The first semester at my school ends tomorrow. We do not have semester exams. Some AP teachers at my school give an exam in the evening. I chose not to. I think the main reason my colleagues opt to give an exam is to give the students the experience of sitting through an extended test in order to prepare them for the exam in May.
I am confident that all of my students have sat a 3-hour exam once before. All but one were students at my school last spring, and they sat final exams at that time. Therefore, I don't feel the need to give them a long test.
I do want them to be frequently reviewing and revisiting previous topics. So, I am giving them three Free Response Questions that cover the first four chapters. But, those three questions will not combine to form some large percentage of their semester average.
After today, my students will have been graded on 13 free response questions. Two of them were of the Investigative Task variety (that is, Free Response Question #6 from past exams). The others were either taken directly from past exams or were in that style. I am dropping their lowest two scores.
My assessments in AP Statistics this semester have mostly been a departure from how I have evolved otherwise. I have another (dormant) blog regarding my thoughts on assessments and evaluation. My tenth grade integrated mathematics course has zero period-long tests. I have given homework quizzes. But, in that class, grades are largely calculated from projects and presentations. I believe these forms of assessment give me the best indication of what a student can do and knows.
My AP Statistics have completed two projects this semester and they account for a large portion of their grade. I think the projects have given the students a worthwhile opportunity to engage meaningfully with the course topics and skills in a way that will prepare them for the exam. But, I think they also help the students see the utility and relevance of the topics beyond the AP exam. And, I think they provide me with a much better insight into what the students really understand and their abilities to apply the methods they have been studying.
I dislike multiple choice items a lot. (I wrote about this dislike in this blog here and here.) I do not think they are fair nor do I think they tell me much about what a student understands. Perhaps, in a 40-item multiple choice exam, they give a better picture. The larger number of items reduces the chance that a score is based largely on lucky guesses and increases its probability of being due to a student's understanding.
The free response questions are better, but still contrived as they must fit into an arbitrary allotted amount of time and they are written in a way that takes much of the decision-making away from the student.
I do wonder if I could teach a project-based AP Statistics class and still prepare my students for the big, bad AP exam. Seems possible. I guess I have my goal for next year's course.
Anybody have experience teaching AP Statistics as a project-based course? I would love to read about your experiences, recommendations, ideas, and thoughts.
Thursday, December 17, 2015
Wednesday, December 2, 2015
Projections and Senioritis
I had hoped to write weekly. I did that for nine weeks. Then, I lost momentum. I'm not sure why, but I expect it's not all that uncommon for new teaching blogs. You start out with a lot of enthusiasm, some good ideas to write about, and you're not too overloaded with work. Then steam runs out, work piles up, and ideas don't seem so fresh.
Tuesday is my blogging day. It says so on my calendar. I even have my calendar send me a nice email to remind me of that. Here it is Wednesday and I have not written a blog post since November 3. A month. And so, even though I am writing this without much of an idea of what I will write, I push the keys on my laptop hoping something worthwhile will end up coming out of this post.
My blogging statistics show that my posts gets anywhere from 12 to 26 views. I am sure that pales in comparison to many blogs, but I am honored that 12 to 26 people were taking their time to read my ramblings each week. I'm guessing my view count for this post will be lower because of my month off.
To be fair, I was out of town for a week in the middle of November, and then there was Thanksgiving. But, ideally, I would have written those weeks, too.
I have eleven more teaching days. AP Statistics will drop two of those days, so I have only nine more class meetings in 2015.
From where I sit, things have gone quite well this semester. Certainly, there is room for improvement, but I am pleased overall. We have covered about 40% of the AP Statistics curriculum. I made some projections based on the tests they have taken thus far and they are all on track for a three or better. Of my nine students, three of them currently project to a five, which certainly feels good to write.
Second semester will present new challenges. Seven of my nine are seniors. I would guess at least two of them will come down with a bad case of senioritis. That doesn't really bother me. I have been teaching seniors long enough to anticipate this and not take it personally. What concerns me is the potential negative impact they could have on the class as a whole.
For my non-AP Statistics class, I designed the second semester with the second semester senior in mind. I kept the workload light and we played blackjack, played craps, read the book "How to Lie with Statistics", and each student sold a product employing the artful use of statistics.
This year I have an AP Statistics class. Particularly since this is my first year teaching this course, I do not feel I can do the same projects. I expect the second semester workload will mirror the first semester, making senioritis a greater concern for me.
I will do what I can to fend it off. I will try to keep my energy up and do my best to incorporate several engaging activities that simultaneously teach the concepts and keep the interest of the students. But, ultimately, it is not me who will be taking an AP exam in May. The students will have to decide for themselves how hard they want to work and how important that three-hour exam is to them.
PS - If anybody can help me learn how to follow a Twitter StatsChat, I would greatly appreciate it. I have not yet figured that out.
Tuesday is my blogging day. It says so on my calendar. I even have my calendar send me a nice email to remind me of that. Here it is Wednesday and I have not written a blog post since November 3. A month. And so, even though I am writing this without much of an idea of what I will write, I push the keys on my laptop hoping something worthwhile will end up coming out of this post.
My blogging statistics show that my posts gets anywhere from 12 to 26 views. I am sure that pales in comparison to many blogs, but I am honored that 12 to 26 people were taking their time to read my ramblings each week. I'm guessing my view count for this post will be lower because of my month off.
To be fair, I was out of town for a week in the middle of November, and then there was Thanksgiving. But, ideally, I would have written those weeks, too.
I have eleven more teaching days. AP Statistics will drop two of those days, so I have only nine more class meetings in 2015.
