This week I am coming off a weekend where I got VERY LITTLE done on the blogging end. \u00a0My school had a planning retreat and spent a lot of time working through the school’s vision and values, and how those should guide our response to the challenges we face. \u00a0As we were ready to leave we faced a more immediate and unexpected challenge when a\u00a0teacher’s jack russell terrier\u00a0ran into the neighborhoods behind the retreat center\u00a0and nine of us had to go traversing through this\u00a0suburb looking for little Bruce.<\/p>\n
It was quite an ordeal, and also an exercise in the collective nature of hope. \u00a0In the 2-3 hours of searching there was a point in which each person sort of said some form of “We’ve done all we can,” or at least thought it. \u00a0However, one other person kept thinking of one more thing we can do. “Maybe we can ask the neighbors?” \u00a0“Maybe we can hang up signs?” \u00a0“Maybe we can drive down past the forest?” \u00a0When one of us had a little hope, we all got a little more hope, and that gave us the energy to throw ourselves into each new task in hopes of finding Bruce.<\/p>\n
Eventually we received the text that Bruce was found. \u00a0He ran into a giant forest and ended up covered in grass stains and ticks 2 miles away from where our retreat was. \u00a0I keep thinking of this story because fixing\u00a0what needs to be fixed in education seems like an enormous task. \u00a0And perhaps thinking of enormous solutions isn’t the answer. \u00a0Perhaps what we need are lots of little infusions of hope coming from a community of\u00a0people all around the world. \u00a0The MathTwitterBlogosphere seems to be just this, and\u00a0I am honored to be a part of\u00a0it.<\/p>\n
What I’m teaching this week:<\/p>\n
This week I am going to take my equations and patterns class and start working on the first third of their project. \u00a0This Carnival Project<\/a>\u00a0was actually 1 piece before, but I am breaking into 3 so that I can give them feedback one piece\u00a0at a time. \u00a0I am going to collect the first game on Wednesday and then help the students by Friday. \u00a0In Banking and Investment I need to start the\u00a0project which means a class about using functions to model the behavior of certain markets. \u00a0Hopefully the markets from the “Dunshire Abbey” game will provide the data if we can push through<\/a> getting the kids to work on it.<\/p>\n What I’m blogging this week:<\/p>\n The Coast2Coast group is off and running and we are\u00a0going to try and do a bunch of posts together around our\u00a0teaching context. \u00a0I plan to have a post about City-As-School<\/a> and all of the things we do here. \u00a0To really portray my school realistically, I am going to have to write a lot, and probably talk a little with my principal.<\/p>\n I also want to do a lot of reading of the other #MTBoS30 blogs so I can\u00a0get another Around The Blogosphere<\/a> up before Memorial day.<\/p>\n What I’m thinking this week:<\/p>\n Right now I’m thinking about this giant spike of traffic I got yesterday when @ddmeyer made this tweet, and @mythagon, @wahedebug, @k8nowak,\u00a0of other people followed up with other positive comments.<\/p>\n Today\u2019s math educator growth stock is @carloliwitter<\/a>. Love the vibe & ideas. Strong buy. Follow and subscribe: http:\/\/t.co\/dPWrTp7RME<\/a><\/p>\n — Dan Meyer (@ddmeyer) May 19, 2014<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n