Monitoring Your GAME Plan Progress

For my first goal, include more real-life situations in the math classroom, I am finding some information, but running into the same problem that I have in the past. I have researched this topic before and find many resources, but not ones that I find useful. There are many sites that discuss the importance of bringing the real-world into the math classroom, but not many that give ideas and projects on how to do so. I have found a few new resources, but nothing that is catching my attention. I might need to use these sites that I am finding and use the ideas to begin to develop a unit or two on my own. I was hoping to find some project ideas on the internet that are developed and I can just tweak them to work in my classroom, but there are not many people that have posted about their successes thus far. I am wondering why there is so much research showing the importance of real-life activities in the classroom, but not many ideas out there of how to do it? It is aggravating when this is the case. It makes me wonder why this is the case… is it that many people get frustrated with this approach and revert back to the direct instruction methods?


My other goal is coming along nicely. I plan to improve my lessons so they include the correct citations that identify the resources I used. I do not see any problems with this goal as of now. I am noticing, however, that it does take more time to identify the old resources than expected. It is hard to find some of the same resources anymore, so I have been finding myself swapping out the old pictures and data with new information that is similar and I can easily site the resource.

Carrying Out My GAME Plan

After a week of working on my GAME plan, I am a little farther than I was a week ago. One of my goals involved incorporating more real-world applications in my math classroom and using the computer lab to complete these activities on a weekly basis. I have found some resources that have ideas on ways to incorporate real world activities, but I am still having trouble finding some really good ways of bringing the real-world into my classroom. Does anyone have some resources or ideas to find usable lessons in a middle school math classroom? I have spoken with my peer group and they all seem bogged down by testing and the pressures that come with the preparation to try anything new or develop new ideas to bring into the classroom. I will need to continue to do some more research to find some good resources… I would purchase some books that have developed lessons, but always hesitate because they seem better than they really are.


The other part of the GAME plan involved updating my lessons to include the citations for the resources that I used to develop them. I want to model writing citations for my students and I have begun to update the lessons that I have used this week. Each night before I leave my classroom, I bring up the smartbaord lesson and change the slides that I need to in order to show the sites and resources that I used to create the lesson. I do not need any additional resources to complete this part of my plan; I just need to constantly remind myself to do so. If I continue to make these changes, then it will become a habit and be second nature soon.

Developing My Personal GAME Plan

Facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity: Engage students in exploring real-world issues and solving authentic problems using digital tools and resources (NETS-T 1b)

I plan to improve the engagement of student involvement in solving real world issues by using digital resources on a regular basis. I plan to use one day a week to pose a real world problem that involves the math topics for the week in hopes to increase the engagement and understanding of the students. I will collect the problem and use the accuracy of the solution to gauge the successfulness of the lessons. I will look for students to receive an 85% or higher on the accuracy of their solution and I will ask the students to fill out a survey on a scale from 1-10 on how they enjoyed the task at hand. I will use these days to show the students how these math skills are used in the everyday lives of individuals and how digital resources are available to help solve these problems. We will spend the days in the computer lab during these lessons so they can have access to the internet and/or specific websites that I have found to aid in the solution of the problem presented. After each week, I will compile the scores of not only the accuracy to their solutions, but also their scale score on the activity. I will spend the next week searching for new online resources and ask colleagues for excellent resources that they have used in their classroom.

Promote and Model Digital Citizenship and Responsibility: Advocate, model, and teach safe, legal and ethical use of digital information and technology including respect for copyright, intellectual property, and the appropriate documentation of sources (NETS-T 4a)

I plan to promote documenting resources and teaching how to appropriately cite information through modeling. I plan to revamp my lessons with citations from the sites and books that I am retrieving pictures and problems from. I will plan on citing 80% of my information immediately through revising my smartboard lessons and worksheets and then I will cite 100% of my resources on handouts and lessons that I make from this point forward. I will monitor my progress by using a chart to keep track of what lessons I have revised and which lessons are new so I will know in the future which ones I need to continue to revamp in the future. I will use the methods of citation (APA style) that we use in our program at Walden and make a point to check for changes in APA citation at the beginning of each month.

Resources:
International Society for Technology in Education. (2008). National education standards for teachers (NETS-T). Retrieved from http://www.iste.org/Libraries/PDFs/NETS_for_Teachers_2008_EN.sflb.ashx