A full year set of 36 weekly Marbleslide Challenges!

Here is the full set of 36 Marbleslide Challenges I'll be using at my school this year:

Marbleslide Challenge Set

Important tip!

Before doing these challenges with your classes, I'd highly recommend running through at least one of the original Desmos Marbleslides activities with them (Lines, Parabolas, Exponentials, Rationals or Periodics): https://teacher.desmos.com/search?q=marbleslides

Poster templates!(Update) 
Jessica was awesome and made poster templates for each challenge and for the weekly scoreboard. You can make a copy here.

Difficulty

These challenges should work for students of all levels from Algebra 1 onward (and they are even fun and challenging for teachers too!)  Each challenge should be possible to complete using linear equations, but can be solved more elegantly with higher level equations. If students aren't being challenged enough, encourage them to use fewer and more sophisticated equations.  The difficulty increases as the challenges go on, so you might want to leave older challenges open all year and encourage students not to skip too many.

Unlocking Challenges each week
You can use the teacher pacing option on the teacher dashboard to restrict students to the first 3 slides to start, then each week go back into the activity to unlock the next challenge using teacher pacing again.  Not sure how to use teacher pacing? More info here.  You could also just consider giving them the entire challenge set unlocked, and if you do let me know because I'm interested to see how that goes!

Scoring/Prizes
I give these as an optional activity for students to work on if they have some extra time in class or just on their own time.  You might even consider it as a fun optional alternative to certain homework assignments. You could not score them if it's too much work, but they love having their answers highlighted and the competition and you can just score the best few.  At the end of each week I make a quick scoreboard for the top scorers and post it with a screenshot of the some of the more interesting graphs. Here's how I score them:

• 1 point for each star
• 1 extra point if they use only 2 equations
• 2 extra points if they use only 1 equation
• 1-2 points if they have a particularly creative solution. This could be creative mathematically or artistically. 
• 1 point if their solution is very consistent (If you watch a student's solution it might not work perfectly because there is some variation depending on your screen size.  If there's doesn't look like it get all the stars but your dashboard says they did, trust the dashboard)

You might want to consider giving out prizes for students who get all the stars each week.  Some teachers are giving out Desmos stickers this year, and I was giving out treats last year while school policy allowed for it.

You can hide students using the gear button in the teacher dashboard if you want to highlight or screenshot awesome answers, but make sure to not forget about those hidden students in following weeks!  If you have large classes, you might want to split them into different class codes to make things more manageable.

The Learning
What I loved about doing Marbleslides Challenges last year was that it gave some of my students the need and motivation to learn and explore all sorts of graphs and equations outside the regular scope of class. Last year I had students figuring out how to use and transform equations that they wouldn't learn about for years in regular school curriculum.  Every once in awhile I'd give them a tiny little piece of info to move them forward "Oh here's an equation that looks cool" or "Hey, it's a little easier to work with that function if it's in this form" and then let them figure out the rest.



If you have need help getting started or have any questions leave a comment here or tweet at me @SweenWSweens . Feel free to tweak things however you think will work best for you, and let me know what works and doesn't in the comments!

Special thanks to Julie who had the awesome idea of putting Marbleslide Challenges together in one activity and then managing the year with Desmos Activity Builder's teacher pacing option.  I loved the idea, and got these challenges together quickly for the start of the school year as a result!

New Marbleslide Challenges

I've been periodically adding Marbleslide Challenges to the master list, and I just added a few more. If you didn't read my original post where I explained how I implement these in my classes, check it out here. Enjoy!

Challenge #9 - https://teacher.desmos.com/activitybuilder/custom/58b835a98e2aabb51caed84f

Challenge #10 - https://teacher.desmos.com/activitybuilder/custom/58f9f949bd944f372ffb85d2

Challenge #11 -  https://teacher.desmos.com/activitybuilder/custom/58fa008f773fad060efb8963

Challenge #12 - https://teacher.desmos.com/activitybuilder/custom/58fa0259e0d8b633f260dd64/

Desmos Marbleslide Challenges

This year I've implemented Desmos marbleslide challenges throughout my classes that have been really exciting, fun and educational for my students.  If you aren't familiar with Marbleslides you are totally missing out!  The basic idea is that marbles will fall down from a certain point on a graph, and students need to graph equations to help them collect all of the stars on the screen.  The full, official marbleslides activites are here https://teacher.desmos.com/search?q=marbleslides and they always leave kids wanting more.  

The original activities went so well last year, that I decided to regularly give more marbleslides challenges throughout the year.  I wanted to give activities that anyone familiar with graphing lines could complete with some effort, but that could also provide further challenge for students who know more about graphing.  I started creating single page challenges and posting an advertisement for them on my door and in my classroom along with a high score board from the previous week.

I award scores(not for a grade, just for fun) based on number of stars obtained, creativity, consistency and on using fewer functions. All of the challenges can be completed with multiple linear equations, but I challenge students who know more to use fewer, more complex functions. 

