Although the first day for faculty and freshmen came last week, yesterday was the first day when all who should be here were present at Weston High School. From where I sit, it was an especially smooth opening day. As… Read More ›
Weston
A portal for parents
There’s an excellent article in last week’s New York Times on the downside of checking kids’ grades constantly through an electronic portal for parents. Here are a couple of excerpts: The reality, at least in high-pressure school districts, is that some parents… Read More ›
“If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it?” (Rethinking quadrilaterals)
Why on earth would we spend two whole days rewriting our Honors Geometry quadrilaterals unit? Our textbook, after all, contains a perfectly serviceable sequence of four lessons on this topic: These lessons are adequate. In the words of the standard… Read More ›
New furniture!
Arrived yesterday to find new furniture for students to use in our Math Office. As you can see, the chairs have wheels and the tables are modular (eight of them, though not all are visible in this photo). This combination… Read More ›
Todd Graff’s Camp
“A flawed movie about flawed characters,” as one reviewer put it. But that’s OK; even flawed movies can be worth watching, if you’re willing to focus on the positives rather than the negatives. This film from 2003 is definitely one… Read More ›
June Academy: Create Your Own Country
For the second week of June Academy, my colleague Mary Fierabend and I co-taught a course called Create Your Own Country. Mostly working in pairs, students imagined and created their own countries, emphasizing one or more themes: maps political structure/government… Read More ›
June Academy: Egyptian Hieroglyphics
For the first week of June Academy, I taught a 15-hour course on Egyptian Hieroglyphics. Many students produced spectacular results, as you can gather from this poster showing their name cards (explanation to follow): The student work is visually beautiful, much of… Read More ›
June Academy
Usually a school year ends with final exams — at Weston and elsewhere. As we know, final exams are designed to reduce stress and pressure by providing a relaxing time when classroom temperatures are over 90°. Right? No? You say… Read More ›
Bullying Three Ways
I originally started drafting this post well before last night’s presidential debate and the follow-up by Van Jones, but these events have slightly rearranged what I need to say. This thread actually started on September 27 with four talks (to different… Read More ›
For the win!
What a great start for the Weston High School Math Team! In our first Massachusetts Math League meet of the year, our goal was a simple one: to beat Canton. Simple, but definitely not easy, as it almost never happens. And beat Canton… Read More ›
