Hello all! Welcome to the round up of the second week of the math blogging initiation. Today I will be featuring 14 posts by math teacher bloggers — out of over 120 that participated this time ’round. Again, zowee!!!

As soon as the other bloggers have finished putting up their posts featuring the participants of the blogger initiation, I will include the links in this post. Apologies for the terse reactions. I am exhausted, and literally fell asleep while trying to read the posts and write my thoughts. Sorry!

Jasmine | Jazmath

Jasmine has a blog named Jazmath. The second post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “First Day” and the author sums it up as follows: “The first days of school are full of excitement and newness. Sometimes we forget about those terrible days when we just don’t want to go to school tomorrow. I am hoping to record what is going well now so that I can draw on that when things are tough later in the year.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “Yesterday was not one of those days where I question my qualifications to teach, but calculus class reminded me of those times. “

My Response: Without going into a disquisition as to why, there is a lot I have in common with the author of this post. Both teach at small independent schools with great faculties, we both teach calculus, and we both have high expectations for our kiddos. 

Evan Weinberg | gealgerobophysiculus

Evan Weinberg @emwdx has a blog named gealgerobophysiculus. The second post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Flipping, Week 1: Stop the Blabbing” and the author sums it up as follows: “In addition to doing standards based grading, I’ve been trying to move all my direct instruction to two minute chunks of video that students watch in class. This is after I saw how effective this was in some courses I took from Udacity (http://www.udacity.com). Students aren’t sitting and listening for long, and I can quickly move to help students that understand the concepts quickly to move on to higher level tasks around the material. Those that need more time can get it, as well as ask questions and get help from me or other students.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “Moving to a more student-centered learning model though has made the students in charge of making sure they understand what they are learning.”

My Response: Regardless of your opinion on the flipped classroom, this is absolutely in my opinion required reading for all math teacher bloggers out there. High praise for a fantastic post. I wanted to underline every other line of it. Probably because the realizations in here are things that I’ve been slowly making in the five years I’ve been teaching… most are there!

Craig Ortner | Mr. Ortner

Craig Ortner cortner has a blog named Mr. Ortner. The second post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “… – the math part was less memorable.” and the author sums it up as follows: “A meta-rumination on one of the prompts.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “… – the math part was less memorable.”

My Response: I would be so happy if my kids remembered any math at their ten year reunion. Anything! 

Sarah Miller | Proof in the City

Sarah Miller has a blog named Proof in the City. The second post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Upcoming Project I am Super Excited About” and the author sums it up as follows: “A brief summary of a project my kids will do soon, where they will perform an experiment to determine if two values have a linear relationship.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “I love that it will (hopefully) clarify and deeply define what “linear” is, in a way other than “it makes a line.””

My Response: Hello math-science collaborations! I love it! It’s so important and I wish we did more of it at my school. As for the question for things that are possibly linear, I seem to remember Kate Nowak had a post where she asked people for help coming up with things that form linear relationships, and got a zillion (or fifty) comments. I’m too exhausted to look it up, but I think with some searching good things will come up!

Mrs Crackers Math | Check Your Work

Mrs Crackers Math has a blog named Check Your Work. The second post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “On posting learning objectives…” and the author sums it up as follows: “In my new district (my first at a public school) my administrators and colleagues are very gung ho about posting learning objectives. I just can’t get excited about it and my blog post explains why.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “…that there objective is just plain icky.”

My Response: Here is an interesting question… is posting daily objectives too restrictive and “give away” the conclusions that the class is suppose to discover together? This is a great question that I’ve never thought of, but yes, maybe posting objectives is kinda icky. I don’t usually post them (I teach in many different rooms), but I always felt guilty. Now I feel like I’ve accidentally made a good decision all along.

Pippi | Pippi’s Adventures in Teaching

Pippi has a blog named Pippi’s Adventures in Teaching. The second post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Learning” and the author sums it up as follows: “I have no illusions that my students need to know the details of physics in their everyday lives. Sure, physics can be applied to sports and driving and cell phones, but they’re right when they say that they can get through life perfectly well without knowing how. But I hope there are skills and, strangely enough, feelings from my class that they carry along with them for a long time.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “I hope she remembers what it feels like to look at a page that looks like gibberish one week, and the feeling of each word and symbol slowly coming into focus and making sense.”

My Response: Here are some nice bigger goals for a physics classroom, instead of content-only goals. 

haversine | Bowditch’s Apprentice

haversine has a blog named Bowditch’s Apprentice. The second post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Playing Games in calculus” and the author sums it up as follows: “I found a paper-based game about identifying the rules needed to take derivatives of various expressions, and turned it into an interactive smartboard game. My students loved it!” A memorable quotation from the post is: “I quickly found that my students loved anything I could turn into a game.”

My Response: I pretty much use all of Maria Andersen’s calculus games. This is one I had somehow missed. But it’s great, for calculus!

Tofer Carlson | teachertofer

Tofer Carlson has a blog named teachertofer. The second post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Hope for My Children*” and the author sums it up as follows: “This post is a response to an xkcd comic about our society’s habit of using one woman to stand in for her gender when completing tasks have been more commonly completed by men in the past.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “When I have children (*sometime in the not-so-near future), I hope identity comes easy, and gender-roles are anything but traditional–little girls catching snakes, before going to tap class and playing ice-hockey; or boys who learn to sew while building lego forts for their pirates to take back from Raggedy Ann.”

My Reaction: Gender and math classes is something I only started thinking about after my first year of teaching. But it was clear to me that, in my school at least, girls were more often playing “learned helplessness” while guys wouldn’t ask for extra help. I think one must be conscious of these things though it can be tough.

