First day Teaching Algebra II

Every class is unique. Some are better behaved than others, some are better prepared than others, some are bigger than others. Mine is huge, rowdy, and full of interesting people.

Today I felt like I didn't have control of the class. I felt like I needed to have a stronger hand in the room, to break up a group of boys who talked insessently, and break up the "good" kids who are on one side of the room with the "not so good" kids on the other side. I felt drawn to the troublemakers, and discovered that just by standing near them I was able to help keep them quiet... the problem was that I couldn't write on the board while standing next to the kids... and thus they were disruptive.

It didn't help that half the class was gone for 1/4 the period, then the other half left 20 min later to get their books. Having only 1/2 the kids made me choose between repeating the lesson more than once, or having both halves of the class miss  half the lesson.

Tomorrow, however, is a new day, one that will not have as many disruptions, and hopefully they won't be as disruptive and talkative. If they are... I have to find a way to channel that energy in a constructive way. I have no idea what I'll do for that, but I think having them do "Bullpen" exercises at the start, doing a quick 45 arithmatic questions reviewing their multiplication, addition, subtraction, and division, will help them get some energy out and focus on the tasks at hand: Learning Algebra II.

I still don't know everything that goes into Algebra II. It's been 12 years since I sat in that chair, and it came at a time of my life when there was a great upheaval, and most of that time frame has been forgotten or blocked. I've been looking ahead in the lessons (got the book yesterday... literally yesterday), and I am getting a little idea of what I'm supposed to cover.

Tomorrow I'm going to teach the students that it is all addition. Addition, subtraction, multiplication and division are really just different forms of addition. Exponents are another form of multiplication thus fall under addition as well. Finding "x", which is the main objective of Algebra, is just applying addition in different ways. With that in mind, I hope to teach them the different properties of real numbers, closure, reflexive, has identities, etc.  I think having themes with lessons helps the kids to remember what happens. It's kind of like episode names on different movies or series, by putting a title to the lesson it isn't just "Another day in Algebra" but instead has things like "It's All addition," "Figuring out the Function" and other such interesting titles. With 640 classes before the end of the semester, I might be able to come up with more exciting names than... 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, Chapter 1 review... though those can be helpful markers. I'll have to invent some system of catagorizing things that makes sense, and is exciting enough to catch the minds of 40 teenagers.

God help me.

Is this thing working

Testing, testing,

Identity, squareroot of four, 2*(sin(pi/6))....

I hope this is really working.