From where I sit, things have gone quite well this semester. Certainly, there is room for improvement, but I am pleased overall. We have covered about 40% of the AP Statistics curriculum. I made some projections based on the tests they have taken thus far and they are all on track for a three or better. Of my nine students, three of them currently project to a five, which certainly feels good to write.
Second semester will present new challenges. Seven of my nine are seniors. I would guess at least two of them will come down with a bad case of senioritis. That doesn't really bother me. I have been teaching seniors long enough to anticipate this and not take it personally. What concerns me is the potential negative impact they could have on the class as a whole.
For my non-AP Statistics class, I designed the second semester with the second semester senior in mind. I kept the workload light and we played blackjack, played craps, read the book "How to Lie with Statistics", and each student sold a product employing the artful use of statistics.
This year I have an AP Statistics class. Particularly since this is my first year teaching this course, I do not feel I can do the same projects. I expect the second semester workload will mirror the first semester, making senioritis a greater concern for me.
I will do what I can to fend it off. I will try to keep my energy up and do my best to incorporate several engaging activities that simultaneously teach the concepts and keep the interest of the students. But, ultimately, it is not me who will be taking an AP exam in May. The students will have to decide for themselves how hard they want to work and how important that three-hour exam is to them.
PS - If anybody can help me learn how to follow a Twitter StatsChat, I would greatly appreciate it. I have not yet figured that out.
Tuesday, November 3, 2015
Trying to keep things fresh
Once upon a time, when I was a young, inexperienced teacher, the same-old-same-old was perfectly acceptable to me. Each day was much like the day before. The students learned and we moved forward at a reasonable pace and I was content.
Many grey hairs and many incarnations later, I am far from content. The same-old-same-old is boring. For both me and my students. It does not promote deep learning and it makes for less interesting teaching.
But, the world of AP Statistics sure does lend itself to routine. There is a wealth of material to cover and efficiency is necessary to get through all of it in time. So, many days in my classroom, I find one day feeling an awful lot like another and I see that glazed look in the students' eyes. As I wrote previously, the honeymoon is over and the students understand that they must grind.
But, that doesn't mean I have to give up. No, I won't do that. I am too hard-headed to give up and my expectations for myself would never allow it. Now that I have a better way to teach, I am not going to give it up. So, I constantly search for something new, something different.
As we have been going through the material, there do seem to be multiple processes that one ought to follow when answering certain kinds of AP exam free response questions. Want to compare two groups of a single quantitative variable? Don't forget your SOCS (shape, outliers, center, spread). Have a problem involving the Normal Model? There's a four-step process for that. Want to analyze a scatterplot? There are four characteristics to consider. Need to judge the quality of an experiment design? Be sure to consider the Three Principles.
Memorization is not something I like trying to teach. Yet, to be an efficient test-taker, there are advantages to having such processes down pat. To freshen up the class and at the same time help students remember these processes, I had them create posters. We will hang these posters in the class and they will serve as reminders of topics past. The students clearly enjoyed creating the posters. And I know that an enjoyable learning experience is one that is remembered. Memorization? Check.
Pictures of posters to follow...
Many grey hairs and many incarnations later, I am far from content. The same-old-same-old is boring. For both me and my students. It does not promote deep learning and it makes for less interesting teaching.
But, the world of AP Statistics sure does lend itself to routine. There is a wealth of material to cover and efficiency is necessary to get through all of it in time. So, many days in my classroom, I find one day feeling an awful lot like another and I see that glazed look in the students' eyes. As I wrote previously, the honeymoon is over and the students understand that they must grind.
But, that doesn't mean I have to give up. No, I won't do that. I am too hard-headed to give up and my expectations for myself would never allow it. Now that I have a better way to teach, I am not going to give it up. So, I constantly search for something new, something different.
As we have been going through the material, there do seem to be multiple processes that one ought to follow when answering certain kinds of AP exam free response questions. Want to compare two groups of a single quantitative variable? Don't forget your SOCS (shape, outliers, center, spread). Have a problem involving the Normal Model? There's a four-step process for that. Want to analyze a scatterplot? There are four characteristics to consider. Need to judge the quality of an experiment design? Be sure to consider the Three Principles.
Memorization is not something I like trying to teach. Yet, to be an efficient test-taker, there are advantages to having such processes down pat. To freshen up the class and at the same time help students remember these processes, I had them create posters. We will hang these posters in the class and they will serve as reminders of topics past. The students clearly enjoyed creating the posters. And I know that an enjoyable learning experience is one that is remembered. Memorization? Check.
Pictures of posters to follow...
Tuesday, October 13, 2015
Choose your own adventure
When I was young, I got hooked on the Choose Your Own Adventure series of books. As the reader, I got to make choices and the plot progressed based on those choices.
As a new AP Statistics teacher, I am trying my best to prepare my students so that they have the chance to reach whatever AP score they find desirable. For the first four weeks, I set a quick pace and assigned a good amount of homework to complement the work done in class. For many, the amount of work proved to be untenable. In response, I started making some of the textbook exercises optional. I explained to the students that by doing the required homework, I believed they were still being sufficiently prepared to earn at least a 3 or even a 4 on the AP exam. The optional exercises would be more important for those who seek the 5.
I have a variety of students in my class. One boy seems in over his head and a 3 will be a great accomplishment. A few students are very ambitious and will likely try for that 5.
And so, I give my students the chance to Choose Their Own Adventure. They can choose to go the easier route, maybe not be prepared for a 5, but still have sufficient preparation to pass the exam. Or, they can select the more demanding option and give themselves a greater chance at a 5. I wonder how many will take the second adventure...
