MU_MN_3RD_03-20_N_B_F_13_C www.thestarpress.com Sunday, March 20, 2011 • 33E
Noon-1 p.m.: Eager for knowledge
There are lessons of compassion as well. As Norris explains this day’s homework, she kindly requests of her students that they use the numbers 0, 1 and 2 to work equations. They can use any number they want to find correct answers, but, Norris explains, doing so would make grading a much more time-consuming process for her. Her students smile at the notion. SMART Boards Northside Middle School is home to four SMART Boards. Two reside permanently in the math department while the others float around the school for teachers to share.
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more time-consuming process for her. Her students smile at or the first day in nine calendar days, the students of Northside Middle School are back for a full day of the notion. classes. A snow/ice storm the week before made for a Halfway through this hour and after a passing period, teachseries of closings followed by days shortened by twoer Tyann Gillum is standing upstairs outside of her door, room hour delays. 218, welcoming her eighth-grade social studies students. Yet the long layoff has not created the drowsy, slow-moving Class begins with a silent reading session. Today it’s a sheet students one might expect. on Diana Ross, part of Black History focus, a daily reading for In room 109, the room of 11-year teaching veteran Joanne this group. Norris, a classroom full of sixth-grade math students not only Later in the class, students break up into “constitution seems attentive, but downright eager to learn about, of all groups.” The six groups work on the project they are about things, linear functions. Words like “variables” and “coefficients” fill the air. The students start their class with a problem of the day, to which the answer is “y=-4x+2.” It’s a review of the work they had done the day before. Today, the group continues its progression in the world of graphing three spots on a chart to form a line. It is a fairly active class. Four to five kids raise their hands for each question Norris asks of them. One girl, Maddie, who sits in the middle of the classroom, wants a crack at every answer. As the teacher next door can be heard raising her voice a bit through the retractable wall, Norris asks that the lights be turned off. Today’s lesson, like so many for Norris, is to be carried out on the real star of the show, a SMART Board — an interactive screen that the teacher and students can write on using Word documents as GREG FALLON / THE STAR PRESS a modern-day answer to the Northside Middle School sixth-grade math teach Joanne Norris works on linear equations with her students. chalk board. The students are especially energized by this, eagerly awaiting the moment near the to present to the entire class — a rhyme, rap or rhythm using end of class when Norris asks for volunteers to come work specific vocabulary words. Today, there are words like unconsome equations on the gadget. Every hand in class goes up for stitutional, bond, inauguration and impose, among others. that request. Some even leap from their seat in anticipation. The words each group struggles to use correctly, however, are Says Norris of their enthusiasm after the snow days, “They precedent and speculator. were ready to come back. They got their rest.” After group presentations, the class transitions into a bit But this is not just a math class. There are other lessons of a lecture/discussion, first reviewing some material about being taught here, too. Like those of attentiveness, when “Thomas Jefferson and The Bitter Campaign.” And finally, Norris asks whether there are questions about last night’s just before the clock strikes 1 p.m., Gillum begins a discussion homework but reminds the class that they should “listen about inaugurations. closely, because I’m not answering the same question twice.” “How many of you saw President Obama get inaugurated There are lessons of compassion as well. As Norris last year? It would have been around your lunch period,” she explains this day’s homework, she kindly requests of her stu- says. dents that they use the numbers 0, 1 and 2 to work equations. Several hands go up, all with the energy of a group who sat They can use any number they want to find correct answers, at home for nine days eager to learn. but, Norris explains, doing so would make grading a much — Greg Fallon