Thursday, February 14, 2008
Writing About Graphs
One of the things that I struggle with in my Intro to Algebra classes (these are the students in the bottom quartile on standardized tests) is getting them to understand that slope is a rate of change and what this will look like on a graph. One of the activities that I tried this week is to have them look at a graph and write a story explaining the time passing and the rate of speed. My students really got into this activity. They were actually quietly working and being creative and learning. It was great. Some of them got so involved in the activity that they wanted to make their own graph to write a story about. I am thinking about making this a children's book or making it more detailed by using Powerpoint.
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3 comments:
I think that this is a really neat idea. However, I was wondering...do you teach about slope and graphs before this activity? Are your kids exposed to word problems that involve linear equations before they write their stories?
Nice activity and we can see that they can actually do this with many math topics. I have used a similar method but asked the students to draw a cartoon or picture and "explain" what the picture represents mathematically.
We discuss the meaning of slope and we practice deciphering what is happening in the graph depending on the slope of the line.
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