As a new AP Statistics teacher, I am trying my best to prepare my students so that they have the chance to reach whatever AP score they find desirable. For the first four weeks, I set a quick pace and assigned a good amount of homework to complement the work done in class. For many, the amount of work proved to be untenable. In response, I started making some of the textbook exercises optional. I explained to the students that by doing the required homework, I believed they were still being sufficiently prepared to earn at least a 3 or even a 4 on the AP exam. The optional exercises would be more important for those who seek the 5.
I have a variety of students in my class. One boy seems in over his head and a 3 will be a great accomplishment. A few students are very ambitious and will likely try for that 5.
And so, I give my students the chance to Choose Their Own Adventure. They can choose to go the easier route, maybe not be prepared for a 5, but still have sufficient preparation to pass the exam. Or, they can select the more demanding option and give themselves a greater chance at a 5. I wonder how many will take the second adventure...
Wednesday, October 7, 2015
Honeymoon's over
Today, there was a palpable difference in the attitudes of my students. The mystery and wonder of just what AP Statistics is has worn off. College application deadlines are no longer small specks off in the distance. Summer is now a long time ago. The senior fall outdoor trip is a fading memory. We are six weeks into the new school year and the word "new" no longer applies as a modifier for "school year".
Here we are. Here we go.
The students by now should fully understand the expectations and demands of this course. As they juggle the many demands on their time, they are likely finding it a bit harder to give as much attention as they might want on certain subjects, such as AP Statistics.
I do not think their dedication has flagged, but I think the flood of work that comes in the first semester of the senior (or, in a few cases, junior) year is wearing them down. So while they still aspire to certain outcomes, their energy is lower.
A few did not have their homework complete today. This even after I made a conscious effort to lighten the load. The spark was not quite as bright today in class, the attention not as sharp.
In reflecting on my use of class time, I know that I have kept it varied. They just completed a group project. This was an assessment that had a very different feel from the tests. They found their own data and used technology (StatKey and Google Spreadsheets in addition to their graphing calculators) to analyze their data. Then they wrote meaningful conclusions based on their statistics and displays. I have already evaluated their work and returned it. And, because I want them to produce the best possible work they can, I have given them the opportunity to improve on their work and re-submit it for a potentially better grade.
So, I am not taking the change in mood personally; I am not taking it as a repudiation of my teaching or of the course. No, I think it's just the normal rhythm of the senior year. At least for the near future, it will be an extra challenge for the students. Can they grind through it until the mood brightens?
Fortunately, for students and teachers alike, our two-day Fall Break is this weekend. Timing is everything.
Here we are. Here we go.
The students by now should fully understand the expectations and demands of this course. As they juggle the many demands on their time, they are likely finding it a bit harder to give as much attention as they might want on certain subjects, such as AP Statistics.
I do not think their dedication has flagged, but I think the flood of work that comes in the first semester of the senior (or, in a few cases, junior) year is wearing them down. So while they still aspire to certain outcomes, their energy is lower.
A few did not have their homework complete today. This even after I made a conscious effort to lighten the load. The spark was not quite as bright today in class, the attention not as sharp.
In reflecting on my use of class time, I know that I have kept it varied. They just completed a group project. This was an assessment that had a very different feel from the tests. They found their own data and used technology (StatKey and Google Spreadsheets in addition to their graphing calculators) to analyze their data. Then they wrote meaningful conclusions based on their statistics and displays. I have already evaluated their work and returned it. And, because I want them to produce the best possible work they can, I have given them the opportunity to improve on their work and re-submit it for a potentially better grade.
So, I am not taking the change in mood personally; I am not taking it as a repudiation of my teaching or of the course. No, I think it's just the normal rhythm of the senior year. At least for the near future, it will be an extra challenge for the students. Can they grind through it until the mood brightens?
Fortunately, for students and teachers alike, our two-day Fall Break is this weekend. Timing is everything.
Tuesday, September 29, 2015
How to Homework
Homework. Work to be done at home. Work done after school is over. Work to do because there was insufficient time to complete it in class. Work done before dinner. Busy work so that students' minds do not get dull. Review of the day's lesson to solidify learning. Work done after dinner. Preview of the next day's lesson to get the students' minds turning in the right direction. Work done after bed time. Work.
Hmmm... shouldn't school be fun? I mean, shouldn't students enjoy learning?
No, I do not believe I am an entertainer. But, am I a slave driver?
Let me say right now that my AP Statistics students have impressed me. A lot. We have been going at it now for almost four weeks and I have been laying the homework on. Thick. Because I have to, right? I mean, it's A dot P dot Statistics. This is a serious class. And we have something like 20,000 hours of material to cover during 110 classes. So, homework is necessary. Lots of it.
Or is it?
If you have read my blog before, you know well that this is my first year teaching AP Statistics. One of my initial stresses was how to plan out the course so that the students get to play around with every topic for an appropriate amount of time. And so rather than linger over the mean and the standard deviation and try to gain a deep understanding of the information they reveal, we rush, give them a high five, and check them off a list. Topic covered. Done.
But topic learned? Skill mastered?
To ensure that my students understand the ideas sufficiently, I had it in my head that they should expect to spend at least an hour on homework before every class. That means 4-5 hours a week spent on AP Statistics outside of class on top of the 3.5 to 4 hours a week spend in class.
My textbook was a godsend, or so I believed. In the Annotated Teacher's Edition, I found a sample syllabus and a suggested pacing guide which completed the book in 109 days. Holy cow, I thought. I actually can cover everything and even have one whole day leftover to do something from a different source! But, seriously, I was relieved to learn that it would be conceivable to get through the course in time and here was an outline to follow.
The catch? Well, not all statistics homework problems are created equal. Problem #68 may take two minutes, while #63 may take thirty. I did the lazy teacher thing (also known as the teacher-trying-to-create-a-good-set-of-assignments-while-still-maintaining-sanity-and-family) and I assigned the suggested problems without even reading through them all. And so I found out last week that a couple students were spending two hours on their AP Statistics homework.