Tangent Vector | Tangent Vectors

Tangent Vector @TangentVectors has a blog named Tangent Vectors. The second post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “In 10 years…” and the author sums it up as follows: “In this post I pretend that I’m not egotistical and don’t care whether or not I’m remembered in 10 years. Fine, maybe I do care just a little–but in all honesty, the rational side of me believes every word I wrote.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “Frankly, if in 10 years my former students are well-functioning members of society–good citizens who exercise critical thought and aren’t hoodwinked by the many propaganda machines that seemingly grow in number, ferocity, and audacity each year–that would give me plenty of satisfaction.”

My Reaction: Okra as unpleasant? Come on now!

Kelly Berg | The M Stands for Math

Kelly Berg @kmbergie has a blog named The M Stands for Math. The second post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Pick up the milk carton please” and the author sums it up as follows: “Quit complaining. Just do it.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “Complaining about the issues and doing nothing is like eating slimy okra.”

My Reaction: Kelly is going through a lot of changes right now. But one thing she knows is to not surround herself with negativity.

Ann Gorsuch | angorsuch

Ann Gorsuch @AnnGorsuch has a blog named anngorsuch. The second post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Random Tidbits” and the author sums it up as follows: “Does anyone have recommendations for good blogs, RSS feeds, or websites that I can add to my Zite magazine and google reader? Also, anyone with me on feeling under-prepared to differentiate and accommodate students with special needs? What should I do? Lastly, if you like racing, check out my Triathlon problem that has students solving systems of equations.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “Nothing re-inspires me more than reading a few good articles on my Zite or google reader.”

My Response: I don’t know about this Zite magazine thing (haven’t used it before), but I should definitely check it out someday soon.

loveteachingmaths | love teaching maths

loveteachingmaths has a blog named love teaching maths. The second post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Grade C Card Sort” and the author sums it up as follows: “It is a review of a resource I have used with a borderline C/D class.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “I teach a few GCSE resit groups and I found this resource on the TES website and thought it was fantastic.”

My Response: A simple idea for groupwork. Often times, the simplest ideas are the best ideas.

Nancy | Infinitely many solutions

Nancy has a blog named Infinitely many solutions. The second post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Venn diagrams” and the author sums it up as follows: “This post is about using Venn diagrams to compare and contrast math concepts and procedures.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “So one way I like to help them make connections is to use Venn Diagrams in class to compare concepts or procedures to see what they have in common as well as how they differ.”

My Response: Nancy’s post on Venn Diagrams reminds me of foldables, and how useful they are for cataloguing, but also comparing and constrasting. This idea of using Venn diagrams for organizing information is pretty fantastic. Simple, but as I stated above, simple ideas are often the best ideas.

mathaholic | Confessions of a Mathaholic

mathaholic has a blog named Confessions of a Mathaholic. The second post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “BFT” and the author sums it up as follows: “It’s a chart form of the special trig values, to emphasize patterns and relationships between the columns and rows.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “So all we need are 5 little values to get the entire table.”

My Response: This seems like an interesting idea for how to organize basic trig values/relationships. I especially like that students are on the lookout for observations and patterns when analyzing a table of trig graphs.

Update: Posts featuring all the others bloggers participating in the second week of the Math Blogging Initiation:

Julie, Fawn, Anne, Megan, Bowman, Sam, Lisa, John, Shelli, Tina, Kate, Sue

Hello all! Welcome to the round up of the first week of the math blogging initiation.

It’s rather unbelievable, but we have a little less that 140 of y’all participate in the first week. With the crunch time of school ramping up, I’m beyond impressed. A giant round of applause for all of you.

If you’d like to subscribe to all (or almost all… late submissions are probably not in this list) the new teacher blogs in Google Reader, simply copy and paste this long URL thingamajigger into the box that appears when you click “SUBSCRIBE”:

This bundle was made by John Burk (@occam98) and a thousand thank yous have to go out to him. I can’t imagine how much copying and pasting he had to go through to create this bundle. This giant list of blogs will probably be overwhelming to you, but what’s nice is that you can unsubscribe to individual blogs within this bundle. So pick and choose the ones you like, or do what I am planning on doing, and keep all of them for a while and do a lot of skimming!

As you know, each week of the Math Blogging Initiation, a number of different blogs will feature a select few of our new or revitalized bloggers. (I’ll update this post linking to all the other featuring posts, once they are completed.) This week I have the great pleasure of introducing 14 of your compatriots. Please take some time to read (or skim) through them. It’d be awfully kind if, after you read some of them, you take the time to write a short comment/note/word of encouragement. Even though I always say “write for yourself,” there is a special feeling when you know that someone else has read what you have to say and has taken something away from it. And maybe someone will do the same for you… and a blogger lovefest is born!

Without further ado:

Peg Cagle | Math Education News & Views You Can Use

Peg Cagle @pegcagle has a blog named Math Education News & Views You Can Use. The first post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Curricula-proof teachers vs teacher-proof curricula” and the author sums it up as follows: “I have been thinking about the relative importance of classroom teachers vs. intended curricula. Policymakers are able to mandate curricula, therefore they want to believe that will adequately address current issues with mathematics achievement. If only it were that simple.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “It is at best naïve and at worst delusional to advocate or believe in the existence of such a thing as a “teacher-proof curriculum”; what is needed instead is “curricula-proof teachers”.” 

My personal response: I’ve met Peg. She’s passionate, thoughtful, and one of the most forward-thinking and concrete-and-honest-about-our-profession teachers out there. This short post encapsulates the direction which the arrow of the education-policy-weathervane ought to point. Unfortunately I suspect this simple and common-sense point of view gets drowned out often enough by other clamoring interests.

Jeremy Loukas | Making Math Work

Jeremy Loukas @jloukas has a blog named Making Math Work. The first post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Writing My Own Job description” and the author sums it up as follows: “This year brings new opportunities and challenges. More than ever, I feel that I have the tools I need to succeed, but I also feel more pressure to get my peers involved in online communities.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “I have been given amazing ideas, and while I always give credit, I have never been able to move my peers to joining these amazing online communities.”

