I've started this blog for my adventures with interactive math journals. I have two other blogs but decided that THIS would be the forum to record what I've done or what I've seen in regards to interactive math journals.
IN THE BEGINNING...
It all started when I attended a workshop and the presenters showed us various foldables. The concept kind of appealed to me on some level. Most math teachers would have run with the idea, I stood back and watched and hoped that one day I'd have the confidence to do foldables. Enter my friend and colleague, TH. Her blog is located at
Journal Wizard. You need to click that link as soon as you read this. Seriously. Just do it. Especially if you teach High School Geometry.
TH and I went through ACP (Alternative Certification) together about 4 years ago and we kept each other informed with our various lesson plans/activities. Unfortunately, TH was in a different region so getting together to go in depth about our ideas was difficult. I attempted a few foldables for the next couple years but was never consistent. (Am I the only one who has problems being consistent??) All hope was lost and I was growing frustrated with the way we took notes in class and the way my students seemed to lose their CScope papers that had our classwork. It would be silly to say that I was a failure because I got through the year all right and the majority of my students passed the standardized tests. What I will say, is there is always room for improvement and there was a lot to improve.
AND IT CAME TO PASS...
The summer before my 3rd year, I was invited to do a TRC Math Grant as a mentor teacher (here is a good place to tell you that even though I am a "young" teacher, I am the ONLY math teacher at my high school, therefore, I earn the title of "Mentor" by default). It was a busy summer going from one workshop to the next as I tried to learn as much as possible in ONE SUMMER. One day, I walked into a week-long Geometry workshop and there she was, TH. I yelled out a "WHOOP!!!" and the rest of the week we learned more about teaching Geometry with an amazing woman, Kathy Hale. Near the end of the week, TH brought in her Geometry math journal. I had seen her journal before, but it had grown EXPONENTIALLY. It didn't really resemble the composition notebook it used to be. This book was crammed full of every Geometry concept required by TEKS. (Go to her blog to get an idea of how big that thing is!!
Journal Wizard). The desire to do interactive math notebooks (or journal, can I just say "journal" or is someone going to get all nasty about semantics here?) lit up again and I vowed to give it a go. (I'm posting those soon, but not today seeing as it's story time).
THERE WERE MANY TRIALS AND MURMURING AMONGST THE STUDENTS...
I did well with Algebra 1 for about 2 weeks. The kids liked it and I had hopes to keep going but due to the way some of the worksheets were set up, it became tedious to keep going and I gave up. Oh, we journalled as a review at the end of our units but that was only because I let the kids use their notebooks on the assessments. I would find some cute foldable to work on and sometimes it worked out. Most of the time, the school printer would not work the way I thought it should and half my class time would be spent trying to figure out how to fix the problem. So much for printing ahead of time. Geometry was about the same. We would put vocabulary in the journals and copies of the constructions we made but thats about it. It was nothing like I'd imagined. Algebra 2 was worse. I think we did one entry and Math Models makes me shake my head in frustration. Many kids asked why we bothered with journals and complained that we weren't using them. Yikes. Near the end of the year, Algebra 1 decided that CScope worksheets were boring and we needed to make a change. I explained how the district required me to use CScope, they said "That's fine, but it's kind of lame." "No kidding." I replied and then asked how we could make things better. The students offered that we just write the notes in our journals instead of using printouts. This surprised me because it would involve more work on the part of the students. We took a vote and it was decided that we would write notes based on CScope lessons. (Can I interject here that I'm not a creative journal person? I just write, and even then, I don't write much.) We finished out the 6 weeks with journaling and then moved on to a super Algebra 1 review packet (which I highly recommend to ANY Algebra 1 teacher trying to get their students ready for EOC exams. You can find the packet at
Teachers Pay Teachers - Algebra End of Year Review and the seller has other cool lessons available BUT I should remind y'all that it is best for the majority of your lesson plans to be based on your state's required expectations - that's me covering my assets!) Whew! Sorry! Sometimes I get distracted. Back to the story, the year ended and the composition books were more than half empty. According to the idea, the composition books should have been full. Argh.
AND THERE WAS MUCH REJOICING...
TH and I had a prof. development training to attend and we started talking journals. She produced her current year's Geometry book and my jaw dropped. As always, her work was impressive. TH suggested we do a presentation on journals for a region conference and I agreed. TH wowed the crowd and we had one of the highest attended sessions. We were on to something.
We started meeting at a coffee shop to talk shop. I would give examples of my work, she would show me her work. We traded ideas on how to make Geometry and Algebra more fun and accessible to our students. People would walk by our table and see our mountains of books and notebooks. The looks we got were hilarious! It was awesome. The topic of our conversation turned to blogging and we talked about how she could better share her ideas and how we could start a community of math journalers.
That brings me to now. TH and I have begun our discussions for next year's ideas. I have been copying TH's methods during PD sessions just to get a grasp on why she does what she does, when she does. It's been VERY interesting and helpful to see how she works. It has given me hope for an even better upcoming year. Add in the fact that the TX legislature has backed off of our required EOC tests and it makes things seem like the sky is near the limit to what we can explore and learn this year. Something about not having a massive test hanging over my head... its a free feeling.
Well, that's all for tonight. In the next couple posts, I'll be posting my journal entries and ideas. I welcome any suggestions (keep it constructive!!!!) and comments. Again, visit my friend's blog at
Journal Wizard. She's got lots of examples and ideas of how to journal. You can also follow her on Pinterest under Journal Wizard. Have a great night!