Renee Jagodzinski							5/2/07
MED300/Cushman							Journal Week 11

Date: 4/30

	Today, we went over a Part 1 of a Math A exam.  We allowed students to work on 

problem by themselves and ask any questions if they needed help.  We guided them by 

giving them hints to the solution, but not actually telling them how to get to the solution.  

The hints guided them in the steps they took.  

	When looking at Part 1 that has all multiple choice questions, I noticed that when 

having multiple choice questions, students tend to just substitute the answers into the 

problem to try which ones work and don’t work.  Students don’t use any mathematical 

strategies and they rely on their calculators to do all the work.  It seems as if they can’t do 

it on their calculator, they have the attitude like they can’t do it at all.  For example, the 

second question of Part 1on the Math A exam had to deal with two equations being equal 

to each other and then moving things around to solve for x.  When looking at the multiple 

choice answers, they just tried all the answers into each equation and see if they equaled 

each other.  They didn’t do any mathematics to get to the answer.  So, multiple choice 

questions, I learned, aren’t reliable in assessing students about the material because most 

will just substitute things into their calculators and just try all the answers to see if they 

work.  

	There were some misconceptions that I thought were interesting.  When working 

on one of the problems from Part 1, it dealt with multiplying variables and fractions.  

Many students did not know how to multiple variables or fractions together.  They tended 

to get mixed up between adding and multiplying them.  I thought this was interesting 

because they learned about these things in middle and elementary school and have no 

knowledge of it now.

	In the lesson, the first questions dealt with vertical angles and using equations to 

solve for x to find one of those angles.  I would’ve liked to make clearer how vertical 

angles are equal and why they are equal.  Students didn’t understand why they were 

equal.  They could see that the angles were similar in size, but weren’t sure if they were 

actually equal or off by a little bit.  I didn’t know how to show them that they were equal 

without having a protractor.

Date: 5/2

	Today, we started doing Part 2’s and 3’s of a Math A exam.  We allowed students 

to try the problems on their own and at their own pace.  If they have any questions or 

problems that they are having trouble with, they can ask us questions and we would give 

them hints on what to do.  The hints triggered information in their memory and helped 

out the student a lot with starting the problem.

	One thing I learned after working with students on Part 2’s and Part 3’s, is that 

you need to make sure that you don’t give out information without letting students 

actually think about the problem first.  Even if students say they don’t know, keep giving 

the students hints to guess because odds are they do know the information it takes to 

complete the problem, but just want you to answer the question for them.  For example, 

when looking at the first problem that involved using the Pythagorean Theorem on a right 

triangle, a student automatically said they didn’t know how to do the problem without 

even reading the problem first.  We gave them a hint to use the Pythagorean Theorem and 

they said they didn’t know what it was.  So, we kept on giving them some more hints and 

the student finally got the formula, said it perfectly, and used it perfectly.  So, it seemed 

like the student was just lazy and didn’t want to do the work.  The student wanted us to 

do the work for them.

	Another thing that I noticed is that you need to stress the students to show all 

work and if units are involved in the problem, make sure you include those units in your 

concluding answer.  Explain to them, that if they don’t know all their work and skip 

steps, or not use units in their conclusion, points may be taken off their work.  So 

showing work is very important especially in part 2’s, 3’s, and 4’s of the Math A exam.  For example, using the Pythagorean Theorem, many students were just using their 

calculators to calculate the answer.  They weren’t showing any work.  So, you have to 

explain to them that if they use the calculator to do the work and don’t show any of it, 

how will the grader know what steps you took to get to the answer?

	In the lesson on the part using the Pythagorean Theorem, some students were 

having trouble with solving for B when they have B^2 = 400.  I tried to give them hints to 

use the square root.  But, I would’ve like to make clearer why they are using the square 

roots.  They didn’t know that square roots were opposite to squaring a number and I 

didn’t really know how to explain about square roots.