Hello from Washington, D.C. Not my usual hood, but my daughter lives here and I get to visit this amazing city.

My head is swirling with history and observations from 5 weeks of traveling in Eastern Europe and then back to visit family in NY and DC before heading home to California. On this trip the hubs and I asked each other' "Why do you travel?" My response after a gigantic pause:

To Understand Time.
To Be an Ambassador of Peace and Mend Cultural Misunderstandings.
To Get Out Of My Comfort Zone.
Understand History from Place and Culture. 
Finding Beauty EVERYWHERE.








Some teachers relate to their students by reading YA fiction, some play country (cough) music all.the.time., some are into super 

400 BCE Wailing Wall Jerusalem, Israel

To Be an Ambassador of Peace and Mend Cultural Misunderstandings:

Muslim Ladies taking their Children to the Beach, Hertzalia, Israel Ifran, a Muslim, gave us an all day tour of Jewish Sarajevo.

Understand History from Place and Culture:

Those are shrapnel holes outside our amazing apartment in Sarajevo received during the 1992-1995 war. (up to 350 + average missiles on civilian targets daily for over 1400 days)

It is hard for me to wrap my head around the call for #MTBoS reflections for the year, but when Jennifer Fairbanks asks, I do. 

Why is it hard? Because I am in Slovenia, having had 7 days of biking, hiking, rafting, swimming, running, and International School Interviewing, that's why! Please put this amazing country on your list!

Piran, Slovenia, Seaport, Adriatic

I don't get that much attention on Twitter, but I did when I posted this:
It was a pleasure to reflect on what I did that makes me smile. I connected with students, I worked closely with colleagues and I spread the MTBoS gospel at the CPM National Conference in San Francisco in February. 

It was tough year emotionally for the students. On October 7th or 8th, wildfires spread throughout our area, burning over 6000 structures. School was closed for two weeks, as students, doctors, teachers, and caregivers were displaced, lost homes, and evacuated. Our school's gym was a Red Cross housing/crisis center. 1 in 5 doctors at our Santa Rosa Kaiser Medical Center lost a home. The air quality was horrible. Anyone not evacuated was housing friends and relatives and helping at shelters and feeding the hundreds of volunteer and emergency workers. No one is the same. EVERY time you open your medicine cabinet, your closet, your pantry, you just ask, "What does this look like, feel like, smell like when it melts together? What does that loss like?" No one knew how long the crisis would last so no plans could be made. Immediately we all combed through our belongings, making piles to donate to victims, putting together a single box labelled, "take this in case of an emergency." 

And our current presidential administration's war on humanity has many of the students scared and feeling uncertain. That has taken it's toll too. The racism and fear and suffering is heavy for students and us teachers trying to find the truth in telling our students who are undocumented or have a family member that is, that all will be okay. 

Trying to teach in these circumstances has been challenging. Add in the complete abuse of vaping (both tobacco and pot), a parking lot with 400 cars that is not being monitored with enough adult power and a school suffering a budget crisis (no raise in 5 years, health care costs increasing, not being able to recruit or retain talent, and getting further and further behind in tech) and you would think you have a complete disaster. 

And it isn't. In these times, I must emphasize art, and creativity, and relationships, and belonging the best I can within the context of teaching math. I have to believe that what I teach is important and make it have meaning. That is my job. 

The MTBoS (MathTwitterBlogosphere) has been invaluable in keeping me centered. The inspiration, support, and feedback have provided me with the energy and momentum to keep moving forward. My desire to own my white privilege has led to hard questions and loving responses, my desire to make it real and make it stick has helped me grow and keep pushing my comfort zone.  And so...back to math...

Our first year teaching Integrated Math 2 went well. The team was tight and mostly on the same page. My colleague, Danielle and I, in particular,  brought out the best we had to offer, bouncing creatively and organizationally off of each other. My Senior Math Class collapsed a bit. I am way too empathetic to their crazy schedules, and all the other stuff above. AND they would say they learned a lot, (not necessarily all math) and I would say 90% of them tested directly into a college level math class! 

Oh and my BTSA mentee became a clear credential holder! (And my former BTSA mentee became Rotary teacher of the year)

Next year means it my turn again to be Department Chair, in a year where we are deciding for reals about Integrated vs Traditional curricula and CPM vs. ????? I will continue to push my colleagues to examine if they have missed anyone's perspective and do their classrooms and curriculum include their student's voices. 

I will miss my fourth TMC and will live vicariously through you and my hope is that my spot went to a first time attendee. 

Know dear community, that I am here for you. 

I am a passionate, empathetic, thoughtful, mindful, and reflective teacher. What am not is fastidiously organized like I don't even get "or" in my middle name. (My colleague, Danielle, on the other hand, is Crazy organized, I mean she can not have a neat stack of papers where an  ungraded paper is touching a lesson plan is touching a IEP request, let alone a pencil in her pen holder or a calculator returned upside down)
So when I asked for help to make a review stack, I didn't want to forget how I was taught. (Previously my stack always had closed loops before a student got through all the stations)

Blogging is the perfect, "make it stick" strategy.

How to make a review station stack that works:

Materials:
*Ready for lamination and fun 10 questions printed out in large font, one per paper,
*10 colored pieces of paper--repeat colors are fine,
*Glue Stick or double stick tape,
*Lots of sticky note strips
*scissors
*notepad

Step 1) Place in separated text boxes these three items like this: Where I have written Solution 1--you write "Previous Answer. "Where I wrote Question One--you write the directions for the next question, ie, "write in simple radical form."


Repeat this configuration for each of your questions.

Step 2) Print each station. Use the sticky notes to label the questions and solutions by number. Q1 with S1 etc...

Step 3) Make yourself a 4 by 3 grid on a piece of paper. Label each square going down the rows, Station 1, 2, 3...

Station 1	Station 5	Station 9
Station 2	Staion 6	Station10
Station 3	Station 7
Station 4	Station 8

Step 4) Under Station 1 write "Solution 1" This is your solution to Question 1. Underneath that, put the question (say Question 4) to a different problem. In the last box put the Question to this solution. Work your way ACROSS the grid.

Station 1 Solution 1 Question 4	Station 5 Solution 4 Question 8	Station 9 Solution 8 Question 3
Station 2 Solution 3 Question10	Staion 6 Solution10 Question 6	Station10 Solution 6 Question1
Station 3 Solution 7 Question 2	Station 7 Solution 2 Question 9
Station 4 Solution 9 Question 5	Station 8 Solution 5 Question 1

Wha-La! Have fun! Send a picture!

What types of questions do you use Stations for?