Think about where the learning happens in PBL

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After a few weeks of recovery, I wanted to write about having a BLAST of a time at our first attempt of putting together the PBL Summit my friend Nils Ahbel and I organized from July 16-19.  I wanted to thank all of those who came and participated in the discussions and talks and who […]

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One of the Original “Makers”

Apologies to any faithful readers out there – I have had a heck of a summer – way too much going on.  Usually during the summer, I keep up with my blog much more because I am doing such interesting readings and teaching conferences, etc. (although I’m running a conference for the first time in […]

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Late night thoughts on Assessing Prior Knowledge

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So it’s 11:50 pm on a Tuesday night, so what?  I can still think critically, right?  It was the last day of classes and I had an amazing day, but then all of a sudden Twitter started gearing up and lots of discussions began and my mind started racing.  I had planned on writing a […]

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NCTM 2015 – Reflections

I know I’m a little late but I did want to post my own handouts and talk a little bit about my experiences at NCTM Boston this year.  I want to thank all of the great speakers  that I saw including Robert Kaplinsky, Ron Lancaster, Maria Hernandez, Dan Teague, The Young People’s Project (Bob Moses’ […]

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Spring has Sprung – and so has the French Garden!

So the spring term means two things for my Honors Geometry kids – the technology inquiry project and looking at the French Garden Problem.  So for those of you who are not familiar with both of those I’ll try to quickly fill you in while I talk about how they just happen to so coolly […]

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Why Can’t We All Just Get Along?: Some Inquiry Math Classes are not Content-less

Maybe it’s just how I am, or maybe I’m just always worried about what people are going to say about me, but I am hesitant to criticize other teachers publicly in the blogosphere. I’ve always felt this camaraderie with others once I’ve learned they were a teacher even if we are very different from each […]

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Succeeding at Helping Students to Fail?? Part 1: Meaning

Apologies faithful readers – those of you who know me well, know that I have been dealing with a great deal of personal issues and preparing for the summer PBL Math Teaching Summit, so I have taken a small hiatus from blogging for a while.  However, with that under control for now, I turn to […]

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Tracking, PBL and Safety in Risk-Taking

I’ve been giving a lot of thought recently to the idea of “tracking” in PBL, mostly at the prodding of the teaching fellow I’m working with this year – which is so awesome, of course.  Having a young teacher give you a fresh outlook on the practices that your school has come to know and […]

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PBL Summit News!

It’s been an extremely busy fall for me, but with the help of my friend Nils Ahbel, I have finally put together an informational flyer and schedule for the Problem-Based Learning Math Teaching Summit for next summer.  As you begin to look for professional development opportunities for yourself, please consider being a part of this […]

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How do we get kids to value others’ ideas in math class?

Some recent common situations: A very gifted student comes to me (more than once) after class asking why he needs to listen to other students talk about their ideas in class when he already has his own ideas about how to do the problems.  Why do we spend so much time going over problems in class […]

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