The Magic Behind Flipping Numbers When Dividing Fractions

While many of you may know how to divide a fraction, how many of you understand why you use the steps that you do?  At the Adult Numeracy Institute they gave me an excellent explanation, so I turned that into a video that you can watch below.

Turn Fractions Into Visuals

Growing up I was taught math in the traditional way.  The teacher gave me some symbolic notation such as 1/2 * 1/4 and then gave me a step-by-step process to follow to the solve the problem, and then we moved on to the next thing with more notation and procedure.  At ANI they present how that should be just one of three approaches.  We need to add in visual models and real world situations and experiment with starting in one of those modes instead.

Attached is a worksheet "Operations with Fractions" that asks the student to make pictures out of fraction problems.  Take a look, give it a try and reflect on how it goes.

Get Inspired at Math = Love

Not having enough materials/resources is a common complaint among teachers.  I love following how a young teacher in rural Oklahoma, Sarah Hagan, is finding a way to thrive without using textbooks. Back in March NPR did a feature story about Sarah titled " The Teacher Who Believes Math = Love."

Since hearing that story, I have been a regular follower of her blog Math = Love.  If you ever need tips on how to make the classroom interactive or how to help students create their own textbooks, then look no further.  She updates her blog almost daily (where she finds the time, I have no idea) and she is truly passionate about her students and how she can help them learn.

HSE Success Story - Holly Hunter

By Cheryl Reidenouer, Career Navigator

Holly Hunter was one of the student speakers at the HSE May 2015 Graduation Ceremony.   Holly told her fellow graduates that “we got here . . . finally”.  She said her fear of succeeding, fear of failing, fear of what if I can’t do this and fear of what if it never goes anywhere kept her from getting her High School Equivalency Diploma in the past.  In September, Holly’s father-in-law passed away.  He was a very important person in Holly’s life, and she promised him she would do it this time.  She said this is for him, her four children, her husband, and her grandmother.  Holly said hope for a better future is what brought us here.  She ended her inspirational speech by telling the other graduates, “Let’s do this, let’s graduate!

Holly said she ran away from home in January of her junior year of high school. She said she was basically staying in a park and living out of her car.  She became ill because of malnutrition and improper care.  She developed bacteria in her throat that causes infections. It was first thought she had mumps in her throat. Eventually she ended up staying with her aunt and uncle and sometimes friends.  She eventually dropped out of high school at the beginning of her senior year as she was unable to keep up with school work.  Holly did have an IEP for extra help as she had been determined to have a reading disability.  Her mother stopped special services for Holly at the end of her junior year.  In April of her of her junior year her aunt helped her through the process of becoming an emancipated minor.  Holly eventually met her husband and they married when she was 18 years old.  She became a stay-at-home mom, eventually becoming a home day care provider for children of other family members.  Over the years she had jobs with a cleaning company, gas stations, and eventually AllSteel where she worked for 4 years.  She quit working there to care for her father-in-law who had been diagnosed with terminal brain cancer.

After lots of hard work and many hours of study and preparation, Holly earned her High School Equivalency Diploma (HSED) on April 24, 2015.  She began attending Muscatine Community College in August 2015.  She is now studying Business Management with an emphasis in Accounting.  Holly said she and her husband hope to eventually start their own business: an Arcade and Party Center where customers can hold birthday parties and other life events.

The Iowa Department of Vocational Rehabilitation and the Workforce Innovation Opportunity Act (WIOA) administered by Region 9 IowaWORKS are helping to cover Holly’s college tuition costs.  As a HSE program completer, EICC awarded her a voucher for 3 credit hours.  Holly’s hope for a better future has brought her far.  We wish her the best and many successes in the future.

Telling stories with data

I was lucky enough to spend two days doing math as if I were a student.  All of the teachers at the workshop were given some data that we care about -- HiSET testing data for all the states that use the HiSET test.

Our task was to tell a story.  Think about that.  We had pages and pages of numbers to look at and it all looked official and concrete and factual.  We had two stories to tell, actually.  The first was to use the data to say how Iowa was doing really well and deserved continued monetary support.  The other story we had to tell was how Iowa is actually struggling and needs money to help bring it up to par.  Below are a few examples of what we created and presented.

My group's effort.  On the left side we left out all the other states in-between to make it look like we were doing way better than everyone else.  On the right-side notice how we manipulated the size of the bars to make it seem like Iowa had a really tiny percent..

Infographics are a powerful way to present information.

Here they added a few sentences to make the story more explicit.

Always question the data!

Teachers can easily adapt this to their classrooms using data that their students care about.  

Match up Fractions on the Number Line

This week I'm spending two days in Des Moines for the Adult Numeracy Institute.  The focus is on number sense (fractions, decimals and percents) and Data, Statistics, and graphs.  I enjoyed the first warm-up activity that was a match up.  This activity could be tailored to any level of math learner.   The directions are as follows:

Beforehand, the facilitator creates pairs of cards with equivalent values (for example 1/4 and .25 would be paired cards or 1/8 on one card and a picture of 8 connected bars with one bar shaded in on its match).  You can make the task more difficult by using pairs of more complicated numbers or concepts such as having the golden ratio on one card and 1.61803398875 on another.

1. When you get to class, hand out one card to each student
2. Students then find the person in the room that has the equivalent card
3. Once they find their partner, they go to the board and place their cards on a number line
4. Facilitate a discussion about how they know the cards are equal
5. Since this activity has an anonymous factor it's safe to discuss whether cards are placed correctly and then move them if needed

Doing this activity gets students out of their seats and thinking.  They have to talk to each other to problem-solve what constitutes a match, and then they have to conceptually understand where the numbers belong on a number line, which prepares them for more advanced math down the road.  Any errors in mathematical thinking are quickly corrected in a safe environment.

Muscatine's Franklin Elementary teams with MCC to offer GED classes

Muscatine's Franklin Elementary teams with MCC to offer GED classes

While the article should state HiSET instead of GED, the Muscatine Journal does a good job of covering our new partnership with Franklin Elementary School.  We are hoping to grow this partnership and recruit volunteers for instruction.