Monday, January 12th: 3 Homework Groups for Math, Finish Conclusions (Period 5 Sci)

Today was a day where things seemed to click pretty well. In math, students began with a warm-up and spend some time explaining solutions to how they figured out the limits of sharing a candy bar (taken from the Common Core released test items - almost everyone nailed it!). Then, students received their assessment from last Thursday, and groups were made for mini-lessons and practice. Those few students who had aced the assessment applied those skills to big problems where they had to use the skills in new ways. Other students reported that they got just what they needed out of today! For homework, students were assigned practice that matched what they had done today in class. WARNING: the assignment in which students multiply mixed numbers by other mixed numbers is very challenging, takes a long time, but it if they took it home tonight, it is completely within their ability :)

In science, we did our last experiment dissolving M&M's, and we tried to once and for all prove that the sugar in liquids like soda is what slows down the process. Last week we ruled out the carbonation with a two-part experiment testing Sprite against flat Sprite, but our test on sugar (selzer vs. Sprite) did not eliminate all the variable ingredients between the two liquids. So today, students planned and carried out our most ambitious experiment yet: 4 experimental trials with progressively more concentrated batches of sugar water tested against the control group - pure water. The results were conclusive, and the homework for period 5 is to write up their conclusions based on the class data and any hypotheses they can make on why it happens that way.