Chapter 4 and 8 Reflection

How does the information presented in chapters four or in chapter eight connect to what you have seen in your practicum placement or how does it compare to what you have experienced in the past?

In chapter 8, it talks about measurements. As you can see by the pictures I have posted from my practicum placement, my students have been learning about measuring length in their classroom as well. They just did a very similar activity to activity 8.4 "How long is the teacher?" In the book it tells the students to write a note to the principal explaining how tall their teacher is and how they decided. And then explain that it may be easier if they lay down and students measure how long they are instead of how tall. They are to go around and measure each other using ONE material choice.

The way my teacher did it was she had me trace her body on Monday after the students had left and cut her body out of paper enough for the students to get in four groups. Then on Wednesday for the lesson, she told the groups that they each had to measure her length with the materials they had. The students did pretty well with this, however some were confused by what length was. So Mrs. Bennett had the groups that were struggling walk around and look at the other groups and how they performed their activity and then come back and re-do theirs. It was a really neat activity to watch them do. Afterwards, they came together and discussed what length meant and how they each came up with their answers and how many of each books, pencils, rulers, and pencil boxes it took to measure Mrs. Bennett.

Chapters 11 and 12 Reflection

1. How does the task presented in class (examining fair tests) compare to the content covered in chapter 11?

-In chapter 11, it talks about data collection, classification, and organization. The task that was presented in class on examining fair tests compares to this content in the book in the way that we had to collect data on finding the circumference of our wrist. The book tells us that there are several different ways to collect data, and in our test, there was a tape measure, string, ruler, etc. Also, there were different units of measure, such as inches and centimeters. Chapter 11 also tells u that classification is the first step in the organization of data. What are you going to be using to measure? What units of measure will you use? What part of the wrist will you measure? Which wrist will you measure? Etc.

2. What are you seeing related to data analysis and probability in your own classroom settings?

-In my first grade classroom, they saw more on data analysis in September than I do now because they did a unit on teaching about data. However, data is still collected daily in the classroom. Data is collected is many subjects, not just math. I remember one activity they did in learning how to make a bar graph, they went around to different tables and filled in data about themselves. There would be different questions such as, "which food do you like better, hamburger or hotdog?" and they would have to put an X under the one they like more. Another was "which type of shoe do you have on today? Tennis shoe, boot, or other?" In groups, they had to get together and make bar graphs using their data. Data is collected for language arts too in making webs or charts. The students have to use the information from the story to collect data and fill out the web on the Promethean board with the teacher. I don't see much probability used in my classroom setting.

3. Examining the SC early childhood content standards (K-3) for data analysis and probability. How do the state standards compare to chapters 11 and 12?

-Kindergardeners are emerging in their sense of organizing and interpreting data. The books gives us ways to help meet the children where they are at their level of understanding. For kindergardeners and younger ages, it talks about using graphs to sort data and lay it out for visually for students to see. For the older students such as third graders, the standard states that the students will demonstrate through mathematical processes their understanding about data and the basic concepts of probability. In the book, it talks about teaching probability using manipulatives and charts for these students who have mastered the earlier concepts about data collection.