We are now starting our third book of the year in the Connected Math Series. I am feeling behind since we have to get through 8 books this year! The other 7th grade math teacher is in the same place though so I guess it's alright. The book we are starting is "Comparing and Scaling". In this unit we discuss how numbers are used to get consumers to buy their product. For example, "9 out of 10 doctors recommend . . . ", The " . . . kills 99.9% of the germs", etc. The students really got into many different commercials when I introduced this unit, and they were excited to be doing something different than scale factors (the last book). The students have spent some time on the internet searching for different advertisements. Then they have to write down what they mean. THey have to decide if the information is valuable and really 'sells' the product.

I have spent the whole last week or so analyzing tests. I had some odd outcomes on the last tests. Instead of the normal bell curve test scores, I had many A's and many F's, but not much in between. After a lot of thought, I went through all the tests and tallied the question numbers that were missed. I found some significant trends. I went back to reteach those questions a little differently if possible. I then gave them another test. I did not change the original grade, but I gave them another chance to do well. I was really frustrated with what to do since I had obviously reached so many of the students. It was really hard for me to figure out what to do since many of the students were ready to go on. Most of the students grades did improve; however, there were still a few F's. I think I need more smaller quizzes in between to assess learning other than the 'big' test at the end.