, work it out on paper in your notebook, then click "What's the answer?" to check it. Repeat as many times as you need to until you've mastered the concept.
   
   Note 2: They indicate exponents with the ^ character. So x² is written as x^2.

Friday, February 11, 2011

We began with our assessment over polygon angle sums (key, pdf).

Today's lesson (pdf) was a Carnegie Hall Day: practice, practice, practice.

Your homework for Monday is:

1. Check the portal for the results of your assessment, fill out your student checklist with your results, and make a plan for retake (if necessary), including making an appointment.
   
   
2. Complete the Perimeter, Circumference and Area Online Pre-Assessment.
   
   
3. If you haven't yet, finish the Perimeter, Circumference and Area worksheet from yesterday.
   
   
4. If you didn't finish in class, finish today's review worksheet by Wednesday.
   

Thursday, February 10, 2011

We began with our assessment over polygons (key, pdf).

Today's lesson (pdf) discussed perimeter, circumference and area.

Your homework for Friday is:

1. Check the portal for the results of your assessment, fill out your student checklist with your results, and make a plan for retake (if necessary), including making an appointment.
   
   
2. Prepare for the Polygon Angle Sums Assessment on Friday. There are a variety of ways to do that including, but not limited to: review the online pre-assessment; review your notebook and/or the openers and lessons posted on the blog; review the video, work some practice problems in your textbook or that you find online. You can, of course, also get help from me, another math teacher, a teacher in the Study Center, a peer tutor in the Study Center, or a parent, sibling or friend. Do whatever works best for you, but make sure you're prepared. The expectation is that you should all be able to do very well on this assessment.
   
   
3. Finish the Perimeter, Circumference and Area worksheet by Monday.

Friday, February 4, 2011

We began with our assessment over Data Graphs (pdf).

Today's lesson (pdf) looked at defining triangles. Feel free to finish the last two sketches on page 3.

Your homework for Friday is:

1. Check the portal for the results of your assessment, fill out your student checklist with your results, and make a plan for retake (if necessary), including making an appointment.
   
   

Monday, January 31, 2011

We began with our assessment over Measures of Central Tendency (pdf).

Today's lesson (pdf) was a review of Five-Number Summaries, Box-and-Whiskers Plots, Stem-and-Leaf Plots and Histograms.

Your homework for Wednesday is:

1. Check the portal for the results of your assessment, fill out your student checklist with your results, and make a plan for retake (if necessary), including making an appointment.
   
   
2. Complete the review worksheet we worked on in class - if you didn't finish - lesson (pdf).
   
   
3. Complete the Data Graphs Online Pre-Assessment.

Thursday, January 27, 2011

We began with our assessment over Permutations and Combinations (key, pdf).

Today's lesson (pdf) discussed five-numbers summaries and box-and-whiskers graphs.

Your homework for Friday is:

1. Check the portal for the results of your assessment, fill out your student checklist with your results, and make a plan for retake (if necessary), including making an appointment.
   
   
2. Finish step 6 and 7 from yesterday's worksheet - page 4 of the lesson (pdf).
   
   
3. Complete the Measures of Central Tendency Online Pre-Assessment.
   
   
4. If you didn't finish in class, the Weekly Median Earnings worksheet is due Monday - page 4 of today's  lesson (pdf)

Monday, January 24, 2011

We began with our assessment over Probability and Odds (key, pdf).

Today's lesson (pdf) looked at both permutations and combinations and we talked about how to determine which one to use.

Your homework for Wednesday is:

1. Check the portal for the results of your assessment, fill out your student checklist with your results, and make a plan for retake (if necessary), including making an appointment.
   
   
2. Complete the Permutations and Combinations Online Pre-Assessment.