My personal response: Jeremy is at a place which feels similar to my own in teaching. He’s taught a total of five years (four consecutive), and I get the feeling he finds himself to be a good teacher trying to break through and become great. He struggles with similar things to me, and he has made them real by articulating them, and coming up with a real plan of action. I have yet to decide what my few big goals are this year (each year I come up with two or three, instead of a million, and try to follow through… I usually accomplish one), and this post is reminding me to get myself back into school-mode and decide on my own goals. It’s tough to transition into school-mode because I have a lot more Friday Night Lights to watch before I finish off the series. True story.

Jillian Paulen | Laplace Transforms for Life

Jillian Paulen @jlpaulen has a blog named Laplace Transforms for Life. The first post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Hi Math Friends!” and the author sums it up as follows: “I wrote about how I decided to start blogging after reading so many awesome posts by other bloggers. I also wrote about the name of my blog, “Laplace Transforms for Life.” It may be corny, but I like it. ” A memorable quotation from the post is: “I have always appreciated ominous looking math problems that, after a long algebraic fight, turn into a nice pretty answer.”

My personal response: I love the blog title. Partly because I have a really funny memory of the particular lecture in college when we first learned about laplace transforms and inverse laplace tranforms — a memory that might not be totally appropriate for sharing here. (An inappropriate math class story! Indeed! Ah, college.) But mainly because the idea of a function which smooths out badness, and which converts something intractable into something tractable. They were really the height of beauty, when I learned about them. Jillian also shares that she wonders if she has anything worth sharing — and I just repeat my refrain… archive your thoughts, questions, lessons, post stuff you’re proud of, things that didn’t work, whatever. You will grow from it, and I promise that it will speak to others. As this first post did for me, reminding me of the beauty of simple higher level mathematics, and that sense of awe.

Mark Davis | Graph Paper Shirt

Mark Davis @graphpapershirt has a blog named Graph Paper Shirt. The first post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Why Graph Paper Shirt?” and the author sums it up as follows: “My post is about why I began blogging and why my site is called Graph Paper Shirt. I have been blogging, very sporadically, for about a year, but I hope this project will kick start a more involved and focused learning process.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “So…here’s to contributing.”

My personal response: I want to see a photograph of this infamous graph paper shirt! I have lots of gingham shirts that I bought this summer, but no graph paper shirts. Now if we could get logarithmic scale graph paper shirts, I’d be in heaven! But back to the post — Mark is taking a leap moving from commenting and twittering to actually wanting to contribute. I remember going through a similar transition (except mathteachertwitter didn’t exist when I started)… where I spent all this time commenting, and then I realized: hey I have something I want to say myself! Not in response to someone else, but my own! So I started blogging. Thanks for wanting to contribute — science teacher, notwithstanding. (JK, I love science teachers!)

Justina Andrews | mathstina

Justina Andrews has a blog named mathstina. The first post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Week 1 of the Blogging Initiative” and the author sums it up as follows: “I literally just started my 5-week teaching practicum three days ago, here are a couple of goals for this prac. Last prac I just tried to survive, this prac I want to excel.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “I felt like kicking myself when I realized how below his standard I had hit.”

My personal response: Justina is going through a teaching practicum. That’s hard stuff, but her goal is to be better than she was in her first practicum. The question is how is this going to happen? And Justina provides some answers — and for me, the most important lies around organization (having things like lesson plans done well in advance). It reminds me of the good advice given by @approx_normal to all her student teachers.

Anna | Borscht With Anna

Anna @Borschtwithanna has a blog named Borscht With Anna. The first post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “First Week Goals” and the author sums it up as follows: “My first week goal is to change my struggling students’ perceptions of math class and create a positive class atmosphere. I want students thinking and working together, but most importantly, feeling hopeful about the year to come.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “Yup, that’s a raccoon group hug.”

My personal response: Anna’s post is essentially about the class culture she wants to create, and she’s right in that the classroom culture gets well-established in the first week or so of classes. And she has a strong sense of what her classroom culture is going to be — though the specifics of how she will achieve this will probably be revealed as the first week of classes unfold. I can’t wait to read all about it. I mean, who doesn’t want a giant huddle of raccoons cuddling in the middle of a classroom?

Damon Hedman | Wild Math

Damon Hedman @wildmath has a blog named Wild Math. The first post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Procrastination” and the author sums it up as follows: “Two things I plan on implementing this year are 3 Act Math and Standards Based Grading. I think the buy in will be easy but the execution will be difficult.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “3 Act Math helps them see that some of the questions they encounter can be answered with mathematical reasoning.”

My personal response: I am ashamed to say that I haven’t tried any of Dan’s 3 Act Maths in my classroom, for no reason other than being overwhelmed with work and scared to change my mode of teaching. Damon is throwing himself in there — doing 3 Act Math and SBG! Wow! Also, here’s a random thought: the procrastination poster is awesome. We all procrastinate. I wonder if, a week or two into SBG, we have an assignment where we show the poster to our kids and say “respond, now that you’ve been introduced to SBG.” I think a really good discussion could come from that, as procrastination (and how that ties into personal responsibility) is one of the things students initially struggle with when it comes to SBG. 

Jocelyn | Making Science

Jocelyn @enigmaniac has a blog named Making Science. The first post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Starting Teaching” and the author sums it up as follows: “This semester I’ll be a new teacher of a well-developed intro course in the Physics department.. I want to build on the existing use of educational research-based methods and make them my own.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “I want to actually walk the walk about learning goals that are required by the university policies.”

