Do you FOIL?

How do you teach your students to simplify (x+3)(x+4)? I used to tell them to use "FOIL," mainly because that's the way I learned it and that's the way the other teachers all taught it. The problem I have with FOIL is when they get to problems involving trinomials. If they've memorized the word FOIL, they have no idea what to do if there are extra terms.

Instead of using FOIL, I've found it works much better to start with simpler problems like (x)(x+4) - this way when you get to (x+3)(x+4), most students correctly suggest that you just need to distribute twice. First distribute the x, then distribute the 3. Why have them memorize FOIL when you could just show them that they're just distributing twice? I've found that my students have a much better understanding of the concept and will be able to tackle harder problems that have more terms.

I know there are other teachers still using FOIL, so I do tell them about it at some point, but most agree with me on the need for it.

Merry-Go Round

Here's a review idea that my kids love to do. I type up review questions, one per page and label them A, B, C, etc. and tape them up around the room. I assign each student a letter to start at - they answer the question with their group (each kid brings a piece of notebook paper and something to write on with them). When it looks like most groups are ready, I have them rotate to the next letter. They keep rotating until they get all the way around the room. When they're done, we go over the answers together as a class.

The student really enjoy it - it gives them a chance to work together and they like being able to get up and walk around the room as they work. It's also nice for me because I know which letters are harder than others so I can anticipate which groups are going to have questions.

This also works great for solving equations that have several steps. I have the groups do one step at a time. When they rotate, they have to check the previous steps and make sure it's correct so far, then complete the next step in the problem. They keep rotating until all the problems are solved.

Reviewing for Standardized Tests

Our state's standardized test is coming up soon. To help my students review, I'm stealing some questions from the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System. Their department of ed's website allows you to search previous test questions by grade level, subject, even all the way down to content strand if you want to be super specific. You can also search for multiple-choice vs. open response, calculator vs. no calcualtor etc.

Here's some sample problems from MCAS:

Hannah’s mean score on four mathematics tests is 92.75. What is the sum of the scores of Hannah’s four tests?

A. 368
B. 370
C. 371
D. 372

Ms. Gleason is opening a new restaurant.
•She has enough booths to seat up to 40 people.
•She is ordering tables to fill the rest of the seating space.
•Each table can seat up to 6 people.
a.If t represents the number of tables Ms. Gleason orders, write an expression to show the total number of people that can be seated at booths and tables.
b.Write an inequality that could be used to determine t, the number of tables Ms. Gleason needs to order so that she has enough seating at booths and tables for at least 125 people.
c.Solve the inequality from part (b) to determine the number of tables Ms. Gleason needs to order. Show or explain how you got your answer.



Check it out - it's a great resource. If only all states made it this easy to search for standardized test questions.

1st Post

I've been teaching math for five years and finally decided to start my own blog to post ideas and (hopefully) get suggestions from the other pros out there who know way more about teaching than I ever will.

I'm about to start a unit on graphing linear equations with my pre-algebra class (8th grade). This is a unit I've always struggled with - quite possibly the one I get the most "when are we ever going to use this?" comments on. So this year, I'm trying to start more with real world applications and then transition to equations with x and y. Hopefully this will help. Here's some images from the lesson I made to use with my SmartBoard.