She included writing standards and a planning guide. She also gave parents a checklist for assisting their children in the final project that entailed building a flying machine and writing a paper about it. In another note home to parents on multiplying and dividing large numbers, DePriest told parents five ways a child might divide 245 by eight. Teacher Jana DePriest plays a math card game with her students. I wanted them to know that just because I was not using a traditional textbook, I was still teaching math and had done my research.
Parents feel welcome to come to class, sit at their child s table, and dive into the work.
Dad Steve Miller arrives as his daughter, Lindsey, and classmate Emma are puzzling over a graph that has five vertical bars, but no title, and no numbers. The students task is to figure out what the bar graph might be representing. DePriest wasn t looking for just one answer. Any reasonable solution would be okay. Miller picks up one of their calculators and starts helping.