As I said earlier, my students have impressed me. Not only have then done all the work I assigned, but they did so without complaint. Just sucked it up and got 'er done. And they have been learning. A lot. The brute force method of teaching has been effective. Efficient? I doubt that.
I only found out about the two hours of homework after casually asking one student about their homework load. Further investigation found that my students were spending 72.5 minutes each night on the textbook problems with a standard deviation of 25.9 minutes. And every night I assign a suggested reading. Some nights, I assign them a video to watch. There's another 40 minutes.
Silly me. I looked at the assignments and I figured 15 minutes on the video, 15 minutes on the reading, and 30 minutes on the problems.
I have already begun re-thinking my homework assignments. I will keep using the suggested assignments, but I will choose a few of the textbook problems to be required and the rest will be optional. And I will assign fewer problems when I also assign a video. Or maybe eliminate the problems on those nights altogether.
And now this question burns in my mind: Can I teach the AP Statistics course without any homework at all?
If you think homework is necessary, I suggest you read some of Alfie Kohn's work and reflect critically and honestly on the role homework plays in your course.
Hmmm... shouldn't school be fun? I mean, shouldn't students enjoy learning?
No, I do not believe I am an entertainer. But, am I a slave driver?
Let me say right now that my AP Statistics students have impressed me. A lot. We have been going at it now for almost four weeks and I have been laying the homework on. Thick. Because I have to, right? I mean, it's A dot P dot Statistics. This is a serious class. And we have something like 20,000 hours of material to cover during 110 classes. So, homework is necessary. Lots of it.
Or is it?
If you have read my blog before, you know well that this is my first year teaching AP Statistics. One of my initial stresses was how to plan out the course so that the students get to play around with every topic for an appropriate amount of time. And so rather than linger over the mean and the standard deviation and try to gain a deep understanding of the information they reveal, we rush, give them a high five, and check them off a list. Topic covered. Done.
But topic learned? Skill mastered?
To ensure that my students understand the ideas sufficiently, I had it in my head that they should expect to spend at least an hour on homework before every class. That means 4-5 hours a week spent on AP Statistics outside of class on top of the 3.5 to 4 hours a week spend in class.
My textbook was a godsend, or so I believed. In the Annotated Teacher's Edition, I found a sample syllabus and a suggested pacing guide which completed the book in 109 days. Holy cow, I thought. I actually can cover everything and even have one whole day leftover to do something from a different source! But, seriously, I was relieved to learn that it would be conceivable to get through the course in time and here was an outline to follow.
The catch? Well, not all statistics homework problems are created equal. Problem #68 may take two minutes, while #63 may take thirty. I did the lazy teacher thing (also known as the teacher-trying-to-create-a-good-set-of-assignments-while-still-maintaining-sanity-and-family) and I assigned the suggested problems without even reading through them all. And so I found out last week that a couple students were spending two hours on their AP Statistics homework.
As I said earlier, my students have impressed me. Not only have then done all the work I assigned, but they did so without complaint. Just sucked it up and got 'er done. And they have been learning. A lot. The brute force method of teaching has been effective. Efficient? I doubt that.
I only found out about the two hours of homework after casually asking one student about their homework load. Further investigation found that my students were spending 72.5 minutes each night on the textbook problems with a standard deviation of 25.9 minutes. And every night I assign a suggested reading. Some nights, I assign them a video to watch. There's another 40 minutes.
Silly me. I looked at the assignments and I figured 15 minutes on the video, 15 minutes on the reading, and 30 minutes on the problems.
I have already begun re-thinking my homework assignments. I will keep using the suggested assignments, but I will choose a few of the textbook problems to be required and the rest will be optional. And I will assign fewer problems when I also assign a video. Or maybe eliminate the problems on those nights altogether.
And now this question burns in my mind: Can I teach the AP Statistics course without any homework at all?
If you think homework is necessary, I suggest you read some of Alfie Kohn's work and reflect critically and honestly on the role homework plays in your course.
Tuesday, September 22, 2015
Free Response to the Rescue
Though I demonize standardized tests in general, the AP Statistics exam has a saving grace: the free response questions. The first section is made up of 40 multiple choice questions and counts for half of the exam grade. The other half is based on six free response questions.
Multiple choice questions (about which I have previously written in this blog) are one of the lowest quality assessment tools available to the teacher. How fair is it to the student that they could do a problem 95% correct and get zero credit? Writing such questions is a bore and a pain. Answering them even more so. And, if you develop good test-taking skills, you can learn how to improve your odds of making a good guess. Since there are no penalty points for incorrect answers on the AP Statistics multiple choice questions, students are free to guess away. So, random guessing will, on average, get you eight correct out of 40.
Fortunately, there are the free response questions. I have long strived to develop authentic assessment tools. I want tasks, projects, activities, and problems that develop students' learning skills such as critical reading, analysis, problem solving, and synthesis. The free response questions do pretty well here. Problems are written to present at least quasi-real-life scenarios and students are asked to use their statistical tools in a meaningful way.
They are far from perfect. Students do better if they understand what the AP readers are looking for in answers. Thus, it is possible to teach free response strategies. Therefore, I feel compelled to do just that and have already begun. My first test involved two free response questions from past AP Statistics exams, as I expect will be the case for each chapter test. That means my students should get at least 24 chances to practice answering free response questions this year before their practice exam in April when they will get 6 more.
That seems like a lot and so I am relieved that I find these to generally be quality questions. I am also very thankful for Jason Molesky's StatsMonkey web site and his list of Free Response AP Problems Yay (aka FRAPPYs). On this site, the questions have been sorted by topics making it much easier for me to write my tests. Once again, the MathTeacherBlogoSphere to the rescue.
