Exponential & Log Functions Scavenger Hunt

Has post-Spring Break, end-of-year craziness hit anyone else yet?  Holy Cow! All I can say about this week is "thank goodness it's over and we all survived"!!  The first day back from Spring Break we spent about 45 minutes in the hallway with our kids sitting out a tornado warning (can I just say that when you put a few hundred teenagers in a hallway with no AC vents and no windows it gets rather stifling pretty quickly) and Wednesday was an un-planned day out due to the threat of severe tornadoes across the area (thank goodness all we wound up with was a little bit of rain - definitely an answer to prayer).   Let's hope that things settle down for the next two weeks before we start standardized testing.  Yep, testing season is almost upon us.  The only good thing I can say about that is it means summer is just around the corner.

Since the weather did not cooperate with me this week and completely messed up my plans to test Friday I was scrambling to come up with an activity for my Honors Advanced Algebra classes that wasn't a waste of a day, but would give 7th pd the opportunity to get caught back up with my other two classes (did I mention that we completely missed 7th pd Monday due to the tornado warning and that my entire 7th pd class was out the day before Spring Break due to a field trip).  Scavenger hunt to the rescue.  What teenager doesn't love the opportunity to wander the hallway for 45 minutes?  On my hallway we love hallway work.  At least once a week you will find someone with their class in the hallway doing some kind of activity.  If you haven't tried it, you should.  It gives the kids a chance to get up and moving without tripping over desks and bookbags (in a classroom the size of mine that is definitely a hazard).  I can stand in the middle of the hall and see both directions and keep an eye on my kids, and (here's the awesome thing) THE KIDS WORK.  There is definitely something to be said for getting the kids out of their desks and getting them moving.  In my opinion they spend way too much of their day sitting passively rather than engaging actively.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not anti-lecture.  I have been know to lecture for a full class period when the need arises, and sometimes it does.  I'm just saying that sitting in a desk from 7:45 to 2:45 5 days a week is a bit ridiculous.

Off my soapbox and back to the scavenger hunt.  Advanced Algebra is in the middle of our Exponential & Logarithmic Functions unit, and we have been working with graphing and comparing functions and their characteristics.  I put together a 13 question scavenger hunt with multiple choice questions related to these topics.  Some of the questions are easier than others, but the goal was to make them think about the graphs and characteristics without completely sketching the graph.  Here are a few sample questions.

Question 1 - Finding the domain of a logarithmic function

Question 7 - Determining the inverse of a logarithmic function

Question 9 - Identifying the correct graph of a logarithmic function

Question 11 - Analyzing and comparing a function and a transformation

I have my kids take a piece of notebook paper with them to write down the question number, answer, and any work they need to show.  If they make a mistake they quickly get stuck in a loop and wind up back at a question they've already done.  I take a copy of the answer key out with me so I can quickly check their work, identify where they made their mistake, and send them back to where they went wrong.  The discussions my kids have while working through this kind of activity are great to hear.  They will argue their reasoning with their classmates, justifying their answers and finding flaws in each other's logic.  It's also not unusual to hear "Ms. M - tell them I'm right because....".  I find activities like this are very effective in making students really think about what the question is asking.  Unlike a multiple choice practice worksheet where they will just circle an answer and hope it's right, in an activity like this they know if they answer wrong it is going to mess them up so they put a lot more thought into what they are doing.  

The set-up is not too difficult either.  Once you have the questions written start with #1 and assign the correct answer the question you want them to go to next.  After each correct answer has a question number assigned to it, then I go through and randomly assign another question number to each of the incorrect answers.  I highly recommend that you write down the correct question sequence along with the correct answers as you are doing this.  It will save you a LOT of time later.  

If you are interested in this activity, or any of my others, please visit my Teachers Pay Teachers Store.  

