Your Life Depends On It

On the drive home tonight, I was listening to RadioLab's most recent podcast entitled, Worth. (Thanks Justin) At the 17:45 mark, one of the producers shares her story about going out on the street and asking people the question, "What is a year of life worth?"

Take a second to think about this question.
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• Would you immediately have an answer?
• Would you want to know more information before answering the question?
• What questions would you ask before finally coming up with an answer?

I totally see this as one of those questions that produces many more questions. Right?

• Would you consider the question uses Mathematical Practice 4, Model with Mathematics?

If you are curious, ask your students this same question, "What is a year of life worth?"

Just take a moment to learn from (and listen to) your students what they have to think of, share, argue, discuss, etc. I would guarantee students will raise so many questions and points. Is this a fake-world question? Can you imagine a question more specific to your content area that would spawn a rich discussion like this? I think Mathalicious does a fantastic job asking powerful questions in their lessons. Let's play a game here. Play along, won't ya?

The challenge: How can you take standards and concepts in your math class, and ask questions that almost get a similar response to the question above?

Let's call them, "Your life depends on it." questions.

Here are three images. What "Your life depends on it." question you would ask for each?

Again, what "Your life depends on it." questions would you ask? If any?
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I'm not saying mine are awesome. I simply think in order to answer the question, students would want to know more information. Ask more questions. Make guesses. Construct a model. Use math to make strong predictions, and more.

What do you think here?

Worth.
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Thank You 2014

There are many parts of 2014 for which I'm thankful. Here are some math-related ones.
*Apologies if I missed someone or something. Please remind (badger) me in the comments.

• YOU for reading this blog, giving me feedback, sharing ideas, making suggestions, attending my conference sessions, sharing stories about using tasks or Estimation 180, and being in education to support students (children and adults).
• The MTBoS for helping me continue to grow as an educator.
• TUSD for having confidence in me as a coach to support fellow math teachers.
• TPSF for allowing me to contribute to such an amazing summer learning environment. 
• DLCs and Co. for being a great bunch of tech-junkies in the name of meaningful learning
• Conferences:
• GLAMC for being wonderful people, organizing great mini-conferences, and gathering wonderful Los Angeles teachers.
• OCMC for hosting highly accessible and meaningful PD opportunities in Orange County throughout the year. 
• NCSM for allowing me to nerd out with Chamberlain and Kaplinsky in New Orleans.
• NWMC for a jam-packed conference of sessions in which multiple states and countries can partake in.
• CMC for holding the best conferences in the biz. I was truly honored to be a small part.
• Consulting:
• PYLUSD, Rockwood, and CUSD: thank you all for your confidence and willingness to have me work with your math teachers. I learned a great deal!
• Christopher Danielson for sending me a wonderful estimation book (still reading).
• Tracy Zagar for including some Estimation 180 in her upcoming book.
• Motion Math for making wonderful-amazing-delightful math apps for my son and me to enjoy together.
• Eric Milou, Gwen Zimmerman, Robert Kaplinsky and Dan Meyer for putting up with me during our NCSM 3-Act project and allowing me to learn a great deal from you all. 
• Hannah for being the best colleague last school year.
• My niece for designing the Estimation 180 logo and artwork.
• Johnny and SPEYSYDE for helping me get my Estimation 180 shirts printed.
• Steve Leinwand for the continued inspiration and top-notch CCSS elevator speech about MP3.
• The Math Forum and the Encompass crew for the continued opportunities to connect, collaborate, and create in the name of problem-solving.
• CueThink for creating a digital problem-solving app to support students and teachers.
• Global Math Department for allowing me to frequently write a short blurb in their newsletter.
• Kaplinsky for being a great (math) friend and coercing teachers to ask for sticky note autographs.
• Fawn for still making fun of me.
• My students for teaching me.
• My family for your love and support that encompasses everything.

Thank you,

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Photocopier Survey RESULTS

In preparing for 2015, I asked for your help the other day. Thanks for entertaining my hunch.

Here are the questions and results (from 65 people):

Question: What are the joys of a photocopier?

You had many great things to share about the efficiency of providing your students with copies and some of the detailed functions of the machine. An interesting number of you find joy in the warmth of the copies (I'll admit, me too). Some of you veteran teachers shared how you appreciate the evolution of photocopy machines. Here are a few of my favorite "joys" quotes:

• The smell of ozone, the warmth of fresh copies, and the feeling that I'm ready.
• I usually bounce/jam to the rhythm as I wait for my copies...
• Solving a paper jam. 

Question: What are the frustrations of a photocopier?

Overwhelmingly, paper jams are the most frustrating part of a photocopier according to you. I would say low toner and long lines are on the heels of paper jams. Here are a few of my favorite "frustrations" quotes:

• Remembering my code
• When it thinks it knows BETTER than you what size paper you want.
• Time lost from my life that I will never get back.

First-world problems, right? The next set of questions asked about your feelings, using a Likert scale from one to five.

Question: When the photocopier is functioning, what's your level of satisfaction?
1 = Not satisfied
5 = Extremely Satisfied

Close to 60 people felt satisfied to extremely satisfied.


Question: When the photocopier is malfunctioning, what's your level of satisfaction?

Over 50 people felt little to no satisfaction.

Question: What's your alert level when the photocopier is functioning?

1 = Ho-Hum
5 = High Alert

Varied data, but most seemed to lean toward Ho-Hum.


Question: What's your alert level when the photocopier is malfunctioning?

I'd say close to 50 people felt some alert to high alert. 

Select any feeling(s) you associate with the photocopier malfunctioning.

Select an initial step you typically take if a photocopier malfunctions on your watch.

Let me translate. Most answered that they "Try and fix it (replace ink, clear paper jam, etc.)


Select any feeling(s) you associate with YOU fixing the photocopier.

Look at that! Accomplished! Happy!
We have to respect that there are times we still feel frustrated, maybe even excited.


Here's where I'm headed. 

• Can any of these feelings or photocopier experiences be similar to learning math?
• Is fixing a photocopier error analysis?
• Are there times students just go through the typical process at a ho-hum alert level?
• Are students given opportunities to be problem-solvers?
• Are students frustrated with math?
• Are students frustrated when problem-solving, but persevere and feel accomplished, happy, and excited at the point of resolution?

I have many more thoughts and questions. My goal for 2015 is to provide teachers with a conference workshop/session where we use error analysis as one way to help students better learn and understand math. I've blogged about this a couple of times (Exponents and Linear Systems), but want to continue exploring this arena.

What are your thoughts?

Jams,
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Credits
*Google Forms to create the form
*Google Sheets to organize the data and create charts
*Wordle to create the word clusters.