One my challenges in using these questions in class will be to apply the scoring guidelines appropriately. The College Board has made these available and easy to find, but it will take me some time to learn how to score the questions correctly. I did an AP Institute this past summer, and that helped some. My experience teaching International Baccalaureate (IB) mathematics helps. Becoming an AP reader seems like an obvious move to help me in this area, but I am three years short of the three-years-of-experience-teaching-AP-Statistics requirement. I do not understand why I must wait three years to be able to have one fewer week of summer vacation.
Some questions for my readers: How do you use free response questions in your teaching? Do you always score them exactly as the AP guidelines suggest? Have you been successful in preparing your students for the AP exam without directly teaching test-taking strategies?
Multiple choice questions (about which I have previously written in this blog) are one of the lowest quality assessment tools available to the teacher. How fair is it to the student that they could do a problem 95% correct and get zero credit? Writing such questions is a bore and a pain. Answering them even more so. And, if you develop good test-taking skills, you can learn how to improve your odds of making a good guess. Since there are no penalty points for incorrect answers on the AP Statistics multiple choice questions, students are free to guess away. So, random guessing will, on average, get you eight correct out of 40.
Fortunately, there are the free response questions. I have long strived to develop authentic assessment tools. I want tasks, projects, activities, and problems that develop students' learning skills such as critical reading, analysis, problem solving, and synthesis. The free response questions do pretty well here. Problems are written to present at least quasi-real-life scenarios and students are asked to use their statistical tools in a meaningful way.
They are far from perfect. Students do better if they understand what the AP readers are looking for in answers. Thus, it is possible to teach free response strategies. Therefore, I feel compelled to do just that and have already begun. My first test involved two free response questions from past AP Statistics exams, as I expect will be the case for each chapter test. That means my students should get at least 24 chances to practice answering free response questions this year before their practice exam in April when they will get 6 more.
That seems like a lot and so I am relieved that I find these to generally be quality questions. I am also very thankful for Jason Molesky's StatsMonkey web site and his list of Free Response AP Problems Yay (aka FRAPPYs). On this site, the questions have been sorted by topics making it much easier for me to write my tests. Once again, the MathTeacherBlogoSphere to the rescue.
One my challenges in using these questions in class will be to apply the scoring guidelines appropriately. The College Board has made these available and easy to find, but it will take me some time to learn how to score the questions correctly. I did an AP Institute this past summer, and that helped some. My experience teaching International Baccalaureate (IB) mathematics helps. Becoming an AP reader seems like an obvious move to help me in this area, but I am three years short of the three-years-of-experience-teaching-AP-Statistics requirement. I do not understand why I must wait three years to be able to have one fewer week of summer vacation.
Some questions for my readers: How do you use free response questions in your teaching? Do you always score them exactly as the AP guidelines suggest? Have you been successful in preparing your students for the AP exam without directly teaching test-taking strategies?
Wednesday, September 16, 2015
Ever improving
I'm only three weeks into this year's AP Statistics course and I am already thinking about how to make next year's course even better.
I'm not sure there exists a high school course better suited to bringing math alive than statistics. It is absurdly easy to connect the math of statistics with the everyday world. One could build an entire course based solely on FiveThirtyEight.com. Or one could teach the book Freakonomics. I have always wanted to teach a Baseball Statistics course. It would be amazing to teach statistics through the lens of baseball. There is endless material. The Ken Burns series. Moneyball. Bill James. Fantasy Baseball. Strat-O-Matic baseball.
That last idea has already got me thinking about how I might teach probability this year. If you've never heard of Strat-O-Matic and you teach statistics, then you seriously need to check it out now. Essentially, two players roll dice to determine the outcomes of a baseball game. Strikeout? Fly ball? Homerun?
Strat-O-Matic is not just baseball. In fact, you could probably create your own Strat-O-Matic game for Congress and then go about simulating votes all sorts of famous bills in history. You could see what would happen if Michael Huffington had become California's US Senator in place of Dianne Feinstein. I think I have just decided how to teach simulations in my AP Statistics course. High five to blogging.
This summer I got to go to a professional development conference at Stanford, the Stanford Summer Teaching Institute (SSTI). I attended the math workshop which was devoted to teaching mathematics using engaging and rich tasks. Chances are, if you are reading this blog, you know who Dan Meyer is. You probably also know who Robert Kaplinsky is. The leaders of our workshop, Zack Miller (@zmill415) and Anna Blinstein (@Borschtwithanna), led us through numerous activities such as how much a 100x100 cheeseburger from In-N-Out would cost and how to inspire by presenting them with interesting videos or photos that have the potential to stimulate rich math discussions and inquiry.
What is blatantly obvious to me is that an AP Statistics course could be taught exclusively with such tasks and activities. There are already courses out there that use Problem-Based Learning, Project-Based Learning, and/or Activity-Based Learning. So this is certainly not a new idea in the mathteacherblogosphere (#MTBoS). I just feel like I am missing out on a wonderful opportunity to implement these ideas in full force in my AP Statistics course.
Hopefully, somebody reads this who knows of a teacher who is already teaching AP Statistics much like the courses outlined on Emergent Math. I have no desire to recreate the wheel here. I certainly expect to create some of my own materials as I have been doing for many years now. But I know that there are teachers out there doing amazing things in their classrooms and online and I love to borrow the work of others to help my students have the best experience possible. So, please, if you have ideas that can help me, by all means share. Post a comment so others can benefit, too.
