At 7:05am Monday morning 25ish 9th graders will grace me with their presence and will forever be known as “My First Class Ever.” The nightmares haven’t started—yet. You know the ones: students tying up the teacher and dancing on desks. But I’m sure they’ll make their way into my subconscious over the weekend.
My goal for the first week of school? Survival.
Last Friday I was informed I was teaching Informal Geometry and nearly died. I hate Geometry would prefer not to teach Geometry. I finally wrapped my head around the whole thing and then, BAM! Monday morning they switched me to Agile Mind Algebra. OK, so Algebra is wonderful, but what is this Agile Mind business?
I wasn’t formally introduced to Agile Mind until today during training. I was thinking I was going to be handcuffed to my computer all weekend exploring the Agile Mind site. (The whole curriculum is online- no textbooks!) Not so much. They’re performing maintenance on the site this weekend. (Cue in panic attack.)
Luckily, I was able to print out a lot of stuff today and had the opportunity to navigate the site. I would have still liked more time, but, really, what can I do. I’m not a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants type of person (aka I’m anal), so I’m still anxious about trying to teach this brand new (to me and the district) curriculum on Monday.
To top things off, my classroom is still not completely set up. I’m thinking I will do the essentials over the next few days and then just make changes as the school year progresses. I really just don’t like this unprepared feeling. Ask my husband- I think he’s ready to kill me. (At least he has already made the determination that he will not be seeing much of me this weekend.)
The Education of Future Math Ninjas 
Hi, new reader to your blog. Would love to hear about your Agile Mind Classes. We used to use Agile Mind at my old campus, but it never really took off. Anway, welcome to the world of math blogging! It’s a great community where you will find lots of support and encouragement.
Thank you! Today was day 3 of the classes and it went much smoother than the first two days. I think the kiddos and I will get the hang of it soon!
I see you’re still alive. Lol…I’m curious about this Agile Mind. Would you mind sharing the link?!
LOL- I am! You can check out Agile Mind at http://www.agilemind.com. You can’t see the actual curriculum without a login though.
Hope that classes are continuing to go well…it gets better every year! Have you read the Letters to a New Teacher blog post series? I found it so useful (even starting my fifth year).
I have read that post- it was so helpful! Thanks!
Welcome to math blogging and math teaching!! You have a great start with getting into the blogging community right off the bat. This is my third year teaching, and I just discovered the wonders of the math blogger community. It has been so helpful in getting ideas and just reading from other experiences.
The Agile Mind Algebra seems very intriguing. Is it set up to be more exploratory for the students, or is it just transferring materials online? I will be sure to follow how it goes. I have an Algebra Extended math class which can be a high maintenance class. The ordinary lectures tend not to fly well with the students in this particular class. I hope to share and bounce ideas with you.
Thanks, Erin! I stumbled upon math blogs during my student teaching experience while searching the internet (and Pinterest) for fun teaching stuff. I am SO glad I did. It’s so fantastic to see such great teachers come together to share stuff that worked, as well as stuff that didn’t.
Agile Mind has some exploratory activities (mind you, I have not looked too far ahead of where we are now in the curriculum) and it is online-based with the students having a consumable workbook. I’m planning on doing a more detailed post this week about the curriculum, so stay tuned!