My personal response: Jocelyn says something that I decided I would do two years ago, but have had trouble being consistent with: explain to students why you are asking them to do something, in the way that you are asking them to do it. If kids know that you put thought into each part of the lesson, if you have a reason for asking for individual work vs. partner work vs. group work or for giving pop quizzes or for assigning a project, they will at least understand that you aren’t doing it only to torture them (but that’s a bonus, right? psyche!). More implicitly, it is showing them that you care about their learning because you’re thinking about these things, and your ultimate goal is to make sure they undergo some deep learning. Whether they enjoy it or not, at least they know you are doing things in a particular way because you care. (Of course, you don’t want to be all edu-jargony — blech — but just normal when explaining your choices… I would also probably have to be sure I don’t sound defensive…)

John McGowan | Math Tech Tips

John McGowan @jmacattak has a blog named Math Tech Tips. The first post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Return to blogging” and the author sums it up as follows: “I blogged about returning to blogging and why I am excited to change schools and classes I teach. I am blogging to stay more organized for myself and future years!” A memorable quotation from the post is: “I just did my first day activities based on some great ideas I stole from a bunch of great teachers, I will blog about it soon, so tune in to see if you were stolen from (I will give credit and links ;)!!”

My personal response: What a transition — to middle school students! John, you are forgiven for posting late. There is infinite absolution in our community. 

Tangent Vector | Tangent Vectors

Tangent Vector @TangentVectors has a blog named Tangent Vectors. The first post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Commence Blogification” and the author sums it up as follows: “This is a very short introductory post describing how I plan to set the tone for a year of group-centric learning to fall in line with the new Common Core standards. I briefly discuss the plans I’ve pilfered from Fnoschese to start things off on what I hope to be the right foot.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “To prepare for the first day of what will be a Commmon Core-centric, deep-thinking, no-longer-yesterday’s style set of math classes, I’ve lifted a few plans from Fnoschese–the subversive lab grouping and the marshmallow tower.”

My personal response: Yay! A first year teacher, who is already using Noschese-esque stuff! Already this new teacher is eons beyond where I was when starting (ummm… so… let’s look at the book and make a lesson plan mimicking the presentation in the book…). This teacher’s goal to create a sense of camaraderie in the first week (what a tough word to spell) is awesome, and I can’t wait to read specifics on how that goal is going to be achieved. 

Tyler Borek | RealProblems

Tyler Borek @tyler_borek has a blog named RealProblems. The first post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Real Problems, Real Time” and the author sums it up as follows: “This post is about an idea for a free math problem bank, created and curated by K-12 teachers. It’s about the power of a great problem to evoke great work, and to communicate the relevance and power of mathematics. Finally, it’s about the ability of a community to create a resource that no individual could create alone.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “When we give a student a cookie-cutter problem, we are asking her for “work.” When we give a student a great problem, we are providing her with an opportunity to create an “opus.””

My personal response: This is a beautifully written post about a hard part of teaching: coming up with great problems. Not good problems, but great problems. I feel this is something I struggle with in my own teaching. I love the idea of a good math problem bank, cultivated by motivated teachers, for motivated teachers. I don’t know if and how it will succeed, but I’m rooting for it. Because it is precisely what we as teachers are trying to do: go beyond the textbook and the standard problems to teach deep concepts and deep thinking. I personally often fail at this… I fail more often than I succeed… but I’m okay with that, because there is no magic bullet for success. 

Jenny Kinter | kintermath

Jenny Kinter @jennykinter has a blog named kintermath. The first post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Week 1 Blogger Initiation” and the author sums it up as follows: “It is responding to the suggestions. Mostly about my pre-algebra class which is bigger than any class I have ever taught as well as the youngest. I am feeling most challenged there.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “My favorite topic to teach is…how can I pick…my favorite topic is the one where I see the lightbulb turn on in a students mind, especially a struggling student.”

My personal response: Jenny has a number of really specific things she wrote about. My favorite is a large geometric prism hanging in her classroom with the simple question on it: “What is my volume?” I’m teaching in three or four different classrooms. I wonder if I had little solvable but curiosity-inducing puzzles hanging up and changing in my classrooms at random times, if that might be something my kids would be into. I think it would speak to a certain population of kids — and not necessarily those at the “top.” 

Roy Dallmann | Dallmann’s Deliberations

Roy Dallmann @RoyDallmann has a blog named Dallmann’s Deliberations. The first post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Returning to Form” and the author sums it up as follows: “The hiring process happens quickly and takes us in directions that we don’t always expect. Within a month, I changed from slightly discouraged graduate teacher job hunter to Canadian expat preparing to teach within 17km of the great pyramids.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “Given that I tend to be on the slightly analytical side of the personality spectrum (if you define slightly as frequently paralyzing due to the time required to consider all angles), deliberations made the most sense.”

My personal response: A first year teacher! Teaching near the pyramids in Cairo, Egypt! We might have another http://bowmandickson.com/ on our hands… 

Steve Grossberg | It’s all math

Steve Grossberg @5teve6rossberg has a blog named It’s all math. The first post for the Blogging Initiation is titled “Why it’s all math.” and the author sums it up as follows: “Every math teacher has had a student ask them at one time or another why they have to learn whatever it is you’re trying to teach. Here’s how I answer this question.” A memorable quotation from the post is: “When you are learning how to [do] Algebra you are also learning tools for how to make better decisions in your own life.”

My personal response: I think how one responds to “The Question” is great. I hope I remember to put it as an option on one of the future week’s list of prompts. Because we are all faced with the “Why do we have to learn this?” question (where this is any math topic, or even math itself) … and I’m terrible at responding to it. I know, I know, everyone says being asked that question means you’re doing something wrong in the way that you’re teaching… so I know I’m doing stuff wrong… but that doesn’t quite help me respond to that question. So I am excited to crowdsource responses!

Update: Posts featuring all the others bloggers participating in the first week of the Math Blogging Initiation:

Julie, Fawn, Anne, Megan, Bowman, Sam, Lisa, John, Shelli, Tina, Kate, Sue

An Idea!