I'm not sure there exists a high school course better suited to bringing math alive than statistics. It is absurdly easy to connect the math of statistics with the everyday world. One could build an entire course based solely on FiveThirtyEight.com. Or one could teach the book Freakonomics. I have always wanted to teach a Baseball Statistics course. It would be amazing to teach statistics through the lens of baseball. There is endless material. The Ken Burns series. Moneyball. Bill James. Fantasy Baseball. Strat-O-Matic baseball.
That last idea has already got me thinking about how I might teach probability this year. If you've never heard of Strat-O-Matic and you teach statistics, then you seriously need to check it out now. Essentially, two players roll dice to determine the outcomes of a baseball game. Strikeout? Fly ball? Homerun?
Strat-O-Matic is not just baseball. In fact, you could probably create your own Strat-O-Matic game for Congress and then go about simulating votes all sorts of famous bills in history. You could see what would happen if Michael Huffington had become California's US Senator in place of Dianne Feinstein. I think I have just decided how to teach simulations in my AP Statistics course. High five to blogging.
This summer I got to go to a professional development conference at Stanford, the Stanford Summer Teaching Institute (SSTI). I attended the math workshop which was devoted to teaching mathematics using engaging and rich tasks. Chances are, if you are reading this blog, you know who Dan Meyer is. You probably also know who Robert Kaplinsky is. The leaders of our workshop, Zack Miller (@zmill415) and Anna Blinstein (@Borschtwithanna), led us through numerous activities such as how much a 100x100 cheeseburger from In-N-Out would cost and how to inspire by presenting them with interesting videos or photos that have the potential to stimulate rich math discussions and inquiry.
What is blatantly obvious to me is that an AP Statistics course could be taught exclusively with such tasks and activities. There are already courses out there that use Problem-Based Learning, Project-Based Learning, and/or Activity-Based Learning. So this is certainly not a new idea in the mathteacherblogosphere (#MTBoS). I just feel like I am missing out on a wonderful opportunity to implement these ideas in full force in my AP Statistics course.
Hopefully, somebody reads this who knows of a teacher who is already teaching AP Statistics much like the courses outlined on Emergent Math. I have no desire to recreate the wheel here. I certainly expect to create some of my own materials as I have been doing for many years now. But I know that there are teachers out there doing amazing things in their classrooms and online and I love to borrow the work of others to help my students have the best experience possible. So, please, if you have ideas that can help me, by all means share. Post a comment so others can benefit, too.
Tuesday, September 8, 2015
An overabundance?
One of my primary concerns with teaching AP Statistics is the pressure to cover the material in time for the test. I have often heard colleagues bemoan not having sufficient class meetings to properly cover the material for their AP course.
For ten years, I taught a non-AP statistics course and I purposefully chose to cover far fewer topics to allow my students to gain depth in those topics we did cover. In "regular" statistics, we would spend a year on about half of the AP topics. It was a project-based course with computer labs in which students would learn the Data Desk statistics software and spreadsheets as well as calculator techniques. Students wrote surveys and gathered data from the student body and faculty. They read "How to Lie with Statistics" and gave sales pitches in which they used statistics artfully to better sell their product. We played craps and blackjack to study probability. And I'm not talking just one period, but multiple days so that we had lots of quality data. Students researched data on the internet and learned how to organize it and how difficult it can be to find quality data. They had the time to make both big and small mistakes and then stop and start over and learn from their mistakes. I had them research data from non-Western countries in an attempt to give the course a global feel.
As I plan for AP Statistics, I certainly do not suffer for lack of material. Rather, the problem is too much. I cannot possibly do everything I want to do with my students this year. Today, I assigned them their first free response question. Their first test is Friday and I plan to give them two such problems, so I felt compelled to provide them with a chance to try one out ahead of time. Tomorrow in class we will go over the scoring and look at sample responses and their scores. In order to fit this free response question in, I dropped a couple other questions from their assignment sheet. And I know that going over the free response question will take the entirety of Wednesday's 35-minute period.
As I peruse my materials, I find a plethora of activities and projects that I want to use. And I don't want to just throw the activities at my students. I want to scaffold them properly. I want to give them sufficient time to reflect on the questions they might answer, what possible answers might look like, the processes they might choose, the information they need to answer the question, and where they might find the information. I want them to have enough time to fully address their questions, to feel free enough to try, fail, re-think their strategy, and try again. And then, sufficient time to write up a beautiful, well-crafted solution, one that displays the salient parts of the process and clear support for their answers.
Don't start feeling sorry for me. I know solutions to my problems will present themselves. Forgive my whining. I don't want my blog to merely be a rant and complaint bucket. I do know I can scale the problems back. I know that rather than address all the different parts in each project and activity, I can have my students focus on one or two of the components at a time. I know I can do this. I just don't want to spend time teaching my students how to AP. I want to help them be more creative, inquisitive, tenacious, fearless, and courageous. Here we go.
For ten years, I taught a non-AP statistics course and I purposefully chose to cover far fewer topics to allow my students to gain depth in those topics we did cover. In "regular" statistics, we would spend a year on about half of the AP topics. It was a project-based course with computer labs in which students would learn the Data Desk statistics software and spreadsheets as well as calculator techniques. Students wrote surveys and gathered data from the student body and faculty. They read "How to Lie with Statistics" and gave sales pitches in which they used statistics artfully to better sell their product. We played craps and blackjack to study probability. And I'm not talking just one period, but multiple days so that we had lots of quality data. Students researched data on the internet and learned how to organize it and how difficult it can be to find quality data. They had the time to make both big and small mistakes and then stop and start over and learn from their mistakes. I had them research data from non-Western countries in an attempt to give the course a global feel.
