Group micro-teaching lesson plan

Teachers: Jessica, Mandeep, Simran

Topic	Intro to Percentages
Grade level	8
PLO	A3 demonstrate an understanding of percents greater than or equal to 0%
Objective	Students will be able to use the given percentage to find the required information. Students will be able to find percentage of two given whole numbers. Students will have the understanding of the percentage sign.
Materials	White board and marker. Lifespan cards.
Prior Knowledge	Students know division and multiplication.
Intro/Hook	4 mins	Percentage sign %, no calculations here. Discuss how many pennies make up a dollar. (nickels, dimes, quarters). Each group still represents one dollar. On the board, draw out a circle representing a dollar and then fill in 25% to represent 1 quarter.
Development	4 mins	Finding a percent of any number with respect to another number (comparative number) Here percent represent the fraction with denominator 100,While the number represent the amount. Example1 -  if i have 40  halloween  candies ,i gave  10 % of candies to my son ,then what is the number of  candies i gave to my son? Solution- Here, 40 is comparative number    10% of 40 candies = 10/100* 40 =  4 candies to my son Example 2-   If i have 40 halloween candies ,i gave 10 to my daughter,then what is the percentage of the candies i gave to my daughter? Solution-       10/40*100 =25 % of  the total number of candies to my daughter
Activity	3 mins	-Give each student a “Lifespan” card - Ask them to fill out the blanks on the card, their age etc - Explain the question on the card and tell them to do their calculations on the back of the card - let the students work in pairs of two for 2 minutes - go around and make sure everyone's clear on the activity
Closure	1 min	go over the idea of percentage and how it can be used in daily life. For ex: at the shopping mall, calculating the time you have left before you have to get ready for school or dividing your food into portions and eat a certain percentage at a time. It becomes very easy to picture what's gone and what's left if you convert things into percentage.

2-column solution to "Thinking Mathematically" puzzle

Exit slip: video of Dave Hewitt's math classes

Watching the videos of two of Dave Hewitt's classroom caused me to think about my own style of teaching, what my goals of each math lesson should focus on, and students' response to a lesson. I like how Mr. Hewitt utilized the entire perimeter of the classroom; the shift in orientation with regards to each student benefits student attention. Also, I was impressed at how extensively repetitions were used to emphasize the main points. Another area of interest was the choral response from the students since most of the time, I imagine a math classroom to be mostly quiet with either the teacher or one student speaking. I think the choral response is generally a good approach but I would like to check the answers at some point. A student may have said a different answer than his peers but maintain that his was correct. The second lesson in which Mr. Hewitt introduced the idea of variables and different operations was quite interesting as well. I think how he subtly wrote down "x" while saying "I'm thinking of a number" was a great way to express these equivalent relations to students.

Response - Dave Hewitt: Arbitrary and Necessary

Arbitrary is something that cannot be worked out. It is in the realm of memory where students must be informed of this information. A square can just as well be named a "syervel" or any other name. There does not seem to be a definite reason why it is named a "square". Such knowledge is arbitrary.

Necessary is something that can be worked out. Students can use their awareness or prior understanding to figure out a mathematical fact. For example, they can determine the position of a quarter-turn and a half-turn in reference to some point of origin.

For a math lesson, the larger part of the time allotment should focus on working out the necessary mathematics. Less time should be spent on practicing the arbitrary. This influences my lesson plans in that the teacher should have a shorter amount of time talking about what is arbitrary: the names, symbols, notations, and conventions, and the students would have the guidance to work out what is necessary: the properties and relationships in mathematics.

Exit Slip: Math Fair at the Museum of Anthropology

For this afternoon's class, we participated in the math fair presented by grade 6 students from West Point Grey Academy. A few weeks ago, the students were given math problems to work on in pairs. After they have figured out the solution, they visited the Museum of Anthropology and modified their problems to incorporate an artifact of interest to them. Then, they prepared the presentation for the day of the math fair, making display boards with a description of the problem, hints, and solutions along with an interesting back story and manipulatives.

During the math fair, we were encouraged to go around in groups of two or three to visit each project. In a group with two others, I was particularly impressed by three presentations. For the first one, the group made two sets of the game board with numbered sea shells for two people to use as aids to solve their problem. In addition, they provided an extra white board for the third person in our group to write on. I think it was quite thoughtful of them to be so prepared and they also gave us each a little present after we successfully solved their math problem. The second group’s model of their problem was not entirely workable so they directed us to pointing our fingers on a drawing on their display. What they lacked in physical manipulatives they made up in their oral presentation. One of the little girls explained the conditions of the problem and guided us through solving it with a high level of clarity and confidence. They had figured out that we were training to be math teachers because we were over-thinking the problem! As we exited, I spied another project that caught my attention so I went back by myself to talk to this group. It was a problem on inverting a triangle made out of multiple blocks. The girl led me to solve several similar problems using less number of blocks before tackling their challenge problem. I think that scaffolding really helped to build my confidence as the number of blocks increased. Then without me mentioning (for a previous group, we asked the presenters, “What will happen if you started with a larger number?”), the girl told us that we can use the same method to obtain a solution for a triangle with n blocks. She also pointed out how the problem is related to the Fibonacci sequence which I had not thought of either.

Overall, I saw that many of the parents came to support their children’s work. I am also encouraged by the level of effort and professionalism displayed during this math fair.

Math Fairs

I have volunteered for several math fairs that took place on campus with the UBC Math Department and PIMS. However, I did not fully understand the rationale behind these math fairs. After reading through the introduction in this booklet, of which I have seen many times at these events, I feel that this type of problem-based fair provides one of the most beneficial approaches to mathematics for people of all ages. The participants ranged from elementary children to mathematical education professionals. Everyone was actively involved and shared the joy in solving mathematical problems, sometimes not even conscious that they were using mathematics. Hence, I would love to run a math fair at my practicum high school if possible. I would first ask the students if they have any problems of interest in mind before giving them one. For the math fair problems, I would allow some class time over two weeks for groups/pairs to work together both on solving and preparing the presentations.