Essential Question: How do you find an angle measure?
Students will learn how to find the angle measure of an unknown angle. The students will learn angle vocabulary, how to estimate an angle measure, use a protractor to find an exact angle measure, and add or subtract angle measures to find an unknown measure.
I believe that it is important for students to understand how to find the value of an angle in order to prepare the students for future math classes, but even more importantly to give the students a new way to see the world. This unit will be one of the first times that students will be asked to think through the problems from geometric lens. Though this lessons students will gain a new way to look at their environment.
How does this unit enable students to experience the power of their minds and their capacities as learners and doers (powerful learning)?
Through this unit my students will continue to grow as learners by being taught to think through math in a new way. They will need to persevere through the geometric thinking. As is acknowledged often in this unit, my students are very used to thinking through math problems in a very algebraic way. Throughout this unit students will be required to think in a geometric fashion and use more visual reasoning to support their problem solving. During this unit I anticipate that the students who usually excel or grasp content quickly will be taken aback or discouraged. The students will have to persevere and work through this feeling and come to discover the power of their own mind as learners.
Through this unit my students will continue to grow as doers by learning to use a brand new tool, the protractor. In addition, students will be required to use exploration as a discovery technique. As technology because more relevant the students often lose the opportunity to participate in hands on learning. During this unit students will learn to use a digital protractor and real protractor. This will be a new experience and a possible struggle for some of the students who lack of coordination. This is another time when the students will need to flex their problem solving and perseverance muscles. Through this the students will grow as doers by being hands on, utilizing exploration, and discovering the outcome of trying different techniques or avenues to solve a problem.
How does this unit develop intellectual and academic habits of mind, work, and discourse, including habits of independent or collaborative thinking and doing typical of readers, writers, speakers, creators, researchers and thinkers in the discipline?
My students overall work wonderfully in partners, groups and independent. This unit will be taught with the students in two different groups. This allows for students to get more teacher attention, easily allow for more small group work and makes the angles math block for each student shorter. I believe this is beneficial because it allows us to present the students with bite size pieces of information each day. This is helpful because if a student becomes frustrated it gives them space to step away and try again the next day.
This unit will allow for us to grow as researchers and thinkers specifically. During this unit students will be told definitions upfront, but they will also be given plenty of space to contemplate and engage with a problem as small groups, partners, or independently. This unit is a type of geometry which is a new type of thinking, getting a grasp on this more open type of thinking will be vital for the students growth in their math conceptualization and in other subjects. This new grasp of open thinking will allow students to become better researchers because when you are a researcher there is not always a clear step by step system. This thinking teaches perseverance.
How does this unit incorporate literacy development, including capabilities of proficient readers, writers, and speakers?
During this unit students will develop their capabilities as readers and writers in a very similar way. Not only is this a math unit, but it is also a geometry unit. This is an important thing to note because proficiency in reading and writing in math is different than reading and writing in any other subject. Through this unit students will work to become proficient in the reading aspect of geometry literacy by increasing their vocabulary and learning to critically read a word problem, directions, or (the focus of this unit) read geometric notation accurately.
As for writing, the students will not be writing essays or any standard writing. Instead the students will be asked to write equations and answer questions using proper notation. For most students this will basically be a new way of writing and contain a whole new set of vocabulary. With practice the students will come to be able to see a diagram or read a word problem and write down the corresponding answer using the geometry notation.
Students will come to know many of the concepts through exploration, group work, and whole group discussions. In order to participate in these activities effectively and clearly students will need to begin to utilize the provided vocabulary. During this unit students will be solving problems which have multiple entry points which will provide a space for students to share their thinking. Providing the student with the space to not only share their thinking, but to share their math thinking will be wonderful for their growth.
How does this unit develop trust in the classroom as a learning community?
As previously mentioned this unit will contain a great amount of group work, whole group discussions, and exploration. These are all important in building trust amongst the classroom community. Trust is also vital in order for these activities to be successful and valuable. In order to reinforce these expectations I will ask the students to not only talk one person at a time but also to face the person who is talking, ask other student in the group to restate what the first person said or share out to the group what their partner said. Over the course of the year the students, overall, have done a great job working together and through those activities have built trust in each other.