As I plan for AP Statistics, I certainly do not suffer for lack of material. Rather, the problem is too much. I cannot possibly do everything I want to do with my students this year. Today, I assigned them their first free response question. Their first test is Friday and I plan to give them two such problems, so I felt compelled to provide them with a chance to try one out ahead of time. Tomorrow in class we will go over the scoring and look at sample responses and their scores. In order to fit this free response question in, I dropped a couple other questions from their assignment sheet. And I know that going over the free response question will take the entirety of Wednesday's 35-minute period.
As I peruse my materials, I find a plethora of activities and projects that I want to use. And I don't want to just throw the activities at my students. I want to scaffold them properly. I want to give them sufficient time to reflect on the questions they might answer, what possible answers might look like, the processes they might choose, the information they need to answer the question, and where they might find the information. I want them to have enough time to fully address their questions, to feel free enough to try, fail, re-think their strategy, and try again. And then, sufficient time to write up a beautiful, well-crafted solution, one that displays the salient parts of the process and clear support for their answers.
Don't start feeling sorry for me. I know solutions to my problems will present themselves. Forgive my whining. I don't want my blog to merely be a rant and complaint bucket. I do know I can scale the problems back. I know that rather than address all the different parts in each project and activity, I can have my students focus on one or two of the components at a time. I know I can do this. I just don't want to spend time teaching my students how to AP. I want to help them be more creative, inquisitive, tenacious, fearless, and courageous. Here we go.
Wednesday, September 2, 2015
The "necessary" evil?
For the last five years or so, I have thought a lot about
assessment, and even more about evaluation in my classes. When I first taught
my non-AP statistics course 10 years ago, I decided to not use tests or
quizzes. I have often tried to make use of alternative assessments such as
projects, portfolios, and take-home problem sets. My primary goal has been to
create assessments for my students that are closer to something that they might
actually do outside of academia. Tests and quizzes as far as I can tell are
artifices almost exclusively in the domain of academia.
And yet, here I am getting my students ready for a major
exam. Granted, they have eight more months to prepare for the AP Statistics
exam, but in a couple weeks, I will give an in-class, timed test. What’s more,
it will have 10 multiple-choice questions as part of the test.
I have not given a standard multiple-choice test in 15
years. I long ago swore them off. To me, they are assessments that in no way
advantage a student and don’t even help a teacher evaluate a student’s mastery
of a concept or skill. Did they get the answer right by luck? Did they get it
wrong because they mis-read the question? Did they drop a negative sign in
solving an equation and end up with one of the incorrect answers?
As I have told my students on numerous occasions, on a
multiple-choice question, one can solve a problem and do 95% of the work
correctly, but get no credit. It’s all-or-nothing.
Yes, it will make scoring those problems very easy for me.
But my job as a teacher is not to make my job easy. My job is to provide my
students with the best learning opportunities I can. Tests, in my mind, are
very low on the totem pole of learning opportunities. Multiple-choice tests
barely even qualify as a learning opportunity. Learning opportunities worth
doing are projects, activities, rich tasks, and presentations. Evaluating a
student’s work on a project gives so much more insight into what a student
knows and what they can do.
I have avoided AP classes because I do not want to teach to
a test. I do not want to rush through material because the College Board has
decided that the course must contain certain topics. I prefer to dive deep into
a problem and to provide my students the time to fully understand the concepts.
My regular statistics students may have only learned half the number of
statistics topics as an AP student. But on the material that they did cover, I
daresay that their learning went deeper and that they understood better how to
properly use the statistical tools. And I bet they also enjoyed the class more.
Tuesday, August 25, 2015
The Calm before the Storm
Amazingly, we seem to be a school that starts late. Amazing because we are still starting before Labor Day. As a kid, school always started after that holiday. From my new Twitter adventures, I realize that many in the Math Twitter Blogosphere (MTBoS) are already well underway. Meanwhile, we don't start until next Monday.
Anyway, I haven't had a lot of time to devote to AP Statistics since I last wrote. Last week, I renewed my Wilderness First Aid certification and this week we have had our opening of school meetings. I have now taught at four different independent schools and so I am well aware that such meetings are pretty much universal. But maybe there could be fewer and shorter ones? I would much more value focused work time so I could make my courses as rock awesome as possible.
I did have one recent significant AP Statistics moment.
A week or so ago, I contacted my textbook rep about some of the instructor resource materials. I also tweeted for help from the Math Twitter Blogosphere about which of the resources were useful. Naturally, my MTBoS colleagues won the quick reply challenge. In under 12 hours, I had multiple suggestions and recommendations. It took my textbook rep a bit longer to get back to me.
Then, earlier this week, a mysterious box arrived in our package room for me. Since I live at a boarding school, this package could have contained just about anything. Lo and behold it was a back-to-school package full of every resource I had asked the textbook rep about. Solutions, test banks, teacher resource CD. I had not planned on ordering it all and I had expected that I would be limited by my department's budget in what I purchased. Being a math teacher, I can say definitively that FREE fits within our department's budget.
Now, I understand a bit about business, especially the textbook business, so while I was pleasantly surprised, I was exactly flabbergasted at the free goodies. I am quite certain the publishing company will make a lot more money if we order a dozen new textbooks next summer than if we get one or two teacher resources. So, by sending me these materials, it's a good business move because I become more likely to stay with textbook especially if I am more reliant on their resources. It's a move done by salespeople the world over in all sorts of commerce, legal and otherwise.
Part of me is hugely embarrassed at admitting to being so smitten with textbook resources. I also teach an integrated high school math course, and last year we didn't use any textbook at all. I usually avoid having a textbook company design my course. But, this is my first time teaching AP Statistics and I have to start somewhere. And, I admit that the textbook we are using may be the best textbook I have ever used (in my opinion, of course).
Next week, I think I'll write about making my first AP Statistics multiple choice quiz. Yes, multiple choice. I haven't given a multiple choice assessment in 15 years...
