[All documents are linked at the bottom of the page through Scribd]
I
am in the midst of a peer teaching lesson on quadrilaterals. I gave students
the task of writing and presenting a 20-minute lesson on a quadrilateral. They
worked in groups of 3-5, assigned by me. They had to create a number of
documents as part of their planning: notes, role division, lesson plan or
activity, worksheet with problems and answer key, mini quiz and answer key, and
poster. Six groups taught about a quadrilateral: parallelogram, rectangle,
rhombus, square, trapezoid, and kite; two groups taught about the relationships
between the quadrilaterals by creating a hierarchy and by writing Always,
Sometimes, Never True questions.
Below
are all of the documents I handed out to students.
This
project was a little scary. I don’t know that students have ever been asked to
learn something on their own and then teach it to their peers. I chose this
chapter for the project because students have been exposed to quadrilaterals
for many years now. They basic properties of squares and rectangles are
ingrained in their minds, and they can use these properties to extend to other
quadrilaterals.
The
project generated a TON of work for me. Not only did I have to design the
project and how it would play out, with all of the considerations involved and
all of the documents; but I had to provide feedback on 30 projects three nights
in a row, grade a different mini quiz for each of four classes for five nights
in a row, keep track of late and missing assignments and absent students, make
copies of worksheets and quizzes for four different classes, and take notes on
presentations. I still have to grade them.
One
of the decisions I made early on was for students to be graded on their contribution
to the project only. I know many students hate group work because of the unequal
distribution of work. I don’t want to penalize students for wanting to do well
and therefore taking all the work upon themselves. I think this was a good
decision, though we’ll see how it works out in the grading.
The
quality of the presentations spanned a wide range. Some students have a knack
for explaining and some for presenting. Some had no clue how to explain
something in front of a class and were unaware of how they presented themselves
and the content. I know that students are not trained in teaching, and I did
not provide them much training on how to present to a class. To make up for the
wide range in quality, I am conducting a day and a half of self-guided review
(see below for review). Hopefully this will make up for any gaps in
understanding.
I
really don’t know what I think of this project. Will I do it again next year? I
wonder what students learned, if anything at all. I wonder if they learned more
about non-math things, like how they work in a group, what their work ethic is,
classroom dynamics, what it’s like to teach in front of their class, their
process of getting work done, and public speaking. It’s hard to put my finger
on, but I feel like they grew somehow during this process. Or we grew together
as a class. Hopefully I will find out more when they fill out a survey about
the project.
Changes
for next year:
- Provide more structure and requirements for the lesson plan, such as questions they will ask during the lesson, a script, options for teaching methods like using whiteboards or a game.
- Create a checklist that they have to present to me at the end of each class period so I am not running around figuring out who is missing what.
- Create common forms for documents like the lesson plan, role division, worksheet, and mini quiz, so it’s easier to grade and keep track of. Possibly color code each class.
- Grade the documents as they come in so no one loses them before the end of the project and I have less work at the end.
- Do a better job explaining the reason for this project. Figure out the reason.
- Be clearer about the types of questions I want students to be able to do at the end of the lesson.
- Combine the hierarchy and Always, Sometimes, Never topics into one.
Standards:
- G.3.1 – Describe, classify, and understand relationships among the quadrilaterals square, rectangle, rhombus, parallelogram, trapezoid, and kite.
- G.3.3 – Find and use measures of sides, perimeters, and areas of quadrilaterals. Relate these measures to each other using formulas.
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