Memorial Day 2023

This Monday, Americans will celebrate Memorial Day.  Who are we honoring?  How did the holiday come about?  Isn’t Memorial Day usually on May 30^th?

Students learn a little about the history of the holiday, analyze the possibilities and patterns for when it is celebrated and make observations about the incredible numbers of deaths that have been caused by war. While trying to make observations about the numbers, they can’t help but appreciate the terrible cost of war and the gift that those that serve in the military have given to us and to our country.

The activity: memorial-day2023.pdf

For members we have an editable Word docx, our data with a pie chart, and solutions.

memorial-day2023.docx     MemorialDayNumbers2022.xlsx    memorial-day2023-solution.pdf

CCSS: 5.OA, 6.RP, 7.RP, 7.SP

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Flag Art – A little ratio art might be a fun way to get ready for the upcoming Memorial Day holiday.  In this activity students measure; create whole number ratios for the official U.S. flag; decide how our artistic flags will be different from the official flag; make stars from regular pentagons, and finally create a flag design in honor of Memorial Day.

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Memorial Day is also a day of sales

Which sale should you choose? – Students decide if these two sales are the same. If they are not the same, which is better? How would you explain this to someone?
Which car should I buy – hybrid or electric? – Students create equations for finding the break-even points of these vehicles by mileage and years of ownership.  They then work with systems of equations to find the number of years or number of miles where the cost of these cars are the same.

Taking two discounts off – Advertisers want your business.  They often use repeated discounts to make you think you are getting stuff for free.  Be aware!

from Yummy Math https://www.yummymath.com/2023/memorial-day-2023/

The 8th billion baby



How fast is the world’s population growing? Will the world’s population size increase indefinitely?  Are all countries’ populations increasing at the same rate? What are some of the factors affecting this growth?

We have two activities:

For younger students: 8-billion-elementary.pdf

For middle and high school students: 8-billion-secondary.pdf

For members we have editable Word docxs, our data, and solutions.

8-billion-elementary.docx     8-billion-secondary.docx

8-billion-elementary-solution.pdf      8-billion-secondary-solution.pdf

8billion-data.xlsx

CCSS: 4.NBT, 4.MD, 5.MD, 5.NBT, 6.RP, 6.SP, 7.SP, 8.F, 8.SP, HSS, HSSP, MP1, MP2

from Yummy Math https://www.yummymath.com/2023/the-8th-billion-baby/

Patterns in the binomial expansion, Pascal

Realizing that (X+Y)ⁿ can be expanded with the help of Pascal’s Triangle offers some pretty and interesting math play.  We love to bring a little fun and beauty into our math classes and the end results are neat!  Here is the first of 3 activities using Pascal’s coloring.

This Binomial expansion activity could be used alone or coupled with our introductory Pascal activity.

 BinomialExpansion.pdf     Introduction&day1.pdf

CCSS:  8.EE.C.7.b, HSA.APR.C.5, MP7

If you wish to focus only on the coloring and Pascal’s Triangle, you might use this Hexagonal grid paper.  Hexagon-grid.pdf

For members we have editable Word docxs and solutions.

BinomialExpansion.docx    BinomialExpansion-solution.pdf

Introduction&day1.docx    Introduction&day1-solution.pdf

from Yummy Math https://www.yummymath.com/2023/patterns-in-the-binomial-expansion-pascal/

Better Science: 5 Excellent Ways to Examine Authentic Artifacts from the Natural History Museum of Utah

From the Cool Cat Teacher Blog by Vicki Davis

Follow @coolcatteacher on Twitter

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Students love to examine artifacts and explore. Whether it is dinosaur bones, a phenomenon causing damage to valuable species of trees, or the relationships between predators and prey in the wild, first-hand explorations will engage students. We know this. Authentic experiences are now made possible with the valuable free resource Research Quest, from the Natural History Museum of Utah.

In this post, I’ll share an overview of the ResearchQuest resources for teachers and five ways you can use these now in your classroom.

The Natural History Museum of Utah sponsored this post. All opinions are my own.

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Click for a free teacher account

Free Science Investigations for Middle School Students

ResearchQuest is a free set of investigations designed for middle schoolers that allow them to examine artifacts, analyze data, and create their own conclusions. They become scientists doing work and drawing conclusions with real artifacts from a fantastic collection of resources.

Promoting Critical Thinking with Authentic Artifacts

When you sign up for your free teacher account, you will receive a special code allowing your students to access the investigations without creating their own accounts. And, there is more! Each investigation is designed to promote critical thinking through explorations, engaging activities, and a very cool research assistant notebook that you’ll want to print and give to your students before they embark on their journey of discovery. Digital options for Google Classrooms and other LMS are available, too.