For a few weeks now, I have had this idea bouncing around in my head. A new blogger initiation! All it involves is writing four blogposts. There will be no hazing of any kind, except for the kind where we all say how much we think you’re awesome. That’s a form of hazing, right? Like happy hazing?

It has recently come to my attention that there are about a zillion new math teacher blogs that I don’t know about. They are new and probably awesome and exciting and fresh. I also have come to find out that there are a bunch of lurkers who are reading and absorbing and loving the math teacher blogs out there, but are on the fence about blogging themselves.

For those who have taken the leap and started blogging recently: awesome!!! Welcome! Define recently however you want… 3 months, a week, half a year, whatever… if you feel like you’re a new blogger, you should read on! This is for you!!!

If you’re a lurker but don’t yet feel like you want to blog, maybe you just need a little encouragement and motivation to get you to start. There’s a site with an awkwardly long url that a bunch of people created with the sole purpose of convincing you how awesome it is. If you’re nervous about writing, read this footnote [0].

Take the plunge!

What The New Blogger Initiation Is:

New and new-ish bloggers pledge to participate. This is to help kickstart you into actually doing it. You sign up. There isn’t any time limit on what constitutes a new blogger. If you’ve never blogged before, you’re definitely good to go. If you feel new, or just want to participate because you’ve been lagging in your blogging and you need to rejuvinate yourself, sign up!

Each week for a month you will be emailed a mystery prompt (but it will be rich and evocative and you’ll want to write about it) — and given a week to write a blogpost on that prompt [1]. Short, long, picture-based, whatever. No pressure. Just get something down! This will happen just four times… In your email, you’ll also get instructions on how to submit your blogpost once it is written and published on your blog.

Each week, I (or hopefully me and a few other bloggers) will compile your posts and share them with the rest of the blogosphere by linking to them from our pages. This way we’ll get to say hi and get to know y’all, and you’ll get to say hi to each other, and everyone will be happy.

Of course you can write as many other posts as you want. This is just hopefully a way to kickstart you into starting or keep you with us if you’ve just started!

And remember, if you need help starting a blog, we have a site to help you!

All You Need To Do:

All you need to do if you’re a new-ish blogger and want to pledge to participate is to sign up below by Tuesday, August 14th. You’ll get your first mystery but awesome prompt via email soon thereafter!

UPDATE: SIGN UP IS OVER! FORM TO SIGN UP HAS BEEN REMOVED.

[0] Do you think you’re bad at writing, so you don’t want to blog? HELLO HOLA we’re math teachers so we don’t care. We don’t snicker when someone writes there instead of their, or misuses a word.  Do you not have time to do it? Just try it out for a month and see if it really takes more time that you have! Do you think you aren’t creative or interesting enough or have anything to say that would interest anyone. SHUT THE FRONT DOOR. Seriously, we all feel this way. We just put it out there. And writing even about the smallest things like a bell-ringer/do now that you like, or musing on an article about education that you found interesting or disheartening, or a single math problem you found interesting, or recollections of one of your favorite math teachers, or whatever. Heck, I just learned the most amazing trick about how to teach matrix multiplication from a teacher who thought that everyone taught it that way. I love the little things.

[1] It’s a secret what these are.

So I’m a little terrified because I never give talks. Some people have thought it weird when I say I hate public speaking, but there are so many teachers I know that feel similarly. And it’s scarier to think that I will be talking to teachers-to-be! Anyway, @PiSpeak (CLopen Mathdebater, mwahahaha) is running a two day session for new math teachers. They are about to have their first year in their classroom. And he wanted them to know that there are communities of teachers outside of their schools that can be a great source of inspiration.

Enter me.

I agreed to a 30/45 minute session with them. My goal is to convince them that reading blogs can be useful. That’s it. I will talk a bit about twitter. And I will probably make a plug for blogging themselves.[1] But that’s it. Showing what’s out there and how it can be useful. The way I hope to do convince them: have them play around online a bunch. See the good stuff out there, and see if they think it can help them.

Here’s what I’ve come up with. Most of the images and links are clickable from the presentation, so go ahead.

[my entrance/exit slip: .docx]

(Here’s an old 7 minute talk on this online community.)

I’m anxious about this, so hopefully it won’t suck. If it does, well, I’ll be glad I did it because I’m putting myself out there. But I will be sad that I took away half an episode of Buffy or 20 pages of 50 Shades of Grey from each person whose time I wasted. I hate having my time wasted, which is why I stress.

[1] I know it isn’t something that everyone recommends for a new teacher… heck, there is enough on their plates… but I blogged from the beginning of my teaching to the present and I can’t tell you how nice it is to be able to be able to go back and see how I’ve evolved from that first year.

UPDATE: The results of the Entrance/Exit Slips.

As you saw, I used an entrance/exit slip asking people to say their interest in reading math teacher blogs before the presentation, and afterwards. (Similarly, for using twitter.) Even though not given numerically, I numericized the responses (1=no interest to 4=a lot of interest).

I plotted the before versus after for both reading blogs and twittering, and the line . Anything on the line means I did no harm. Anything above the line means some sort of success (and the further away from the line the better!). Anything below the line means I did some harm.

 

My session at the Twitter Math Camp conference was on designing a website for newbies who may have heard about the use of twitter and blogs for math teachers, and are intrigued enough to find out more. The website was supposed to have twin purposes:

1. To convince those who are on the fence to try out twittering, reading blogs, or writing blogs.
2. To make the entrance to our online community easier, with instructions and advice.

Lots and lots and lots of great ideas came up at the session… and then when I got home, I spent a day and a half creating a simple website, with the help of a lot of people, including @jacehan and @JamiDanielle, who worked on one of the most important pages of the site. Props to them!

Personally, I can see this site being used in a couple of different ways. If there’s a newbie who is interested, we can give ’em the site to help them get started. But also, if you are ever asked to give a talk about the math twitter blogosphere or how this community can be useful, this could be one of the resources for your talk!

