TGC Monthly August/September

TEXAS

August September 2014

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GRADUATE

Rey Jope on the the importance of teaching Perspective in Mathematics

Monthly

Spotlight: TGC Students register for 2014 Fall Courses

CENTER

RGV administrators convene at the TGC to discuss formation of Cohort III

TGC Harvard students prepare for Fall 2014 classes

August - September 2014 Annenburg hall, harvard university

TEXAS

GRADUATE

CENTER Monthly

President Dr. Roland Arriola Executive Director Dr. Mary Alice Reyes

About Us:

The Texas Graduate Center (TGC), a component of the Texas Valley Communities Foundation, has been established to support programs in higher education that will guide new and emerging leaders in education to implement transformational change that will impact schools and communities. TGC will offer distance learning graduate programs from outstanding universities in the areas of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics. The TGC will make available the latest telepresence technology and virtual classrooms with direct connection to world-class undergraduate and graduate programs from across the country. TGC will also serve as a college and career readiness facilitator offering assistance in selecting, preparing and enrolling in nationally recognized graduate programs.

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Associate Director Adriana V. Lopez Designer & photographer David Alvarado Academic Advisor Dr. Edwin LeMaster TGC OFFICES 1098 W. Expressway 83 Mercedes, Texas 78570

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In this issue...

Harvard University Extension School

The Texas Graduate Center has partnered with the Harvard University Extension School to implement the Math for Teaching Graduate Program. Harvard Extension School is one of the twelve degreegranting schools of Harvard University, offering professional certificates and liberal arts-based undergraduate and graduate degree programs aimed at nontraditional students, as well as openenrollment continuing education courses.

05 Overview of Fall 2014 Harvard Courses

A brief overview into the instructional courses Texas Graduate School Scholar will be undertaking for the 2014-15 academic school year...

06 TGC Scholars reflect on Summer experience

TGC Scholars spent three to seven weeks fullfilling their summer residency requirement at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts...

08 An Eye on Perspective

TGC Scholar and McAllen ISD teacher Rey Jope writes scholarly paper on keeping perspective in mathematics curriculum...

12 Cohort III: Area School Administrators meet TGC hosted several representatives from Rio Grande Valley area school districts interested in joining the TGC’s MATHTEACH Collaborative...

14 Teacher impact by the numbers

“One teacher in area schools with a graduate degree would impact 120 students a year; in ten years that same teacher would impact 1,200...”

16 La Joya: CAMT Share Fair

TGC Director was invited to be the keynote speaker at the annual Conference for the Advancement of Mathematics Teaching (CAMT)...

The Flagellation of Christ (probably 1455–1460) is a painting

by Piero della Francesca in the Galleria Nazionale delle Marche in Urbino, Italy. Called by one writer an “enigmatic little painting,” the composition is complex and unusual, and its iconography has been the subject of widely differing theories.

G.E.M.

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GIRLS ENGAGED IN MATHEMATICS

Building CONFIDENCE and reducing MATH ANXIETY The notion that only boys can become scientists and engineers has persisted over time. Studies have shown that negative stereotypes about girls’ abilities in mathematics and science have impacted their performance in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and math) areas.

to schedule a gem camp at your school, contact: Executive Director Dr. Mary Alice Reyes 956.903.4231 mareyes@tvcof.org 4 | Texas Graduate Center

Girls Engaged in Mathematics is a public-private initiative of the Texas Valley Communities Foundation in partnership with La Joya ISD

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Fall 2014 Harvard Courses A brief overview of the instructional courses Texas Graduate Center Scholars will be taking during the Fall 2014 semester.

Mathematics E-15 Fall 2014 Saving Schools: History, Politics, and Policy in U.S. Education Instructor: Dr. Paul E. Peterson This course seeks to answer the question: How did a school system, once the envy of the world, stumble so that the performance in math, science, and reading of U.S. students at age 15 fell below that of students in a majority of the world’s industrialized nations?

Exploring that question, we identify the personalities and historical forces—the progressives, racial desegregation, legalization and collective bargaining—that shaped and re-shaped U.S. school politics and policy.

Instructor: Eric Towne This is a complete course in first-semester calculus. Topics include the meaning, use, and interpretation of the derivative; techniques of differentiation; applications to curve sketching and optimization in a variety of disciplines; the definite integral and some applications; and the Fundamental Theorem of Calculus.

