Help my young students see the magic in geometry!
I teach kindergarten in a wonderful elementary school in east central Alabama. We serve students from all economic and ability levels. Our student population (around 1,000 students) is very diverse so our classrooms are never dull!
One challenge we face is appropriately challenging our highest achieving students, especially in the areas of math and science.
Basic lack of funds limits classroom teachers in Alabama to purchase higher quality and interesting supplies and materials because the majority of our classroom supply money is used for consumable materials. This year, our classroom supply money ($525) has been reduced to $400. Our financial outlook in Alabama schools is certainly not bright for this school year. Even so, our students deserve only the best!
This summer, I and fellow co-workers are attending AMSTI (Alabama Math, Science and Technology Initiative) training for 2 weeks. We have volunteered to give up 2 of our 6 weeks in the summer so we can learn how to better teach our students to problem solve, think critically and learn to understand and love math and science.
In order to help my students learn the basic principles of geometry, I need to build a child-friendly math station. I need pattern blocks in several sizes, tangram sets and geometric manipulatives to supplement the new curriculum that I've learned about. I am so excited about teaching my kindergartners about the difference between pyramids and prisms, rectangles and squares, vertices and edges, etc.
My class needs pattern blocks, tangram sets, large magnetic pattern blocks, geometric shapes and a math station to display them. I want my students to independently be responsible for getting the manipulatives they need as we experiment with spheres, ellipses, trapezoids, parallelograms, rhombuses, lines, angles, vertices, grids and basic design and the list goes on and on!
Engineers, computer-aided design, landscapers, construction workers and designers all work with 2-D and 3-D objects daily. In the AMSTI curriculum, even kindergartners explore, predict, form hypotheses and test ideas with geometry! Can you believe it! Please consider funding my proposal so the world can have a few more brilliant engineers and architects!
Thank you so much for your consideration.
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