Anyway, I haven't had a lot of time to devote to AP Statistics since I last wrote. Last week, I renewed my Wilderness First Aid certification and this week we have had our opening of school meetings. I have now taught at four different independent schools and so I am well aware that such meetings are pretty much universal. But maybe there could be fewer and shorter ones? I would much more value focused work time so I could make my courses as rock awesome as possible.
I did have one recent significant AP Statistics moment.
A week or so ago, I contacted my textbook rep about some of the instructor resource materials. I also tweeted for help from the Math Twitter Blogosphere about which of the resources were useful. Naturally, my MTBoS colleagues won the quick reply challenge. In under 12 hours, I had multiple suggestions and recommendations. It took my textbook rep a bit longer to get back to me.
Then, earlier this week, a mysterious box arrived in our package room for me. Since I live at a boarding school, this package could have contained just about anything. Lo and behold it was a back-to-school package full of every resource I had asked the textbook rep about. Solutions, test banks, teacher resource CD. I had not planned on ordering it all and I had expected that I would be limited by my department's budget in what I purchased. Being a math teacher, I can say definitively that FREE fits within our department's budget.
Now, I understand a bit about business, especially the textbook business, so while I was pleasantly surprised, I was exactly flabbergasted at the free goodies. I am quite certain the publishing company will make a lot more money if we order a dozen new textbooks next summer than if we get one or two teacher resources. So, by sending me these materials, it's a good business move because I become more likely to stay with textbook especially if I am more reliant on their resources. It's a move done by salespeople the world over in all sorts of commerce, legal and otherwise.
Part of me is hugely embarrassed at admitting to being so smitten with textbook resources. I also teach an integrated high school math course, and last year we didn't use any textbook at all. I usually avoid having a textbook company design my course. But, this is my first time teaching AP Statistics and I have to start somewhere. And, I admit that the textbook we are using may be the best textbook I have ever used (in my opinion, of course).
Next week, I think I'll write about making my first AP Statistics multiple choice quiz. Yes, multiple choice. I haven't given a multiple choice assessment in 15 years...
Tuesday, August 18, 2015
Just another AP Statistics Teacher
Hello there. I teach students. After successfully avoiding the letters A and P during the first 16 years of my career, I have been asked to teach my students the AP Statistics topics.
The good news for me is that I have taught a non-AP introductory high school statistics course for the past ten years or so. The bad news for me is that I feel like I am going to have to completely overhaul my syllabus and employ some of the teaching methodologies I have tried to leave behind in order to meet the demands of the AP course. I have many ideas how to make this process more palatable and to make it a better experience for my student.
The very good news for me is that I found a practical use for Twitter this summer, and that is making this transition a heckuva lot better. In July, I attended CSET's Stanford Summer Teaching Institute and one of my instructors sold me on Twitter. Who knew there were so many wonderful teachers out there very willing to help a fellow teacher out? I just drop a hashtag on a tweet (such as #MTBoS or #statschat), maybe mention another teacher using that @ symbol and teachers from all over place can see what I write and respond to it. And they do!
Besides the wonderful help these twittering teachers provide, it also gives me a new sort of community that makes me feel not so alone in what I am trying to do. And it does my soul good to know that there are so many kind teachers out there who are willing to help a stranger.
Today, however, I had a realization that I am trying to recreate the wheel and I wonder if there might be a much better way. Especially given this online community and the collective resources. My students will have a much better experience this year if they get instruction from experienced AP Statistics teacher. I know I can help my students, but my inexperience will limit me and make it harder for them.
Wouldn't it be better for my students if they could somehow connect directly to the best AP Statistics teachers? Wouldn't it be better for them if someone who has done this ten times designed the syllabus I use in my class?
I did an AP institute this summer and I have resources to help me and I am certainly not starting from scratch here. But does the world really need another AP Statistics teacher? Isn't it conceivable that there exist enough excellent AP Statistics teachers already and that instead of trying to do my own thing, my students could tap into the knowledge and direction of those that really know what they are doing?
The good news for me is that I have taught a non-AP introductory high school statistics course for the past ten years or so. The bad news for me is that I feel like I am going to have to completely overhaul my syllabus and employ some of the teaching methodologies I have tried to leave behind in order to meet the demands of the AP course. I have many ideas how to make this process more palatable and to make it a better experience for my student.
The very good news for me is that I found a practical use for Twitter this summer, and that is making this transition a heckuva lot better. In July, I attended CSET's Stanford Summer Teaching Institute and one of my instructors sold me on Twitter. Who knew there were so many wonderful teachers out there very willing to help a fellow teacher out? I just drop a hashtag on a tweet (such as #MTBoS or #statschat), maybe mention another teacher using that @ symbol and teachers from all over place can see what I write and respond to it. And they do!
Besides the wonderful help these twittering teachers provide, it also gives me a new sort of community that makes me feel not so alone in what I am trying to do. And it does my soul good to know that there are so many kind teachers out there who are willing to help a stranger.
Today, however, I had a realization that I am trying to recreate the wheel and I wonder if there might be a much better way. Especially given this online community and the collective resources. My students will have a much better experience this year if they get instruction from experienced AP Statistics teacher. I know I can help my students, but my inexperience will limit me and make it harder for them.
Wouldn't it be better for my students if they could somehow connect directly to the best AP Statistics teachers? Wouldn't it be better for them if someone who has done this ten times designed the syllabus I use in my class?
I did an AP institute this summer and I have resources to help me and I am certainly not starting from scratch here. But does the world really need another AP Statistics teacher? Isn't it conceivable that there exist enough excellent AP Statistics teachers already and that instead of trying to do my own thing, my students could tap into the knowledge and direction of those that really know what they are doing?
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