Math E300 Math for Teaching: Arithmetic Instructor: Dr. Andy Engelward

STAT E-100 Introduction to Quantitative Methods for the Social Sciences and Humanities Instructor: Dr. Luke Miratrix This course introduces the basic concepts of statistical inference and statistical computing, both increasingly used in the social sciences and the humanities. The emphasis of this course is on statistical reasoning, visualization, data analysis, and use of statistical software instead of theory analyses.

Math E300 was created for middle school and high school mathematics teachers to give teachers a chance to explore the inner workings of fundamental issues involved in arithmetic as well as the basis for working with a variety of number systems things that many people often take for granted.

It turns out that there are a number of very intricate issues involved in the “simple” story of arithmetic.

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Harvard Summer Residency 2014: TGC Scholars reflect on their experience

T

GC scholars participating in the Harvard Math for Teaching graduate program spent three-toseven weeks at Harvard fulfilling their summer residency requirement.

After each semester, we ask them to take some time to reflect on their experience.

This is an important part of our data collection for the improvement of our programs at the Texas Graduate Center.

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Rey Jope McAllen ISD

“ With my first Harvard Summer School experience on my sleeve, this new school year I am far more confident in front of my students, but more sensitive to their needs. I am braver at taking new initiatives, but more calculating. I am a better teacher, and I am Harvard.”

Diana A. Garcia South Texas ISD

“This semester was a unique experience. I now appreciate certain things a little more because of it and I have learned that sometimes we take certain things for granted. Being away from my family is difficult but being at Harvard is an opportunity of a lifetime. The way I see it is that I am making a sacrifice now so that my family, my students and I can have a better future. Thank you Texas Graduate Center for bringing this opportunity to the Valley.”

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Queen Martin La Joya ISD

Corazon Bautista Hidalgo ISD

“Our Calculus class was fantastic! I’ve never learned Calculus in a perspective that Dr. Otto Bretscher presented to us. In a very condensed period, he taught us the applications and how Calculus differentiations and integrations came about, something I had not learned even with three semesters of Calculus back in college.”

“ I enjoy every minute of going back to school.

Most of the time I could not help asking myself if I really deserve all these things. Who would think of getting free education at Harvard University? I am literally paid for doing something I always love to do – study and learn Math! I am indeed very grateful to be part of this program and I look forward to my last summer in 2015.”

Juan Barrera PSJA ISD

Homer Colunga Weslaco ISD

“One of the things that I enjoyed about the Adam’s House [dormitory] was that I got to experience the college life of an undergrad/ graduate student. I can now go back to my students and share with them the experiences that I had. Overall, I enjoyed the summer and all it has taught me. I cannot wait to bring back and share everything I have learned with my students and co-workers. I’m grateful for the opportunity TGC, PSJA ISD and GEAR UP has given me.”

“I was truly impressed with the Calculus I course. I leave it to my students to memorize formulas, but I have never been able to offer reasoning for concepts. Professor Otto Bretscher truly opened my eyes to the conceptually defining foundations of Calculus. What I truly loved was the great relationship and rapport that Harvard Faculty have with students. Dr. Bretscher invited us to the Harvard Faculty Club and even ate lunch with us at Annenberg Dining Hall!

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An

Eye On By: Reynaldo Jope

Perspective

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Harvard grad student writes scholarly paper on keeping perspective in math curriculum

I

n Frontiers of Space, the third installment in the BBC documentary series, The Story of Maths1, highlights included mathematics in art, mathematics of objects in motion, development of modern number theory, the beginnings of hyperbolic geometry, and the rise of calculus. All these are obviously integral parts of the history of mathematics with unfathomable repercussions in the present and future endeavors of mankind. But the one single word that I am going to pluck from said videography to reckon with is the word perspective. In introducing the Italian artist cum mathematician named Piero

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Piero’s The Flagellation of Christ Observe how the use of perspective successfully gives the viewer a 3D sense of the scenario being portrayed on a 2D medium.

della Francesco in Frontiers of Space, Prof. Marcus du Sautoy, writer and narrator of all four installments of the UK-produced documentary series, claimed that the use of perspective “caused a mathematical revolution.”2 Although his failure to explain how exactly it caused such a revolution disappointed me, I found myself somehow casting an eye on the word Perspective in drawing is in the pages of the textbook that I use in teaching my Geometry classes. But due to perceived time constraints, I usually dropped the lesson in favor of other lessons that have higher prominence in the state exam. Sautoy’s presentation reminded me that, as Piero and other great minds before us have successfully demonstrated, mathematics can enhance art and art’s potential to tell powerful stories and touch the world.

