Author Archives: Fawn

House Cleaning and Lesson Planning

By Fawn | Published: May 27, 2018

I posted this on Facebook: There is something else that I do way better than teaching mathematics, even though teaching has been a 25-year plus career. That something is house cleaning. Then, a friend asked for advice on this, adding, “Will desperately be awaiting your response.” I responded with: Thought no one would ever ask. […]

Posted in Teaching | Tagged lesson planning, VNPS | 6 Responses

Broken Straps

By Fawn | Published: April 1, 2018

Robert Kaplinsky drops me off at the front of the district building. I make my way to the room where I’d be presenting. I set up. I go out to the hallway, walk around, long enough to get lost. I’m looking for something. I don’t know where my backpack is. Where did I leave my […]

Posted in General | Tagged #PDNightmares, PD | 3 Responses

Scoring an Ordered List

By Fawn | Published: January 31, 2018

My 7th graders have a question on their exam that asks them to put eight numbers (integers and fractions) in order of their distance from 0 on the number line, starting with the smallest distance. These types of questions are tricky for me to grade, and because there are eight numbers in this sequence, the task […]

Posted in Teaching | Tagged fairness, grading, ordered list, scoring | 26 Responses

How I Use “Between Two Numbers”

By Fawn | Published: January 28, 2018

I’m overwhelmed by the number of teachers who have asked how I use Between 2 Numbers (B2N) in my class. So this post is for all three of them and for anyone else who might be interested. It has become one of our regular warm-up routines. (We do visual patterns and math talks, too. Duh.) Before […]

Posted in General | Tagged Between 2 Numbers, calculator, estimation, large numbers, scientific notation, warm-ups | 3 Responses

Send Doughnuts

By Fawn | Published: December 15, 2017

I had a wonderful time working with a roomful of teachers over two days at my Grassroots Workshops last week. During a morning break, I talked with a teacher who was concerned about not being able to reach all her kids, that there was a handful of students who were failing the course, and that she’d […]

Posted in Teaching | Tagged administrative support, Grassroots Workshops, parenting, teacher support | 4 Responses

Green Olives

By Fawn | Published: November 13, 2017

My 7th graders are working on “percentages of” problems currently, and late last night, I saw this problem on one of Don Steward’s handouts. There are 75 olives, 40% of which are green. I eat some of the green olives until 10% of the olives that remain are green. How many green olives did I […]

Posted in Algebra, Course 2 (7th Grade Math) | Tagged Don Steward, percent of, percent of a number, rectangles | 11 Responses

Global Math Week Starts on October 10, 2017

By Fawn | Published: September 27, 2017

It was the summer of 2012 when I talked my colleagues, Erin and Melissa, into signing up for a week-long training in Palo Alto, California, to start a new Math Teachers’ Circle (MTC) program in our area. It was there that I first learned about Exploding Dots from Diana White, an associate professor from the […]

Posted in General, Problem Solving | Tagged exploding dots, global math movement, Global Math Project, Global Math Week, James Tanton, Raj Shah | 2 Responses

Upcoming Grassroots Workshop in December

By Fawn | Published: September 19, 2017

I’m super excited to announce my upcoming Grassroots Workshops event being held on Friday, December 8 and Saturday, December 9. It’s the first time that I get to spend TWO FULL DAYS sharing math teaching, math learning, and math awesomeness with teachers. So, if you teach mathematics (grades 6-12), please-please consider signing up! Registration does not […]

Posted in General, Teaching | Tagged Grassroots Workshops, PD, professional development | 3 Responses

Between 2 Numbers

By Fawn | Published: September 10, 2017

I created a new site, it’s called Between 2 Numbers. From the About/Contact page: The inspiration for this site came from John Allen Paulos’ book Innumeracy. I read the book back in 2008, but reading it again this past summer reignited the inspiration and turned it into fruition. In my lesson plan spreadsheet, I started a […]