Laminating

I now have my own laminator at home-I'm not sure this says anything good.

Working even better

Mental, barmy, foul, assholes, unteachable....well 11b5 are starting to grow on me. OK, most of them are functionally illiterate, most of them have the handwriting of a 9 year old, all have criminal convictions, are some sort of register and broadly .

They can also work out the general rule of an arithmetic sequence of decimal numbers (DECIMAL NUMBERS FFS!!!). It wasn't even that difficult-all you really needed to do was show a little bit of enthusiasm and not get wound up when they looked around you. Throw in a few moment of active learning, throwing a ball about to make sequence for example, direct the TA to deal with some of them, humour them ('The Don' Jerome) a little but more than anything just don't get wound up. If you do they'll sense blood and pounce on you.

I just wonder about the teachers who just shout at their students all day. Firstly they must have a rubbish day, most importantly they are making the kids mental, barmy, foul, assholes and unteachable.

I can work with this.

Bottom set year 11s. The lowest of the low...there's something to work with. They're clearly really weak and clearly 50% are going to end in up prison pretty quickly but there's something there to work with.

On the other hand 7b1. Keen, eager and really full of spirit. A little too talkative but I can bang that out of them pretty quickly

9b4/8b4.....practically exactly the same class. Stamp on them a bit....be a bit more interesting than other teachers, don't be so didactic and get some good results.

10b1...I'll find out tomorrow but have a pretty active starter activity for them.

Decision maths and Economics.....can't wait to get my teeth into them.

Well that went well

That went well.....apparently maths is all about 'numbers, dividing, shapes, multiplying, compass and circles'.

At least it was at the start of the lesson. Towards the end we all agreed that maths was more about asking the right questions, problem solving and being logical. What worked well was linking the starter to the main part of the lesson. After then had their silent debate I ignored what they wrote until they had done an activity which wasn't related anything they had done (a little game about sitting and standing) and then brought them back to make a point. I will do that more.

Today's homework was to produce a list of mathematical questions about one of Dan's video:

http://vimeo.com/13968850

Let's see what they come up with.

Silent Debate

Wow, I've actually been to a good whole school inset. Here's a good idea I'll be using this term, starting tomorrow with my new year 7s.

A Silent Debate-pose a question (I'll be starting with 'What's maths and what skills do you need?') and rather have a conversation/debate where students can be passively involved in the lesson get them in groups of 3/4/5 and express their ideas on paper-giving everyone a chance to get involved.

I'll wager £20 that not one of them (top set year 7s) will mention measuring.

They'll be doing lots of that with me this year.

New

Right, new year, new head. Lots of plans. Here are the things I want to do.

• Active learning 80% of lessons
• Produce more resources myself
• Complete the NCETM regional project excellently
• Get better Decision 1 results
• Do really well on the masters
• Get the year 9s in a position so 30% get their C. (very low ability)
• High profile Maths quiz
• 4 Golds in UKMT Challenge
  
• Blog everyday
• Get really good on the IAW....REALLY good.

Oh, and must blog everyday.

So are they from Venus

Last lesson of term befroe everyone went home and so I decided to break with tradition and show them a video of something. I decided to show them the brilliant 'Wonders of the Solar System' presented by the person I could have been in another universe, Brian Cox. He's a professor of physics, used to be in a rock band, is married to a model and despite being 41 years old has wonderful hair and teeth. I hate the man.

Anyway, Brain happened to be talking about Venus when he suddenly cut away to a busy street in India.

'Sir....are those people from Venus'.

'No Michael, but could you go to the science department and ask them for a fallopian tube'.