For example, one project called for students to predict the changing hours of daylight over the year. Students collected data on certain days, then developed a formula that could be applied to predict the amount of daylight on any given day. To teach the concept of calculating probabilities, Girard's students designed their own carnival games. As a reward at the end of the unit, they spent the final class playing the games. Another class studied functions using a fictional ostrich farm.
Students retain more when they connect what they've learned with real-life examples.
Girard also sees value in the emerging tools available to math students. If music students can use their clarinets and saxophones to make music, Girard reasons that math students can use their calculators to do mathematics. It's made more math accessible to a greater range of students. For Girard, the poster sums up her teaching philosophy. Twenty years from now, I don't want to hear any former students apologize because they can't balance a checkbook.