Click for a free teacher account

Each lesson plan includes standards, a downloadable ‘research assistant’ guide for students, assessments, and more.

Click for a free teacher account

And the instructional guides for each investigation include not only NGSS science alignments but lesson plans, an overview of what students will do and assessments with rubrics for student self-assessments, and an overview of how to evaluate student critical thinking as your students are conducting their investigations. This is such a valuable resource for teachers!

Now that we’ve looked at the overview of these amazing free tools let’s dig into five ways you can use these resources now. There are more than this, so I recommend going to ResearchQuest and signing up for a free account to dig into the student investigations yourself.

Click for a free teacher account

1 – Study Care of Our Environment by Understanding Natural Materials and Synthetic Materials

Students need to learn to draw their own conclusions in the critical area of caring for the environment. For this reason, I recommend digging into the “Artifact Investigation” and specifically the study of early ceramics and how they impacted the lives of those who used them. This unit not only brings in history but science, ecology, and an understanding of the impact on cultures. This is a great way to use the scientific method in an excellent cross-curricular study.

Click for a free teacher account

2 – Dinosaur Bones Investigation

The artifacts from the Cleveland-Lloyd Dinosaur Quarry are an awesome way to study dinosaurs and more. I like the investigation where students look at fossilized bones and determine which dinosaur they belong to. Notice how students will “meet” a real paleontologist named Carrie, who studies dinosaur bones and leads them through the investigation.

In addition to studying dinosaur bones, students can also dig into other investigations in this area that will teach:

• How disruptions in ecosystems can cause population shifts.
• How we can learn from the fossil record.
• How various traits impacted dinosaur survivability by using a cool “Dino Lab Simulator” to build a dinosaur that can survive multiple challenges.

Click for a free teacher account

3 – Understanding Forest Ecosystems

Some incredibly rich investigations are situated within the Uinta Mountains ecosystem investigations. You have four investigations to choose from where students will study change and stability in ecosystems. You can use one of them or all of them.

As a farm girl, I was taught to understand, conserve and care for our forest ecosystem on the farm. That is part of what I like about the forest ecosystem investigations, where students build their own digital food web model to understand the interdependent relationships in this ecosystem better.

Students can study far more in these investigations including:

• Understanding the phenomenon that is at the heart of dying Lodgepole pine trees.
• How museums gather their biological collections.
• Ecosystem changes.

Click for a free teacher account

4 – Bioscience Investigations: Predator and Prey

The Epic Bioscience Investigations are exciting because of both game-based digital manipulatives and a virtual dissection of a bat. 

In the investigation “To Eat or Not to Eat,” students start by playing a game to determine “what physical cues predators use to make decisions on what to eat or not to eat.” They are also guided by an NHMU entomologist and some cool science-based comics.

Finally, students “use museum collections to compare select specimens as they look for evidence that may reveal which physical cues drive prey choice.”

What an awesome resource! Research Quest is such an incredible use of museum collections and will be very engaging for students.

Click for a free teacher account

5 – BioScience Investigations: Bats

Another EPIC investigation that is great for classrooms allows for virtual bat dissections, but a choice in the bats students will compare to figure out how adaptable bat diets are in a changing ecosystem. This will allow for some fantastic classroom conversations.

Click for a free teacher account

I will admit that dissections were never my personal favorite, but as I sat down and worked with the “virtual dissection” tools, I think this would have been a good fit for me for many reasons when I was in middle school. As you proceed, it not only teaches you the tools that are used for dissection but how things are done in the dissection. I would like to do this on a large screen, and I think touch screens would make it even better.

Click for a free teacher account

Click for a free teacher account

Hands-On Investigations with Research Quest

These ResearchQuest investigations are thought-provoking, cross-curricular, and NGSS-aligned and make an excellent addition to any middle school science curriculum. You can choose the investigations you want to use and link to them within your learning management system to manage your student’s progress. 

ResearchQuest is a fantastic resource from the Natural History Museum of Utah. I recommend it for middle school teachers as an excellent supplementary material and lesson plans that will deeply engage students in learning and make it super simple to plan during the school year. Sign up today.

Disclosure of Material Connection: This is a “sponsored blog post.” The company who sponsored it compensated me via a cash payment, gift, or something else of value to include a reference to their product. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I believe will be good for my readers and are from companies I can recommend. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

The post Better Science: 5 Excellent Ways to Examine Authentic Artifacts from the Natural History Museum of Utah appeared first on Cool Cat Teacher Blog by Vicki Davis @coolcatteacher helping educators be excellent every day. Meow!

from Cool Cat Teacher Blog https://www.coolcatteacher.com/authentic-artifacts-from-natural-history-museum-utah/

Triple Crown hopefuls at the Preakness

Credit: AP Photo/Garry Jones

Saturday, May 20^th, will be the running of the Preakness Stakes thoroughbred horse race in Baltimore, Maryland. The Preakness is the second major race for 3-year old thoroughbreds to run in their effort to claim the Triple Crown of horse racing.  Mage won the Kentucky Derby on May 6^th.  Does he have a chance to win all three races?  In this activity we look at the empiracle probability of winning the second and third events.