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Exponential-Logarithmic-Functions-Scavenger-Hunt-3095851

Poster Project Alternative

Just like every other teacher I know, my goal is not only to teach the content of my course, but also to prepare my students for the next level as much as possible.  Sometimes in the pressure of making sure students are prepared for THE TEST at the end of the year and that we teach all the standards of our courses, we lose sense of the bigger picture and forget that for our students leaving our class is not the end.  Next year they will move on to something else.  Whether that next step is the next grade/course, a job, or college is irrelevant.  The point is, for our students the class we teach is not the end but is merely a stepping stone on their path.  With that in mind, I have intentionally focused this year on making assignments that prepare my students for the next step.

I have discovered over the last several years that while we assume our students are technology savvy, most of mine are not.  Anything that is not a social media app that runs through their cell phones seems to be out of their realm of experience.  I don't know if my students are the exception, but they seem to struggle with figuring out how to manipulate new programs.  With this in mind, knowing that many of my students will be going on to college and job opportunities that require the ability to figure out how to manipulate new programs, I decided that this was an area I needed to address in my class. 

This week in Honors Advanced Algebra we tackled a project that required students to make an infographic using a web-based program that was unfamiliar.  Prior to beginning the project I discussed the motivation for the project with my students and explained my reasoning for requiring them to use a program with which they were unfamiliar.  I also made a sample for my students and posted it in my room so my students had a visual of what an infographic looks like.  My students rose to the challenge, which I'm very excited about.   The assignment, as well links to a few samples are linked below.  This project was designed as a summary of transformations of cube root functions, but it could be easily modified for a different function type.  Also, my sample infographic was based on square root functions so that students could view a model, but they could not simply copy and paste my work.  

Sample Infographic

Student Sample Product #1

Student Sample Product #2

Desmos Activities

Thanks to one of our county curriculum coordinators, I have discovered Desmos Activities.  I have used the Desmos online graphing calculator for several years, but had never checked out the options for classroom activities.  I must say, I wish I had done so sooner (no, Desmos is not paying me to advertise).  There are quite a few pre-made activities to choose from; some made by the Desmos staff and some shared by teachers.  There is also a feature that allows you to create and share your own activities.

I took advantage of the ability to create your own activities and made one for my Geometry kids to practice with the properties of parallelograms.  Here are a few screen shots of my activity.

Multiple Select Question

Free Response Question

Card Sort

I checked out a classroom set of Chromebooks from our Media Center (we are blessed with access to such technology) and did this as a classroom activity.  My students enjoyed the variation in our routine, and I was able to see their work on my iPad and give feedback as they were working.  I will definitely use this activity again.

I have set up another activity for my Honors Advanced Algebra students to investigate the graphs of cube root functions.  We will do this after we return in January.  Hopefully it goes as well as the one that I did with my Geometry classes in November.  Here are a few screen shots from the Advanced Algebra activity.  

Free Response - Students can view each others' answers

Graph with sliders so students can investigate the impact of changing various parameters

Students create their own graph

Free Response - Answer viewable only by the teacher

Multiple Select Question

The links to my activities are below.  Check out some of the other activities available also.  There is lots out there!

Advanced Algebra - Graphing Cube Root Functions

Geometry - Properties of Parallelograms

Free Graphing Tool

So I've finally started planning for this year.  I don't have as much done as I had hoped, but does anyone ever?  For my Honors Advanced Algebra class I wanted to design a task where my students analyzed a piecewise function created out of linear and quadratic functions.  I typically use Geogebra and Desmos to create the graphs that I use in handouts and assignments, but I couldn't figure out how to get either one to easily and nicely graph piecewise functions.  In my case necessity is always the mother of a google search.  Fortunately this time I was successful.  I found an awesome (free) graphing tool that will not only graph piecewise functions, it will graph asymptotes, implicit functions and slope fields.  While I won't use all those features, our AP Calculus teacher was quite excited about them.  The site isn't very fancy looking but it's fairly easy to figure out and is definitely a good addition to any list of math resources.  Amazingly enough it is just called "GraphFree" and the website is www.graphfree.com.  I hope you find it as helpful as I did.

Home Page of GraphFree

Snapshot of Graphing Features