David Curlette

Imagine a picture of someone that has failed at something.  Did the person you just imagine give up, stops trying, or walks away not to ever return to the activity or job?  Probably not!   The person works to improve his or her weakness and focuses on his strengths to keep pursuing the dream or goal set forth.   Because i f we don’t fail, then we cannot succeed.      Teachers should produce lessons that will challenge students to be successful through the process of problem solving and learning.  T eachers should teach students that failure will happen along the way, but don’t give up.   Students will be able find a possible solution or answer.   Yes, teachers we can teach our student in this way. To teach students through failure is to remove the obstacle that there is only one way to solve a problem.   Allowing for failure will promote students to derive their own path to solution and answers.   Giving students owners...

Lesson Content & Rigor:  Is it Grade Appropriate As I watched my almost two year old daughter singing along to Barney and Friends (video is below), I realized that I could use this song in my high school math class.  What?!  Wait, did I just say that I could use a video that my daughter is watching in a classroom with kids that are about eight times her ages.  Students are being taught many lessons they already know because as educators we "think" that they don't know the material.  At time this is true, but shouldn't we as educators want to challenge our students to keep up with the correct grade level content and rigor?   Yes, we should. So, then why are we teaching students to name shapes in a high school geometry class?  Barny and Friends are currently teaching this to my daughter thirteen years before she will be asked in high school to regurgitate this information. Educators can fix the process of re-teaching already learned ...

Math...the class that everyone lines up outside classroom doors excited for the next lesson.  Wait, I have not seen this to be true for many math teachers.  Instead student arrive stressed and worried about the lessons taught in math classes.  Why?? Math instruction that is skill, drill, and lecture helps to create the stress and anxiety for students.   Instead of skill and drill defined as showing a student how to solve a mathematical problem then having students replicate this process for "leaning".  Math teacher should move away from this concept (have a paradigm shift in teaching) to teaching through asking students questions that engage them into the math lesson.  The questioning allows students to feel apart of the lesson and that they are all learning together.  Also, teachers should allow students to teach each other as well as to encourage (without forcing) students to demonstrate how to solve problems by co-teaching the class with the...

The new buzz word in education is flipping a classroom.  A flipped classroom is a teacher’s website where their students go to get class lectures or class teaching notes.  The expectation is that students will watch the lectures videos the night before the material used in class the next day.  Then material taught in class is done through practice problems, “real world” problems, projects, or activities.  Because the students are watching the typical teaching lectures online, this frees up class time to be spent on engaging students into the lessons through “real world” problems or activities. Does the flipped classroom work?  This all depends on the teacher, the students, and the expectations of the class.  Teachers who have the expectation of students watching the videos and force the students to watch the videos in order to understand of to solve the “real world” problems that are completed in the classroom, then these teachers find much success.  O...

Many teachers have been asking how to record lessons to create a flipped classroom or blended classroom.   To record your lessons or tutorials you must first find the way you want to record the lessons/tutorials.  Some ways to do this are by using your cell phone to record videos, a document camera, a webcam, or a screencasting program.  Once you have your video recorded and ready to post, simply upload it to your webpage, YouTube, teachertube, or another hosting site/location.   (Example at www.CurletteMath.com , then go to TrigOnline).

I have just created my own YouTube Channel - CurletteMath (www.youtube.com/user/CurletteMath). It is a great way for my to teach and/or reteach my students my math lessons. I find it very easy to upload the videos and to organize the page by play lists to categorize my videos. I am finding that many of my students are loving the ability to re-watch the math lesson while completing their homework. They are asking me after each lesson, "Is this going to be online?" Recording lessons can be easy using your smart phone, document camera, camcorder, and interactive white boards.