Sautoy began his third series installment with a well-deserved bow to Piero, the artist behind celebrated masterpieces such as The Flagellation of Christ and

“his most famous work”3, The Legend of the True Cross, a cycle of frescoes.

He said that the Early Renaissance artist was “the first major painter to fully understand perspective, and that’s because he was a mathematician as well as an artist.” Wolfram Mathworld defines perspective as “the art and mathematics of realistically depicting three-dimensional objects in a two-dimensional plane.”4 The same Internet website features the following photo, which exemplifies the three different types of perspectives.

“Over the years, my lessons on perspective in art and mathematics were, time and again, relegated to the trove of less important lessons when time wasn’t on my side. I have come to a decision to recall perspective and let it flourish in my classroom. I believe that math is lost without context. Since art appreciation is inherent in our human condition, in teaching perspective, with a dose of math history and a dash of homegrown common sense, I should find higher efficiency in my delivery of math to my students in a perspective that matters the most: theirs.”

- Rey Jope, Cohort II – McAllen ISD

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Cohort III is now forming for Jan 2015!

Texas Graduate Center Learning for the 21st century

• 3-year Master’s of Mathematics for Teaching graduate program with Harvard Extension School; • Fall/ Spring classes will take place at the TGC – Mercedes, TX; • Summer classes will take place at Harvard University – Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Qualifications: • Minimum undergraduate degree GPA of 3.0 • Minimum 2 years teaching experience in secondary mathematics or related field • Must be currently teaching secondary mathematics or a related field

Apply now (Deadline Oct. 24)

www.txgradcenter.org/application

Texas Graduate Center is a public-private intiative of the Texas Valley Communities Foundation

CONTACT: Dr. Mary Alice Reyes, mareyes@tvcof.org 956.903.4231 – 1098 W. Expressway 83, Mercedes TX

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Area School Administrators meet to discuss formation of Cohort III The Texas Graduate Center (TGC) recently hosted representatives from Rio Grande Valley school districts interested in joining the TGC’s MATHTEACH Collaborative. MATHTEACH is composed of local school districts committed to supporting their teachers in earning a Master of Liberal Arts in Mathematics for Teaching from Harvard University. Representatives included Rebeca Garza, HR Administrator with PSJA ISD, Cris Valdes, Assistant Superintendent of Curriculum and Instruction at Mission CISD, Liz Stenhouse, HR Specialist at Mercedes ISD, and Carmen Esquivel, College and Career Readiness Supervisor with Edinburg CISD. Deadline for application to Cohort III is October 24, 2014.

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he Texas Graduate Center (TGC) is on its way to fulfilling its goal of impacting more than 300,000 mathematics students in the Rio Grande Valley (RGV). The Harvard Math for Teaching Masters program will grow to include a third cohort this Spring.

Currently, there are sixteen local math teachers pursuing their masters degree from Harvard University Extension School. No other RGV educational institute has more students currently enrolled at Harvard, an exciting accomplishment for an RGV educational foundation.

THE IMPACT OF MATHEMATICS IN OUR LIVES From times immemorial, mathematics has been the backbone of any civilization.

Even in the past times, the more

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successful clans were those which adopted and polished the concepts of mathematics.

The brilliance of the Egyptian civilization in the field of construction and architecture might well be a product of their mathematical skills. The writings and the scribblings found on the walls of the Egyptian monuments point towards the interest that those people took in mathematics. Architecture would be a chaotic mess without the rules of measurement

provided by mathematics.

Most modern cities are planned using mathematical tools. It is impossible to even imagine a structured society without the knowledge of mathematics at its core. Mathematical algorithms are responsible for the advanced technologies that we have on or disposal in the form of super fast computers and digital processors.

In fact, the binary number system is the language that is used to interact with computers. This binary code is a provision made by mathematics.

