Buffington's Blog

Math has never been so Romantic!

2011-01-07T06:48:00.000-08:00

In an attempt to help my math students see how math relates to everyday life I have created a math video about Valentine’s Day. Of all the math videos that I have created this one has received the most feedback and I think that is because of how many relationships it has helped to save or strengthen. Have a happy Valentine’s Day and remember that you are one in 6.7 Billion!

Overcoming Social Challenges

2010-06-14T11:04:00.000-07:00

One of the greatest challenges and criticisms of online schools is that students need opportunities for social development. Although there is not a daily live interaction with other students in the halls, cafeteria and classroom some have argued that removing this from our schools is a positive move. Either way I am really excited about all the social opportunities available through our K12 school this year.

For a couple of years we have had regular monthly outings, similar to field trips, in local places across the state. These outings are available to all students and some are specifically designed for different ages. Some of these events have included bowling, nature walks, college tours, roller skating, visiting the state capitol, and large end of year events.

Clubs have also been a big part of the social aspects of our schools. Clubs have been growing in popularity and diversity over the past three years at our school. This year we have had many students involved in clubs such as ambassador, sports, ski, multimedia, game, craft, science, book, bible, healthy eating, and last year the wonderful addition of the first yearbook. The clubs have regular meetings and often meet at outings.

Proms and graduation have been a huge request especially from seniors and last year having our first prom was a big accomplishment. As prom was so successful our first year the prom committee has worked very hard fund raising and getting three proms set up across our state to be more accessible for students. In our third graduation last year we had a record turnout and filled a small auditorium with friends and family of our graduating class.

Along with all of the social activities that are available I’m especially excited about a new addition this year of getting a chapter in the National Honors Society. Through the work of some wonderful teachers our school is having our first induction meeting where 27 students will be inducted into the National Honors Society. Not only do I want to applaud these students, I also wanted to share some of the great social opportunities available in cyber schools.

The final Say on the Binomial Challenge

2010-06-07T06:04:00.000-07:00

The results for the Binomial Expansion are in! Great job Jason the winner of the competition and Great job everyone who participated, I'm glad that we were able to get some wonderful resources out there. f(t): Drumroll, Please Next time I won't go so easy on you...

Don't Let Challenges Get in your way

2010-06-03T06:31:00.000-07:00

A large number of the students who come to cyber schools are coming because they are looking for a way to be more successful in school. It makes sense that if they were finding success and thriving in a traditional school they would probably not look for another educational option. For some people a challenge to being successful may come in the form of a learning disability, for others it can be a physical challenge, and for many people it comes as both. As I have never had a physical or learning disability it is impossible for me to fully understand what they have to go through to get through their day, not to mention learn challenging content. Although I have not personally gone through their struggles I have a very good friend, Alex, who inspires me and helps me understand better what it means to overcome challenges.

I have shared this video of Alex with students and teachers in hopes that we can gain from his determination a drive of our own to never let challenges get in our way.

To get this video uploaded and the blog posted I had to overcome some challenges with editing, copyrights of music, and successfully escaping the house with our family video camera without having my wife find out that I intended to take it skiing with me. Due to some of these challenges this ski video blog is being sent out right when the weather is starting to get a little nicer in my area of the world. Sorry for sending a snowy video now, but I didn’t want to wait until next winter to share this inspiring example with you.

Binomial Expansion Challenge

2010-05-20T08:00:00.000-07:00

In her blog Posting, f(t): The Gauntlet Kate made a challenge for Math teachers to create a decent lesson on the Binomial Expansion.
The first PowerPoint lesson I put together, "binomial", was way too long, I made a second, "binomial shorter", and a third, "binomial even shorter". I even considered doing two episodes and linking them together, but I finally recorded a version where I talked fast enough to cover all the material in the allowable YouTube 10 minutes.
If you like the recording, or the PowerPoint Slides please feel free to use them. Also if you want a copy of the slides just comment on this post and I'll e-mail them to you.

What does a Cyber School Teacher do?

2010-05-18T06:31:00.000-07:00

I grew up in Canada and in 1993 I was traveling during March break with my father to Georgia. The schools in Georgia were still in session and my dad thought it would be fun for me to go to school for a day during my break. In school I was somewhat of a celebrity, students were so interested to meet someone from Canada and in each class I attended the teacher gave students time to ask questions about my life in the great white North. I answered some of the most interesting questions I have ever heard. Do you eat seals, have you ever killed a polar bear, do you live in a regular house, do you have television, what vehicles do you drive, do you have shopping malls? I never thought I would ever in my life have to answer such basic questions again, and then I got a job as a Cyber school teacher.
As a teacher in the Cyber world I’ve heard it all. My friends tell me it’s not a real job because my commute is walking down to the basement, regular teachers have told me I’m virtually a teacher, I get asked all the time when I’m going to get a real teaching job and I have to constantly explain to people what it is to be a cyber teacher. The most ironic situation that has happened to illustrate this point was not too long ago with some school administrators.
I was talking with some administrators from a local school district and they asked me questions about being a teacher at a cyber school. I felt like I was twelve again, they asked me questions like, do you meet with your students, do you talk to your students, do you get paid to do this, and the question that always follows, what is it that you do?
In answer to all the people in the world who have ever wondered what a teacher does at an online cyber school, here it is: I instruct students in class, I communicate with students and parents, I grade work, prepare lessons, monitor student progress, differentiate instruction to meet students needs, attend faculty meetings, consult with colleagues, attend IEP meetings, and do all the other things that need to be done to ensure my students are learning and progressing. I guess you could say… I am a teacher.

