Golly! I Mastered Pre-Algebra & Had Fun Practicing With Friends | Part 1 of 6 | Operations with Integers (FLEX)

With Pre-Algebra, mastery has to be the goal. And the right teacher knows she can get your learner there. You, as a parent or as a learner, should make sure that someone beginning this class has the foundational math skills such as addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division and some basic understanding of fractions.

This is a FLEX class, so there are no live lessons. That makes it perfect for those who can't meet during my scheduled live classes. I often have families whose learners want to take my classes because they do well with my teaching style, but a specific class doesn't fit their schedule. They have found the flex classes not only fit the schedule, but offer many advantages and they enjoy the community that develops from our activities we do together.

Here is how it works:

Each week on Monday morning your learner will get assigned a weekly assignment that will be due on Friday. It will be in the form of a Nearpod Activity Link. Nearpod is easy to access and requires no logging in. When they hit the link, they simply put a name in - it can simply be their first name if they like. I will receive a report of their finished work.

They will also receive, on Monday morning, their first of two recorded lessons in the week. That will also be a Nearpod link, and embedded in the lesson are my short video-recorded lessons along with interactive games, fun mini-projects, and polls. The results of their interactions with these are received by me, the teacher, through Nearpod.

The fun mini-projects are just that - fun and mini. They won't stress out your learner, but they will get your learner posting an "I have a problem to stump you with" game.  To build a richer learning experience with the team of learners taking this class, each lesson will have a challenge to see if students can (in the spirit of positive learning) come up with great problems to solve.  Your learner will share his/her problems by saying, "I have a problem for you... will it stump you?"  We'll see who is not stumpable!!!

On Wednesday morning they will receive the second of the two lessons for the week.  It will be modeled the same way as the Monday Nearpod lessons with  brief video recordings of me teaching and embedded places in the recording where your students can interact. Those interactions and the results of activities and games they do will be something that will generate a report for me, the teacher, so that I know they are participating and progressing.

We will repeat that cycle for each of the four weeks and have a final assessment at the end that your student will do on Nearpod. Upon completion of the assessment, I will send a final report to the parent of each learner.

The activities can be polls, games, or quizzes. I will show them the results of this poll on the classroom page so that they can discuss it and get to know each other. There are match games, timed races to answer problems, fill in the blanks, and drag and drops. 

These interactions have worked well in my FLEX classes!

The material I cover along with the content of the videos is very much like the live classes I teach on the same topic.  I have had many students and parents tell me they love my style of teaching and interacting with the students, but one of two obstacles get in the way of signing up for or staying in the live classes.  Either there is a scheduling conflict, or the student wants to move at a more accelerated classroom pace than I can do in a live class because I believe so strongly in making sure all students are reaching mastery.   With the FLEX format, students can go as fast or as slow as is appropriate for their learning needs.

I teach each concept thoroughly and with positive energy so that students stay engaged.  As I teach the content, I have the learners interact through Nearpod so that they are fully involved like they would be in a live classroom.

Links to the Nearpod meetings will be posted to the Outschool classroom page each week on Monday and again on Thursday.  The classroom page will be used for class administration discussions and any specific questions about methodology.   The other discussions and communication points will be done in Nearpod.  

The course is called, "Mastered Pre-Algebra & Had Fun Practicing With Friends"! Level 1 FLEX 
In it, we cover the following topics:

Week	1	:	 Place Values of Digits and Expanded/Standard Forms
                               Rounding and Regrouping Whole Numbers

Week	2	:	 Order of Operations
                               Writing and Intuiting Expressions

Week	3	:	 Negative Numbers, opposites, Absolute Values
                               Adding, Subtracting, Multiplying, Dividing Negatives

Week	4	:	 Arithmetic Properties of Multiplication - Commutative/Associative
                               Arithmetic Properties of Multiplication - Distributive

Week         5:           Course Review
                               Final Assessment

Where this class fits within my Pre-Algebra classes: 
My Pre-Algebra classes fall into 6 parts.  The first two pars focus on Integers in Equations and Expressions. These two have a violet background.  

The next two parts (parts 3 and 4) focus on Fractions, Decimals, Percents, Ratios and Proportions. These two have the dark blue background.  

The last two parts (parts 5 and 6) focus on Charts, Statistics, Exponents, and Shapes. These have the gold-colored background).

All six parts work together to form an entire Pre-Algebra year long course. Your student can complete this in as little as 24 weeks by staying with the 4 weeks per part (or they are also called levels).  But on the last week of each level is an assessment for the content of that level.  Feel free as a homeschooled parent to use those assessments to calculate your child's grade.  Or, if your learner is not homeschooled, feel free to use those assessments to benchmark how well your learner is doing.

I intentionally include the assessment as part of the forth week of each level. However, if I were teaching the course to a class, this assessment would take an extra week of time for study review and proctoring. I leave that up to the parent and learner. If you feel you need an extra week, the material will still be available for you work work on through the Nearpod links, and you can simply take an extra week before signing up for the next level.

The class is designed for the student to complete all of their work in class.  Additional problems are provided for students who need additional practice for mastery.