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Without this, a computer would just be a metallic junk. Prominent sciences like physics and chemistry would be rendered incomplete without the aid of mathematical theories.

The human race enjoys a superlative position in the ecological set up. And this is because humans are able to apply their mind and logical reasoning to handle their troubles and problems, apart from having the skill to foresee and anticipate the probabilities of the future.

These qualities would be hard to foster without the inclusion of mathematics as a compulsory subject for students. Business houses use statistical interpretation of data, which enables them to deduce out hidden patterns from raw data, thus enabling them to make appropriate changes in their working in order to achieve the desired results. Graphs, pie-charts, histograms; all mathematical tools, allow easy and effective representation of information in graphical form, thus facilitating easier understanding.

The concepts of geometry are employed for the understanding of the crystal structure of various chemical substances.

students

Cataloging of chemical experimentation is also made easier through the concepts of mathematics. Error correction mathematical coding techniques make communication secure and reliable. These codes also make a momentous building block of the contemporary entertainment devices. Hence, it can easily be established that mathematics has always been a contributor towards social and economical progress, and it would continue to be so in the future as well. -Adapted from www. adorablescience.com

in 10 years will have an impact on

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Texas Graduate Center Executive Director Dr. Mary Alice Reyes delivers her keynote speech titled “I’m a Girl and I Love Math.”

CAMT Share Fair

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r. Mary Alice Reyes, Executive Director of the Texas Graduate Center (TGC), was invited to be the keynote speaker at this years Conference for the Advancement of Mathematics Teaching (CAMT) “Rebranding Math” Share Fair in La Joya ISD. Dr. Reyes addressed more than 150 La Joya ISD teachers on the importance of supporting girls in the areas of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM).

Her speech, titled “I’m a Girl and I Love Math,” focused on the alarming statistics facing girls in respect to careers in STEM, and more

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importantly, what administrators and educators can do to turn those statistics around.

She highlighted Girls Engaged in Mathematics (GEM) summer camp which launched in La Joya ISD this past summer. The camp focused on fifth grade girls entering sixth grade. The goal of the camp was to not only sharpen their abilities in mathematics but to help build their confidence in the subject as well.

Servando Abad, a teacher at La Joya’s West Academy, found Dr. Reyes’ speech inspiring, not only professionally, but on a personal

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ABOVE: Dr. Reyes spoke to a crowd of La Joya ISD mathematics teachers from various schools.

CENTER: The CAMT Share Fair gave Dr. Reyes the oppourtunity to connect with administrators and teachers interested in motivating students towards fields in mathematics.

BELOW: Dr. Reyes being interviewed by KLJS-TV, La Joya ISD’s local news channel

level as well. “I have two daughters. Its good information for me personally because I can motivate my daughters to like math” he said.

Also presenting at the Share Fair was TGC scholar and Harvard graduate student Queen Martin.

Martin’s presentation, titled “Let’s Multiply,” showcased different strategies for teaching multiplication.

Martin had her audience stand and practice all the techniques with their fellow attendees. “This is fun!” said an audience member as she participated in a “Rock, Paper, Multiply” game inspired by the traditional “Rock, Paper, Scissors” game.

The annual Share Fair was organized by Lucy Munoz, La Joya ISD Elementary Math Coordinator and Rio Grande Valley Council of Teachers of Mathematics (RGVCTM) President. Ms. Munoz was integral in coordinating the GEM Summer Camp for the district. Having struggled with math herself as a young girl, Ms. Munoz knows the value of camps like GEM to help boost confidence and ability in young girls.

August - September 2014 RIGHT: Also presenting at the Share Fair was TGC scholar and Harvard graduate student Queen Martin. Martin’s presentation, titled “Let’s Multiply,” showcased different strategies for teaching multiplication.

BELOW: Line Multiplication method works because the number of lines are like placeholders (at powers of 10: 1, 10, 100, etc.), and the number of dots at each intersection is a product of the number of lines. You are then summing up all the products that are coefficients of the same power of 10.

BOTTOM: Teachers in the audience were encouraged to learn about the new strategies which included “Finger Multiplication,” “Line Multiplication,” and “Lattice Multiplication.”

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Finger-method Multiplication

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Thank you to our MATHTEACH Collaborative Partners:

The Texas Graduate Center is a public-private initiative of the Texas Valley Communities Foundation.

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