My project.

It has been a few weeks, but I have been ending one job and beginning another. Many changes here, but I have been fortunate to have my project be an application of some of the part-time work I do. I will cover in some detail what my position is, what we do, and how the lesson was developed.

I work part-time for the Alliance for Education. The purpose of the Alliance for Education is to serve as a liason for businesses and schools for the purpose of helping business partners relate to students in schools the importance of math and demonstrate authenticate application of how the math that they are learning in the classroom works. The organization was created seven years ago in response to a lack of qualified students in San Bernardino County who were prepared to enter professional careers because of their poor math skills.

To save business partners time and to ensure that what they present offers clear relevancy to math, I meet with business partners who have expressed an interest in working with the Alliance for education. At the meeting with the business partners, we discuss our purpose and ask in what ways they use math in their careers. Once some applications are found, I create a sample problem and show it to the business partner to clarify that the problem created is an authentic application of how they really use math. Once this is modified, a lesson is created for the business partner as well as the activity for the students to experience in as real a was as possible to teach the ideas of the lesson. After some feedback is received from the business partner, the lesson is amended and field tested by us. Feedback is collected, and adjustments are made in order to give the lesson greater relevance. Finally, the business partner presents the lesson for the first time with me in the classroom, and adjustments are made as needed.

For developing my lesson with SchoolsFirst, I met with them in March to discuss what type of math they used in banking. After some initial brainstorming, we thought that car loans would be a great way of hooking students' interest.

I was given a formula used in the banking industry and created a sample problem to bring back to ensure that it authentically represented the problem as the bank does it. Although the banks have computer programs that perform the calculations, the formula in the sample problem was an adequate representation of how banks determine the maximum car payment may be eligible for. From here, I created an entire lesson including vocabulary development and three sample problems. Also included was an activity that allowed students to roll dice to play a game to determine monthly income, rent and credit payments. With some feedback from the banks, minor changes were made.

Needing to field test the lesson, I chose to try the lesson myself with six classes of foster youth students on a Saturday, May 16th to see if the lesson would flow smoothly and would relate well with students. This would serve as my Alpha Test. After delivering the lesson a couple of times, I made a couple of additional changes, including clearly showing how certain calculations were performed with cancellations involved before having it presented to the business partner.

On May 31st, SchoolsFirst presented it to Chaffey High School - due to one of the partners being sick, I did the math portion the first two times in order that he could save his voice. He was feeling better by late morning, and he did the third presentation by himself. We found that in the time that we had, we never got to the third example - this appeared in this round because when I did the testing, I did not use the time in the beginning of the lesson to offer background, as I was not a business partner, and did not need the time to present myself. It was decided to keep the third problem as part of the power point presentation in order that it may be used in the future in case the lesson went faster in the future.

As one of the first lessons I developed, it was a real learning experience to have the opportunity to work with the business partner as well as present a portion of the lesson to the students. One of my first lessons I learned is that the time of business people is valuable, and the more that you can do for them to simplify what you can do, the more willing they will be to help out. Respect for their time (especially when they are donating it) is critical. Secondly, listening carefully to business partners and what they need is also important. Finally, having the chance to field test the program yourself was helpful for improving it, but if possible, it is better if the business partner can be part of the process as well. In this instance, it was not possible, but because we were overprepared for the presentation, it still went well.

All in all, I enjoy working on these activites, and am continuing to develop more lessons that will be in several school across the West End of the county next year.