Let's be real for a second--alternative assessments are really hard in secondary math. I have like 87 objectives and you want my kids to make a poster? For real? I've tried doing them a couple of times over the years, but they were usually such bad initial experiences I've stuffed all memories of them deep into my mental closet. This project is the exception to the burn-the-lesson-plan-to-get-rid-of-all-evidence I've come to expect from my attempts at alternative assessments.
This is my 3rd year doing this project. Apparently, the 3rd time is the charm. I posted about my experience last year here. You can smell the fear in that post.
At this point in quadratics, we've covered: graphing, factoring, the quadratic equation, vertex form, and transformations. What I really want is for students to see the connections between multiple representations. I want students to see that you can find the roots from the graph in Desmos. Those roots are the same as the roots in the factored form of the equation. Those roots are also the solutions to the quadratic formula. Slowly, we're making progress.
Here's the rough outline of the project:
1) Find a "real-world" example which you can fit a parabola to. If you want to fit a parabola to Payton Manning's forehead, or Donald Trump's smile, or some other hilarious thing, that's fine with me--you'll just lose the "real-world" point.
2) Fit a parabola to the image using vertex form.
3) Show all points of interest on the Desmos graph (roots, y-intercept, vertex, axis of symmetry)
4) Demonstrate you know how to calculate the a-value for the vertex form of the equation using the vertex and a point.
5) Show me you know how to find the factored form of the equation from your Desmos graph.
6) From either vertex or factored form, calculate standard form of the equation.
7) From the standard form, show me you know how to calculate the vertex of the parabola. It should be the same vertex as your graph.
8) From the standard form, use the quadratic formula to calculate the roots of the equation. These should be the same roots as your graph.
9) Put your name on the back of the poster so I can take pictures of your work and put them online without worrying about student identities (that's one of the reasons at least).
This is my 3rd year doing this project. Apparently, the 3rd time is the charm. I posted about my experience last year here. You can smell the fear in that post.
At this point in quadratics, we've covered: graphing, factoring, the quadratic equation, vertex form, and transformations. What I really want is for students to see the connections between multiple representations. I want students to see that you can find the roots from the graph in Desmos. Those roots are the same as the roots in the factored form of the equation. Those roots are also the solutions to the quadratic formula. Slowly, we're making progress.
Here's the rough outline of the project:
1) Find a "real-world" example which you can fit a parabola to. If you want to fit a parabola to Payton Manning's forehead, or Donald Trump's smile, or some other hilarious thing, that's fine with me--you'll just lose the "real-world" point.
2) Fit a parabola to the image using vertex form.
3) Show all points of interest on the Desmos graph (roots, y-intercept, vertex, axis of symmetry)
4) Demonstrate you know how to calculate the a-value for the vertex form of the equation using the vertex and a point.
5) Show me you know how to find the factored form of the equation from your Desmos graph.
6) From either vertex or factored form, calculate standard form of the equation.
7) From the standard form, show me you know how to calculate the vertex of the parabola. It should be the same vertex as your graph.
8) From the standard form, use the quadratic formula to calculate the roots of the equation. These should be the same roots as your graph.
9) Put your name on the back of the poster so I can take pictures of your work and put them online without worrying about student identities (that's one of the reasons at least).
Let's talk pacing for a moment. I give two work days in class for this project. On the first day, we intro the project, work on finding a super cool picture, and fit a curve to it (#1-3 above). On the second day, we work on doing the math and I hand out poster board to students. I have the project due several days after our second work day. There is no time to work on the project on the due date. Students waltz into class, I collect the posters, and we delve into radical functions.
Next time, I will strongly suggest to students that it's worth it to do the work before starting on the poster board. I made a template for next year (below this paragraph). I'll probably import it into a Google Doc to encourage students to type out their work. Typed posters are usually much nicer to look at than the scrawl of most of my students.
| 10_project_work_before_making_poster.docx |
If you're interested, here's my files for the project. The directions on the left are what I hand out to students. The checklist, which is included in the directions, gets paper clipped to the front of the poster so I can evaluate student understanding without writing all over their beautiful projects.
| Project Directions
| Project Checklist
| ||||
And now for the gallery. I'm going to include the good, the bad, and the ugly so you get a realistic picture of what to expect. I make it very clear to students that it is possible to get full credit without making these display worthy. I'm most interested in the math. However, I do offer bonus points for making things pretty.
First, a couple of pretty ones. The math isn't perfect, but I'm not going to highlight the mistakes for you.
Here are some more student examples to give you an idea of the range of quality to expect. Not everything is super pretty all of the time.
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