Cheating in a Cyber School: Keeping a Close watch over a Long Distance

2010-05-07T06:01:00.000-07:00

Because we don’t see our students’ faces while they are in class and we can’t circulate while they are reading online lessons we, as online teachers need to be creative to check and see that they are learning, attentive and aren’t asleep drooling on the keyboard. We also cannot see them while they are taking a test, quizzes or other assessments so we have a very serious job of watching out for any academic dishonesty.

Some people are worried about the integrity of cyber schools because of the challenging nature of monitoring academic dishonesty. Students can go online and ‘Google’ an answer while in a testing situation, but what most people forget is that teachers have Google too!

Although a serious issue with cyber schools it also yields some funny stories. I have on occasions had students copy and paste answers from online sources. These answers are usually easy to pick out as the font, formatting, wording and sometimes hyperlink are included in the paste. When a young man submits an answer in hot pink cursive font it’s usually time to check the source. One student decided to copy an entire assignment from a website and was kind enough to include the answer, title, author and web address, that made it really easy for me.

Like all other public schools cheating is a reality in cyber schools, but it is easier to spot than most people would think and teachers are charged with the responsibility to investigate any questionable material and administrators are vigilant in making sure that it is stopped. While the technology exists to cheat, the counterpart tools to better detect and combat plagiarism and other forms of academic dishonesty are also present.

Kids say the Darndest things… about Math

2010-04-29T05:23:00.000-07:00

In my Algebra class, as hard to believe as it may be, we have fun with math. Students like to laugh and I like to make jokes about math. As funny as I am I have to realize and accept the fact that as a cheesy math teacher some of the laughing is directed at me. To help bring humor to math and help maintain some self dignity I decided it was time to bring in some funny little helpers.
It is true that Kids will say some crazy things when they have a chance to just speak their minds. I started asking my children and some nieces and nephews about what they thought of their math classes and I found that we were laughing together, so to help bring some good fun to my online math classroom I took some videos asking children questions about measurement, quantities, math terms, numbers, and math in general.

We had fun making this video but an even better result is that I now have something fun to help show my students that it can be fun to just talk about school. With all the negative things that are said about education it’s wonderful to have good positive fun based directly around the dreaded subject of math.

Solving Problems that Don’t yet Exist

2010-04-12T05:15:00.000-07:00

I was reading through a PowerPoint article, Did You Know, about some aspects of the world population and technology in the world, and finally some important ideas for education in the future. The concept that really struck home with me is that, “the top 10 in-demand jobs in 2010 didn’t exist in 2004 … We are currently preparing students for jobs that don’t yet exist… Using technologies that haven’t been invented… In order to solve problems we don’t even know are problems yet.” What a daunting task educators and parents have in such a quickly changing world.

In my mind the best way to prepare students and children to solve problems that don’t yet exist is to help them gain the knowledge that is needed, teach some problem solving strategies, foster critical thinking skills, and practice practice, practice. I took a good look at my teaching, my curriculum, my courses, my live sessions, personal interactions with students, and the way I teach my children at home and asked some hard questions. Is what I’m teaching or showing going to help them to think more critically? Do I allow them to discover? Have I let them learn from their mistakes? Have I let them make mistakes? Will this session help my students to be better at solving problems? Am I preparing them for a test or for the future?

Admittedly, there is some math that doesn’t directly apply to real life. Some skills students learn in many subjects do not directly correlate to problem solving, critical thinking or their future jobs. It is also true that many of the seemingly unimportant lessons are a foundation for learning the content that does directly apply to life. It is also true that learning something challenging to the point of mastery will help students to develop the tenacity, thinking, and drive that will be a great asset in solving the problems of the future.

Wii Need to Relate to Our Students

2010-04-06T05:18:00.000-07:00

Last year at a professional Development I was asked to train teachers in using a new type of software. The software took our online lessons and made them into video or mp3 files. As I explained how to use this software I was asked questions about technology I could not answer. I realized that teaching about video and mp3 files when I don’t personally own an mp3 player, or even a cell phone was problematic. I don’t think I’ve ever said “I don’t know” so much in an instructional setting before in my life. I really needed more experiences to better relate to my target audience.

With high school students it is the same thing. If I’m going to connect my math content to their lives I have to do it on a personal and practical level. Last week a student sent me a message letting me know that he was really into football. He said if I could relate a math problem to football he would do much better in class. Although it took some creativity that day in our live session I related direct linear variation to football. In some situations the math doesn’t relate exactly to the interests of students, however, in some situations, like video games and spending money, the message goes right to the heart of my high school audience.

Youtube.com (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8oIe1OZ6CY) Retrieved April 2010

Bringing a Classroom Favorite to students across the World

2010-03-29T07:10:00.000-07:00

When I was teaching in a regular public school I liked the lesson about Probability because it always talks about die or numbered cube, coins and cards. One of the reasons I like this lesson is because the lesson demands that teachers use manipulatives. I would bring in my Rubik’s cube and we could roll it and change it and learn about theoretical and experimental probability. When I first started working in an online school I put my Rubik’s cube, and many other fun classroom activities, on the shelf as I was not in the classroom with the students anymore.

After a year of teaching I saw a video by another online teacher where he taught a fun lesson to students using a video. At that point the wheels in my head started turning and I dusted off old Rubik and went to work. I was able to not only teach a concept but show it to students all across the State and it has been shared with teachers across the country. This Video has now been viewed in Canada, England, Germany, Sweden, Australia, the Philippines and other countries across the world. This is one of the reasons I love working as an online teacher. I can take the fun I had in the classroom and share that fun way of learning across the world.