Before you go off running to the site, I have one last important thing to say. There is a list of blogs and twitterers on the site, divided up by various categories. These are not comprehensive, nor were they meant to be! The point of the site is to make joining up easier, and providing lists of 30 blogs that deal with Algebra I or 45 twitterers who teach middle school math is totally overwhelming. So if you’re on the lists and wrongly categorized, just let me know in the comments to this post! And if you’re not on the lists and want to me, throw your info in the comments below (including what lists you think you belong in) and I’ll see about adding you. (But no promises.)

With that said, without further ado:

(drumroll please)

PS. I’m not looking for advice on how to expand the site, or ideas for changes to the site, right now. I’m feeling a little burnt out. So if there are broken links or misspellings or something that is totally unclear, throw those in the comments most definitely! But otherwise, I’m going to wait a while before changing things…

I just got back from Twitter Math Camp (TMC), after an uneventful flight home, after a super eventful time in St. Louis.

I have a lot to say about the content of the conference itself (program of the sessions offered here), but I wanted to take some time to pound out my initial reflections about what I just experienced… which is something that transcended the content I was picking up. To begin, here’s a tweet from today, after we all said our final goodbyes and scattered to various modes of transportation.

Now to backtrack. The fuse of this conference was lit three years ago when the twitter world started exploding with math teachers from all over, who couldn’t not think about math instruction at all times of the day (and night). Okay, maybe not exploding, but there were a ton of blogging math teachers who decided to start communicating in a more real-time way, and three years ago I started seeing twitter become saturated in a way that cool things were resulting organically. A sustainable, supportive community was forming (complete with inside jokes). One ongoing joke was about us hosting a “conference” on a cruise ship… so we could have a vacation and have it paid for by our schools as professional development.

samjshah thinking about it. the only math tweeps i’ve met in person: @jimwysocki@k8nowak @sarcasymptote @j_lanier @CmonMattTHINK

CardsChic @samjshah You’re ahead of me! Math tweeps met in person: 0.

jreulbach @samjshah wow! How cool! I can’t wait to go to math conferences and meet you all!

samjshah @CmonMattTHINK we should plan to meet up at a conference this year.

JackieB @samjshah @CmonMattTHINK I vote for NCTM in Indy. Or the tent-conference thingy in @dcox21‘s backyard. Or both.

CmonMattTHINK @JackieB @samjshah It’d have to be somewhat north-easternly for me. Like the Brooklyn Sour Beer Conference or something. :-)

samjshah baltimore NCTM guys. BALTIMORE!

jreulbach @samjshah I’m going to Baltimore. Already have approval from my admin. PARTY. ; )

nyates314 Agree! RT @samjshah: baltimore NCTM guys. BALTIMORE!

approx_normal @samjshah We gotta change that!! Tweeps Cruise!!! (Unless there’s someone who doesn’t wanna be “On A Boat”)

Fouss @approx_normal Oooh.. a cruise. I’m down with that.

nyates314 @approx_normal You can’t not be on a boat.

approx_normal @CmonMattTHINK @samjshah they’ve got beer ON THE BOAT…. C’mon – @fouss and @druinok are already on board. If Brett performs, @Mseiler‘s in

Sarah_IC @druinok Twitter cruise would be fabulous. I’ve learned so much from all of you!

jreulbach @druinok Why isn’t NCTM doing THAT? conference on a cruise. I am so in! [0]

And then this joke became a reality of sorts [1]. And a few months ago, some of us decided to actually do it — have an official meet up, instead of the informal meetups that were happening when one or another of us was visiting friends in San Francisco, or driving through New York, and getting coffee with each other (and hoping that the person we were meeting wasn’t a krazypsychokiller).

So, through the hard work of a lot of people, and the spearheading of two lead organizers, an actual conference came together. It started out, at least in my mind, with the idea that we might be able to get a dozen people together for some fun and informal teacher talk. And initially, that’s what happened. A few hardcore people signed up. And then more. And then more. I remember checking the registration list and being surprised when we hit 20. And, to cut a long story short, when registration closed, we had 40 people from the US and Canada all flying and driving to St. Louis for our first Twitter Math Camp conference.

How did this happen?, I wondered. I mean, most of the participants were coming from public schools and many weren’t getting a lot (or any) funding. So, even with sharing a hotel room and assuming basic transportation costs, it was going to run more than $500. It was in the middle of the summer, which meant that a lot of people had to leave their families (some leaving their kids for more time than they ever have before! 5 days!). And most participants had never met each other in real life.

But the fact that so many people decided to come (and others were insanely jealous because they couldn’t come) is a testament to what we have done in the past couple years. We’ve formed a group that has become more than a professional development tool, more than just a way to get this or that resource or steal this or that idea. It’s a close-knit community of people who care about each other. @sophgermain said it well:

I did write a crappy little blog.  Then Dan read it, then Dan posted about it.  Then I started twitter stalking all of you. I said a couple things and feigned shyness for about a week.  (It does not come naturally to me, i.e. I am inclined towards being obnoxious.)  Then I just started talking and you talked back.  And I was part of something.  I was part of a community. […]

So I just wanted to take a moment and say even though I wasn’t there [at TMC];  you are the best.  This community of people has made me a better teacher but more than that a better person.  You have all helped formed my opinions on education and taught me how to be a teacher. You have reaffirmed my belief time and time again that there is no shortage in the world of hard working dedicated teachers.

Thank you for making me laugh, thank you for helping me find a job, thank you for reading my cover letters, lessons plans, resumes, and this crappy little blog. Thank you for helping me love my job. Thank you for being my real life friends. [ed note: underlining mine]

(For some of my previous thoughts on this, see Why Twitter?, How BlogBuddies Became Friends, and Blogotwitterversesphere.)