The activity: Will-Mage-win-TripleCrown2023.pdf

For members we have an editable Word docx, our data and solutions.

Will-Mage-win-TripleCrown2023.docx      triple-crown-data2023.xlsx

 Will-Mage-win-TripleCrown2023-solution.pdf

CCSS: 6.SP.B.5, 7.SP.C, 8.SP.C., HSS.MD.A

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More Horseracing activities

California Chrome’s lineage – calculating fraction of parentage of this horse.  CCSS: 3.NFA, 4.NFA, 5.NFB, 6.RP

Triple Crown Possibilities – Tons of calculations and measurements of horses … rates, hands tall, furlongs, fractions. 4.NF.1, 4.NF.2, 5.MD.1, 5.NF.1, 5.NF.7, 5.NBT.7, 6.NS.3, 6.RP.3, 7.NS.3

Horse Odds – Mathematical probabilities. CCSS: 7.SP.7, 7.SP.8, S-CP.2

from Yummy Math https://www.yummymath.com/2023/triple-crown-hopefuls-at-the-preakness/

Mother’s Day ideas (14 activities)

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Updated! How much do we spend on Mother’s Day – Use the Mother’s Day event to engage your students in approximating, reasoning, and investigating as students estimate how much is spent in the United States for Mother’s Day.

• For what is money spent?
• For whom is money spent?
• What is a low guess?
• What is a high guess?
• What facts would you like to know?

Spend-forMother’sDay2023.pdf

Helpful information for teachers:

CCSS: 5.NBT.5 , 6.RP, 7.RP, 7.SP, HSS.IC , MP1 , MP2

For members we have an editable Word docx and solutions.

Spend-forMother’sDay2023.docx      Spend-forMother’sDay-solution2023.pdf

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What time should I wake up? – I’m going to get up early to make my mom breakfast in bed. Of course I want the eggs and biscuits to be hot when I bring the tray to her but I also like to sleep as long as I can. 3.MD, 3.OA, 4.MD, 4.OA, MP5

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Mother’s Day is soon and this means big business for the greeting card and floral industries. Let your students practice averages, percents, and large numbers while they analyze the statistics on Mother’s Day spending.  You could even ask students to do their calculations in scientific notation to add an extra dimension to this activity. Enjoy!

mothers-day-numbers2021.pdf

For members we have an editable Word docx and solutions.

mothers-day-numbers2021.docx      mothers-day-numbers2021-solution.pdf

CCSS: 6.RP, 6.SP, 7.RP, 7.SP

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A gorgeous, glittery Mother’s Day card – Finding the area of a heart by finding upper and lower limits.

CCSS: 3.MD.C, 4.NBT.B, 5.NBT.B, 6.G.A, 7.G.A

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Thank you mother and father for all of those diapers – Which is a better deal, cloth or disposable diapers?  How much did you cost your parents in diapers?  An investigation which develops and uses systems of equations.

diapers2016.pdf

diapers2016.docx       diapers.xlsx        diapers2016-solutions.pdf

CCSS: 6.EE.9, 7.EE.4, 8.F.2, 8.F.4, 8.EE.8, HS.F-IF.8.B, HS.F-LE.2, HS.F-LE.5, MP7, MP8

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Or just concentrate on Chocolate …

• Big Snickers bar – 3-act task; How much bigger than a regular Snickers bar is that?
• World record Snickers Bar – Recently the Texas Mars factory workers created the World’s largest Snickers Bar.  Students explore similarity, cross-sections and number of servings (equivalent number of mini-snickers bars).
• Shrinking Toblerone – Two sizes of Toblerone bars are now configured differently.  How much did they lop off? How much did the price per gram of chocolate change? Is the price per gram still the same, if not how might you adjust the price of the products to make it fair?  How much could you buy for $1.00?  Could you have designed it better?
• Giant Chocolate bunnies – What can you deduce about the bunnies (pictured in this activity) from the descriptions given … solid? hollow? cost per pound? cost per height?
• The size of chocolates – Students approximate the volume – Mean radius method and the counting squares.
• Chocolate milk and mixture problems – changing percent mixtures through a fun class day that ends with a yummy treat. 
• Chocolate raspberry heart cake – Students calculate base area or volume of cakes made from 2 cake pan sizes and observe how the volume of the cake changes with the increased pan size.  This is an activity intended to demonstrate that the volume increase is not linear.  Volume expansion would be cubed if all dimensions of the cake were enlarged but in this case (since we didn’t increase cake depth) only two dimensions are enlarged.
• Holiday candy sales – Translate a pie chart of information on candy sales to actual dollars spent. Ponder the amount of money that is spent on various holidays for candy.
• Too early in the day for so many choices – Calculate the number of combinations possible in a story of buying a warm drink when you are still sleepy and there is too much to decide.

