Teaching First: March Madness

I enjoy a good athletic competition.  But to say I'm a casual observer of the sporting world is a great understatement.  Over the last year, I've probably watched three complete games, one being the Super Bowl.

My first week in Junior High is almost over.  I  have spent most of the time making observations about everything from classroom management to student penmanship.  My conclusion is that Junior High is a very, very different environment.

In observing student interests, I have noticed that quite a few of them are interested in March Madness, the annual NCAA basketball tournament.  And, by interested, I mean obsessed.

So, on Wednesday, with 15 hours before brackets had to be "locked" I set up my own.   ...blindly and based on unwarranted hunches.  And I've been keeping track of my predictions every few hours and catching highlights of the games.  This madness may have bit me.  Though, midway through the first round, I am sad to report that I will not be receiving a billion dollars from Warren Buffet. 

I'm not even close.

But, I have had a few good conversations with students, which was the goal.  Ohio State's loss has been the theme of most of the conversations.  In one instance I was able to talk to a student about their own college aspirations.  It's a small step forward in establishing relationships with my students.  And, just like Dayton, a win is a win, even if the margin is small.

NetLogo - Technology and Models

For the past week we have been learning about Ecology.  I have a number of old resources that I have been asked to use in the classroom.  With the recent talk of NGSS and STEM I was looking for ways to integrate some sort of meaningful technology into the classroom.

As I was poking through several videos on the Bozeman Science website, Paul Anderson briefly mentioned NetLogo as resource he uses in his classroom.  NetLogo is a piece of software that creates computer models of all sorts of scientific or statistical situations.  The software helps model everything from basic traffic patterns to game theory.  I found a model that helps visualize relationships between predator and prey and I was able to use it in class with great success.

The need in the classroom:

1. To quickly visualize the relationship between predator and prey over generations.
2. To quickly visualize the results of messing with the balance of predator/prey relationships.
3. To visualize and analyze the results of the corresponding data.

Gathering this type of data to has been a lengthy process in the past.  It ends up usually being too general or too painstakingly lengthy to make the exercise meaningful.  And, generating data where one of the variables changed is hypothetical and equally time-consuming.  NetLogo provided a way to quickly generate data for the situations we were looking at.

The Old Way.  *sigh*

Downloading and installing NetLogo was pretty simple.  It's a Java based program so it can be installed almost anywhere and I was impressed that it ran so smoothly on my lightweight laptop.

Here's a screenshot of the Wolf Sheep Predation model.

Shiny!

Now, here's what I'm most excited about.  The model produced data that really helped scaffold good questions.  The students were interested in the modeling and were mostly impressed at how fast data could be generated.  The data allowed me to assess the students' understanding of the principles we've been talking about in the last 4 class periods.

In each class we ran a basic simulation and we talked about the ebb and flow of both predator and prey but we were also able to play with the variables.  In one instance we had a situation where the number of sheep dipped too low and the wolves went extinct within our digital biome.  I got a reaction from a lot of the students!  I was surprised and very excited at the empathy!

After the demonstration we moved on to other classwork, but I continued to get questions about the predator/prey relationships, what-if questions, and questions about running the software themselves.  For a small investment of classroom time and an hour of my personal time I got quite a satisfying result.

Can We Have Class Outside Today?

Can we have class outside today?  Yes!  Yes we can!  And, there was much rejoicing!

We began a unit on Ecology and it seemed fitting that we actually go outside.  After all, we're all very much a part of the local environment and getting into the environment seems like a good first step.

During the beginning of class students wrote down as many observations about the local environment as they could.  Before going out we had a discussion about some of the things that make up environments.  Then, students were asked to be silent, observe, and write things down.

Students responded well.  They were very funny too.  One student 4th period wrote down "Mr. Davis," much to the enjoyment of his buddies.  It was a good jumping-off point to discuss human impact on the local environment; one of the major parts of our study of ecology is recognizing that we all have an impact on the environment.

When I discussed my plan with my wife, she offered some suggestions:

1. One, the time outside needs to be finite.  Too long and the students will get bored.
2. The students need to have a goal to work towards.  I asked each student to come up with at least 20 observations in the 10 minutes we were outside.
3. The students need to be spread out from one another; too close and they chat.

The 10 minutes flew by!  The students came up with great observations that we were able to incorporate into the following lecture and discussion.  This is a lesson plan I'll definitely use in the future.

Here's a shot of the local environment from the classroom door.

Student Engagement: On Science and Romance

Last semester, the students studied genetics.  This semester the students' studies will be slightly distracted by the joys of Valentine's Day and Prom.

While the students were working on a practice assignment one of the guys stopped me and said, "Hey Mr. Davis.  I have a question for you and it's not about the assignment."

He began asking me questions about how we get blue roses.  I let him know that blue roses are artificially colored white roses and that blue coloration in nature is quite rare.

After talking about it for a couple of minutes, I asked, "What's the interest in blue roses?"

Turns out there's a nice girl he'd like to impress.  Her favorite color is blue, and he wanted to get her a bunch of blue roses.  Specifically, he wanted some with blue and white stripes.  I mentioned the word "variegated" and he said, "Hey, isn't that co-dominance?"  I replied in the affirmative, and what he said next made me happy and a little sad:  "Hey!  Biology in real life!"

I was glad that he made the connection to his experiences, but we may have missed an opportunity to help him make that connection during the unit of study.  This type of thing will be a good item to bookmark in my brain; much may be learned through romantic endeavors.  

After a quick banter about genetics, I recommended that he walk into a florist's shop and see if they could help get him some blue roses.  I am not only a biology teacher, but a floral adviser, too.

Evolution and Student Interests

There is a point in every childhood that you hear an adult, probably your mom, try to sound cool.  I think these same adults write text books.  I think these same adults become teachers.  I think I may become this type of teacher if I'm not continually considering student interests in lessons.

We were talking about artificial selection in class.  The examples on the PowerPoint and in the book are simple:  cats, dogs, milk cows.  I dutifully added  these text-book approved examples in my lesson, but in the last class of the day I mentioned that I grow Ghost Peppers, a type of pepper derived from artificial selection.  This got a rather hot (pardon the pun) reaction.

We talked about how the peppers are bred and cross-bred, isolating the part of the pepper that we want--heat!  Cross-breeding, then, got the students talking about funny-sounding dog breeds.  During the conversation, I was able to point out how each one of these things is tied to an overarching concept we've been talking about during the lectures.  Ah, the joy of seeing light bulbs go on!  And, for a few minutes, we enjoyed the connection between content and student interests, even if it got a bit silly.

I walked away from this lesson resolved to make sure this happens a lot more than I had anticipated.  If I don't, I'll turn into a square.  Yo.