It is so clear to me that we have become this wide group of friends who have our real lives and virtual lives totally intertwined — where we have emotional (and not just professional) attachments with each other. You see, the core commonality among all of us is a passion for sucking a little bit less as teachers each year. And for those of us who have this passion, our lives are truly centered around our jobs. In other words, you can’t really know me without referencing me as a teacher. It gets to the core of who I am. So it’s no wonder that we all get each other.

So when Education Week said that The Math Blogotwittersphere is the Best Blogotwittersphere, I didn’t throw my hands up and exclaim “HELL YEAH!” I was like… um, duh?

Without a doubt, the conference was for and about becoming less sucky teachers. But as a virtual community, it was also a chance to change how we talk about each other.

Sample interaction before TMC12 (BTMC):

[Me laughing, while looking at my phone…]
NYC Friend: What’s so funny?
Me: Just something my friend said.
NYC Friend: Which friend?
Me: Um… you wouldn’t know them.
NYC Friend: Is this one of your stupid twitter friends?

Sample interaction after TMC12 (ATMC):

[Me laughing, while looking at my phone…]
NYC Friend: What’s so funny?
Me: Just something my friend said.
NYC Friend: Which friend?
Me: You wouldn’t know them.
NYC Friend: Is this another one of your stupid twitter friends?
Me: YES BUT I HAVE MET THEM IN REAL LIFE SO THEY ARE FRIENDS EVEN BY YOUR STUPID TWENTIETH CENTURY STANDARDS.

At the conference, we were connecting in ways we couldn’t connect online. For example, there’s this glorious picture of someone connecting with me:

(Just to be clear, this picture is not what it looks like. I can’t have my reputation sullied through a misreading of this picture. THIS WAS A JOKE. GEEZ. GET OVER IT.)

It was like we were on first dates, which felt our fiftieth-gazillion dates. Because we all KNEW each other. We knew about each others’s schools, kids, husbands/wives/bfs/gfs, movie and music preferences, deepest fears (SPIDERS!!!)… and still wanted to meet. I think the highest praise I can give is that the overwhelming feeling of nostalgia I had after leaving from this four day conference was greater than the nostalgia I had after leaving the amazing three-week PCMI conference.

Every session that I attended was great. (But of course the best session was the one I led!) I learned about interactive notebooks and foldables, about the concept of “flow” in the classroom and how to disrupt the hidden pedagogical contract that schools have with kids, and about teasing kids with motivating questions and problems. I was re-inspired to use geogebra in the classroom, and reconsidering the notion of what a flipped classroom might look light. And we had a lot of time to formally and informally share tricks of the trade. Whether it be how to get cheap giant whiteboards and use them effectively in the classroom, to saying “What questions do you have?” instead of “Any questions?”, to being consistent in asking a kid who says something disparaging to someone else say “two nice things about them… go!”  and in asking a kid who says something disparaging about themselves to say “two nice things about yourself.”

This, in itself, is powerful. There were concrete and useful takeaways for my classroom practice. But what made it all the more powerful for me is that I was getting these ideas from teachers I knew personally and trusted. Everything was vetted. And anytime I need more information, or resources, or have questions, I can just send an email, tweet, or comment on a blog. And I can give back by sharing my experience with the things I take from others. Our community is dynamic and responsive and open to ideas and change, and we’re all on equal footing. And that only comes from us being friends. (And the fact of the matter is collaborating with friends is waaaay more fun than with colleagues-who-aren’t-friends… and who doesn’t need a lot of fun and smiles in their lives?)

But the sessions were only part of it, and I would argue, the less important part. We broke bread together while rehashing old memories together, as old friends do. If anyone felt that what we had wasn’t real, watching me give @approx_normal a piggyback ride at the Budweiser Brewery Tour, seeing @jreulbach excitedly show us and an entire movie theater how to cheerlead-dance before a showing of Magic Mike, seeing the almost English-teacher-level of hugging that was happening in the last few days [2], would change anyone’s mind.

My favorite thing at the conference was the laughter. It didn’t matter if you were going to a session, if you were in a group hanging out in a hotel room, if you were out for dinner, or if you were in the restroom alone — you were always surrounded by laughter. (Okay, maybe not the last one… creepy!) It was the nervous laughter of meeting for the first time, the giddy laughter of realizing the person you were anxious and intimidated about meeting was awesome, the snort-worthy laughter accompanying stories about teaching that only those in the trenches could get, the uncontrollable laughter when we all finally let our hair down and let our true personalities fly…

I’ll end with the collective work of some tweeps:

I sat alone in my class,
Hoping my students would pass,
Prepping was kicking my ass
But help was on the way

I started searching the net,
To find a way to connect
Found teachers I’d never met
and I was on my way

Dan’s blog was poppin’,
G-Reader, feed not stoppin’
Each day, I would drop-in
Guess it’s time for hop in!

Hey, I just found you,
And this is crazy,
But here’s my ID,
So tweet me, maybe?
It’s hard to reach out,
Please don’t flame me,
But here’s my ID,
So tweet me, maybe? x2

Oh holy crap can it be,
Nowak responded to me,
Blogging math celebrity,
She’s twitter royalty

I beg, and borrow and steal
No reinventing the wheel,
What are these urges I feel?
Nerdy math sex appeal

Hal-lo-ween was awesome
Dull worksheets,
I could toss ‘em
My i-deas could blossom
Now it’s time for Math Camp, baby!

Hey, I just met you, all in person.
Twitter Math Camp,
this was the first one
It’s hard to teach right,
in i-so-laaaaaation,
So here’s some PD,
just like va-ca-tion x2

Before I came onto your sites,
I must’ve taught so bad,
I must’ve taught so bad,
I must’ve taught so so bad

Before we came onto your sites
we must’ve taught so bad
and you should know that
It was so, so sad

I loved free pizza, and the brew-ry.
You know my ID,
So tweet me, maybe?
Ci-ty Muse-um, or the Card’s game,
So tweet me sometime,
I won’t be too lame

So, thank you Shelli,
thank you Li-sa.
Don’t want to go home – so glad to meet ya

Now that it’s coming to an end
we’ll miss you so bad
we’ll miss you so bad
I’ll miss you so, so bad

Before you came into our lives
I must’ve taught so bad
And you should know that.
So tweet us, maybe?

