Paper, Pencils Please!

My Students

Shrinking budgets make simple supplies quite scare and daily students come to school without adequate resources to complete assignments. Mathematics requires many hands-on and paper oriented creations. Our classes are creating math literature and designing activities that will provoke innovation.

It is my tradition to name my classes, this year they are American Innovators.

These innovators are located in Southeast Michigan, in an old city with great pride in creativity and ingenuity. That is why my students are using mathematical writing to create stories, poetry, posters, booklets and hands-on projects. Often, we are working with limited resources yet, this never reduces the enthusiasm of my students. Daily we see the evidence of has at risk youths, 100% free break and lunch programs help, but it is only part of the equation. The school is an imperative in our part of the city, the community requires a place for students to get extra nurturing and we provide it but, they need more. Your attention, participation and vast network of resources add to the equation that will provide an additive inverse to the solution for these American Innovators lives.

My Project

Many people think of mathematics with negativity and rote disappoint. Not these innovators, they are embracing the new writing initiative in math comprehension. Our American Innovators are creating biographies of mathematicians, stories, poetry, draws, posters and designs using mathematics. We have started working cooperatively to solve complex equations using hands-on activities that they design and posting them on-line on websites for storytelling. Having these basic supplies like pencils, glue and construction paper adds the framework to everyday procedural knowledge, while subtracting the frustration of limited resources. Simple tools make visualizing mathematical concepts that move the pistons that supply the combustion of Science Technology Engineering Art and Mathematics (STEAM). Division, fractions and decimals are more memorable with plentiful construction paper models that multiply the understanding of visual learners. The equation needs you to offer a spark in the ignition of a solution.

Paper and pencil please is more than a title, it is the simplicity of mathematics.

The future of our nation is in the tiny hands of the next generation of innovators. Having plentiful supplies make creativity open up the range of variables that are available in our country. Our families make survival based choices and school supplies are not in the equation. This solution is simple, you and I working together is the answer. Math + writing + you = more American innovation.