from Yummy Math https://www.yummymath.com/2023/mothers-day-ideas-14-activities/

Wolfram Alpha + ChatGPT = Amazing Math Teacher Help

From the Cool Cat Teacher Blog by Vicki Davis

Follow @coolcatteacher on Twitter

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As part of 80 days of AI and HI, I’ve been testing ChatGPT to see what I think of it for math teachers. In this post, I’ll talk about how math teachers can get totally accurate math problems (and answers) from ChatGPT.  I’d like to add that this will also be a benefit to science teachers and other teachers using statistics and data.

So, ChatGPT has done reasonably well with math problems and answers, particularly word problems. However, math needs to be accurate (as does everything else, as well.) But specifically, to be used for math teachers, they need to trust the results. So, until now, I hesitated to recommend ChatGPT to math teachers. That seems to be about to change. First, I’ll share why this is important and then share the current instructions for installing the plugin.

First, the plugin is available for the ChatGPT Plus version (which runs $20 a month.)

Why Would a Wolfram Alpha plugin for ChatGPT Plus be so Helpful?

I am recommending the Wolfram Alpha plugin because if it works like I think it will, it will be a game changer. I have already been recommending Wolfram Alpha for math teachers (instead of ChatGPT) because it is accurate, can generate step-by-step instructions, and is a math teacher’s “best friend.”

However, Wolfram Alpha wasn’t easy “to talk to.” ChatGPT excels at conversation. So, suppose the ease of conversation actually does combine with 100% accuracy for math, as math teachers need. The result will be an incredible assistant that every math teacher can use, science, history, and many others. Wolfram Alpha will give accuracy that ChatGPT needs for so much discrete information.

If you look at the ideas for how this can be used (as shared on the Wolfram Alpha site) you’ll see everything from musical notes to mathematical functions to movie trivia. Function plotting, factorization, and population statistics will also be able to be accurately generated.

ChatGPT Adds Plugins

ChatGPT is gradually adding plugins. So, if you have a ChatGPT account, sign up on the waitlist here.

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ChatGPT plugins are coming. Join the waitlist to gain access to plugins.

The ChatGPT Plugin Store

Now it gets exciting. The ChatGPT plugin store is accessed, and you can install the Wolfram Alpha plugin! (After you get accepted after applying to the waitlist.)

Go to the ChatGPT Plugin Store.

Then, you can add this (and other plugins) from the store.

Talk to Wolfram Alpha in Conversational English

Now, you can enable the Wolfram Alpha plugin inside ChatGPT to create incredibly useful things that are accurate and usable! This is so exciting!

Now, talk to ChatGPT and Wolfram Alpha.

Not Just ChatGPT Plus

If you peruse the Wolfram Alpha AI Tools, you’ll see that these incredible features will be coming to many tools and can possibly be added to the tools you already use.

They also have Wolfram Alpha widgets to add to your class websites and lessons, but we’ll expand far beyond these in the future.

Math teachers hold on. You’re about to get some help.

But also realize that these tools will be available to students as well. This will likely change your instruction, move you towards mastery learning, and perhaps flipping your classroom. (See What is Mastery Learning and How Do you Implement It Effectively with Jon Bergmann.)

As the tools change, instructional pedagogies change.

And I will continue to talk about the integrity gap—those students who genuinely educate their minds.

However, another gap will be created between educators who know how to teach in the age of AI effectively and those who do not. Human Intelligence (HI) is even more important in the age of AI. AI can do some things, but it still needs well-educated, savvy, creative humans to make it useful. 

And remember that amazing, energetic awesome educators will always have a place in the classroom. 

Stay tuned for more! I’ll test these tools as soon as I’m able to become eligible to install them. This is exciting! 

The post Wolfram Alpha + ChatGPT = Amazing Math Teacher Help appeared first on Cool Cat Teacher Blog by Vicki Davis @coolcatteacher helping educators be excellent every day. Meow!

from Cool Cat Teacher Blog https://www.coolcatteacher.com/wolfram-alpha-chatgpt-amazing-math-teacher-help/