[0] Another, prior, conversation.

samjshah i’m jealous, all. can we plan to go to a conference together next yr? maybe we should just plan our OWN small conference abt blogging?

samjshah that last tweet was for everyone at NCTM and everyone else who is JEALOUS of them. im kinda serious about hosting a conference. NYC?

k8nowak @samjshah How about next Wednesday?! j/k. I think some prior coordination to invade a conference would be nice.

SweenWSweens @samjshah I’m in, got such an idea in October, but was waiting for more street cred to suggest it.

SweenWSweens @samjshah @k8nowak I see Kate’s idea and raise October Baltimore NCTM. Also, NYC is prolly too far north for them VA and NC peeps.

CmonMattTHINK @samjshah @k8nowak @SweenWSweens I can just see submitting the PD $ proposal… “Location: various bars in NYC…”

dcox21 @samjshah Thinking the same thing. Think I’d get more from talking to people I already know I respect than from rolling dice on conference.

mctownsley @dcox21 @samjshah what’s the name of this math/blogging/twitter/teaching crew? seems like a good start for a mini-conference

samjshah @dcox21 @CmonMattTHINK @k8nowak @SweenWSweens i know the good ones, just so you know. the right mix of dive and quality craft beers.

SweenWSweens @samjshah @dcox21 @CmonMattThink @k8nowak There’s gotta be bars in NYC that sound like they could be conference venues.

samjshah 1. go to NCTM conference, 2. meetup at nyc bars, 3. hold our own miniconference (designed to be useful), 4. do nothing and let the idea die

cannonsr @SweenWSweens Like the bars called “The library” near university campuses. Totally

jreulbach @samjshah YOu had me at NYC bars…

k8nowak @samjshah et. al. An unconference. Like BarCamp.

jreulbach @k8nowak Bar camp?

samjshah @k8nowak et al. yes. our own format. about interactivity, convos, playing with the web. less about leaders and more about those coming.

k8nowak @jreulbach http://lmgtfy.com/?q=barcamp

samjshah @k8nowak wow, i’ve seen that *in theory* before (see this cool site), but never used in practice. OH SNAP!!! @jreulbach got served!

SweenWSweens @samjshah Sounds like those venues are the start of a sweet summer 2010 “conference” where we could brainstorm about any future ones.

k8nowak @samjshah @jreulbach I feel kind of bad for picking on the noob. Sorry. I’ve been waiting for an excuse to use lmgtfy.

k8nowak @SweenWSweens @samjshah Yes. This calls for a preconference planning conference.

jreulbach I am in for summer. No kiddo or new job conflicts…

jreulbach @samjshah Can’t believe you said OH SNAP!! LMAO.

SweenWSweens @samjshah @k8nowak Any1 else close ? The Internet is so weird, everyone is so spread out. How do the tubes bring things so from so far away?

k8nowak @SweenWSweens Well, see, it’s a SERIES of tubes.

k8nowak @SweenWSweens @samjshah I don’t know who else is near-ish, but we could announce on blogs and see who bites.

CmonMattTHINK @SweenWSweens @samjshah @k8nowak Yeah how does there not exist a Google Map or something with all of our locations on it?

samjshah @k8nowak @CmonMattTHINK here’s our map! enter your info! (unless you tweeted about a map when i was making one) http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?hq=http:%2F%2Fmaps.google.com%2Fhelp%2Fmaps%2Fdirections%2Fbiking%2Fmapplet.kml&ie=UTF8&lci=bike&dirflg=b&hl=en&msa=0&msid=102961433061679876855.000484f12a77524f148fe&ll=40.670125,-73.955283&spn=0.00721,0.01929&z=16

SweenWSweens @samjshah Ugh haytchu, I was literally typing the one I had just made in. You win this round! But watch your back!

samjshah @SweenWSweens *pffffft*

cannonsr @samjshah Loving how this map has 63 views within 10 minutes.

SweenWSweens @samjshah @k8nowak I’m not sure posting on my blog will help, as seen in figure 1-a http://mobile.tweetphoto.com/19648985

dcox21@sweenwsweens @k8nowak @samjshah If you look reeeeeal close… #photocapshttp://twitpic.com/1hwwir

[1] We dropped the cruise part, for some reason (sigh). But we did have a wiki created for our twitter math cruise… I’m being FOR SERIOUS!

[2] Math teachers don’t hug.

Dear you,

Yeah you, my super awesome teacher friend!

I am about to start composing a letter of recommendation for @cheesemonkey [blog, twitter], and I wanted your help. For me, her constant upbeat spirit and cheerleading of every one of us  in everything we do has been glorious. Heck, in my opinion, she’s a lynchpin to our online math math community. Full stop. The activities that she posts about are constantly on my list of things to steal. And just as importantly, the thoughtfulness that she writes about in all her interactions with students — whether it be in her zillion recommendation letters to her conscientious work to build up each student’s math confidence — is an inspiration.

I want to write a collective recommendation, one where the reader can see that @cheesemonkey has a broad impact on the math teaching world.

So let’s do a solid for @cheesemonkey. If she’s done something large or small, inspired you, helped you, given you something to use in her classes, keeps you engaged in teaching, pay back the favor. Throw your mini-recommendation in the submission box below (it will be emailed to me) and show her how much you care! A few sentences to a few paragraphs, just share. We’re a community that helps each other out all the time, and I need your help!

It is a bit time sensitive, so if you could do it soon (translation: in the next day or two), I would be ever grateful.

Thank you, all!

Always,
Sam