I knew that this would be a fun activity for my students, and could help provide some extra challenge, but it has far exceed my expectations for what it could be.  These  challenges have gotten some of my students really excited about math, graphing and learning about equations.  It has created a need for them to learn more, completely on their own, about different types of graphs and how to manipulate them.  I have had students in my class who have only formally learned about straight lines pulling out answers like this:

Every once in awhile I'll drop a little clue for a new type of equation that might help, and they run with it or search things out on their own.  Here are a few more mind blowing examples from students who've gone way above and beyond my expectations:

(The bearded face is part of the challenge.  The student answered by making a hat!)

The challenges have also helped me to further differentiate and more easily manage my classroom.  Whenever students finish an assignment or assessment early, I point them to a challenge and off they go.  I'm really happy that I started these challenges, and if you try them at your school I hope that work out as well for you as they have for me!

If you'd like take a shot at one of the marbleslides challenges yourself, give this one a try.

If you want to try to implement these are your school, here at the first 8 challenges I used this year, and I will continue adding to this list.

#1 - https://teacher.desmos.com/activitybuilder/custom/57e52bcfb2f6f32507db1a18

#2 - https://teacher.desmos.com/activitybuilder/custom/57ee5bd5b3b240fe050581c8

#3 - https://teacher.desmos.com/activitybuilder/custom/580e515ad08d01c809f19d13

#4 - https://teacher.desmos.com/activitybuilder/custom/57f6a27d2101b9e90587bce9

#5 - https://teacher.desmos.com/activitybuilder/custom/581c962ce943d4a012362f02

- by Suzanne Von Oy

#6 - https://teacher.desmos.com/activitybuilder/custom/583dd636b60af2af1daf4043

#7 - https://teacher.desmos.com/activitybuilder/custom/586cfdafaaaa98a305054eca

#8 - https://teacher.desmos.com/activitybuilder/custom/589dd7da46d4f6ac0593c440

f(u) Calculus Song!

In case you haven't seen it, I made a song parody about some of the basic derivatives rules in Calculus to the tune of Ceelo's "Forget you."   Enjoy!



updated with lyrics:

Chorus:
I see you derivin' in class during calc-u-lus
And you've got f(u)
Which you want to find the derivative of,
it's just f '(u) and a du too,
it's just the chain rule,
a great cal-cu-lus tool
and you use it when...(you use it when)
When there's an inside and an outside that you can write as,
f(u)
(ooo ooo ooo)

Another derivative tool,
is the product rule.
And I know you can get it done
The slope of the product
of functions 1 and 2
is 1d2 plus 2d1.
I pity the foo-ooo-oool
who forgets the product rule
(oh, that's how you get it done)
(it's just 1d2 plus 2d1)
OoooOooOoOh
There's just one more rule
Wait... what was the chain rule again?

-Chorus-

For quotient, quotient, quotient you don't have to, have to pull out your hair,
(your hair, your hair, your hair)
Cause it's just low di high minus hi di low all over low squared
(Low squared, low squared, low squared)
To find dy dx dy dx dy dx baaa-aaa-aaaby,
But what about, that dang chain rule?

-Chorus-

Geogebra Derivatives with Limits Activity

Yesterday morning I had an epiphany and started on a new idea for a lesson which was rolled out exactly 43 minutes later. I've been trying to use GeoGebra more in my classes and I thought of an idea that would not only let me do that, but also help out with the actual concept of limits which some of my students were struggling with.  While they can calculate limits pretty well and can throw back some of the things I've thrown at them(phrases like "what the function is approaching" and "what the point should be"), I've had this underlying feeling that there's still something missing in their understanding.  We're also moving into derivatives, and I wanted a nice visual way to show them what exactly we are going to do.  So I whipped up a few of these:


Sorry, the GeoGebra Applet could not be started. Please make sure that Java 1.4.2 (or later) is installed and active in your browser (Click here to install Java now)


I split the class into a few small groups, had each group use their laptops to manipulate the GeoGebra files and gave them this worksheet which has them find various slopes at points on the curves, then had them explain their process and discuss what exactly that has to do with limits. The graphs increased in difficulty so the first answer was 0, which is intuitive just by moving the point around.  The second answer was 1, which is also pretty intuitive, but a little more challenging.  For questions 3 and 4 they had to get a little deeper into how exactly how to calculate the slope.

It was important to me that I didn't tell them *how* exactly how to find the slope, so that they could figure it out on their own. I did mention that if they put the points directly on top of each other, they wouldn't have a line anymore. For most of the students, I felt this activity went over really well.(A few students did struggle with not being told exactly how to do it and how exactly to discuss it with their group to make forward progress) For the most part they were able to figure out how to get the different slopes. A couple had an issue with the question about how this dealt with limits until the following exchanges:

"Okay so what exactly did you do to find it"
-"We just moved the point as close as we could to... Ooooh!"

or

"Hey wait a minute, you were assuming that point was (4, 6) but it's actually not exactly"
-"So as I move the point it's getting closer and closer to (4, 6) so.. Ooooh!!!"

That "Ooooh" moment was awesome, and exactly what I was looking to see.  Through this activity, a lot of my students ended up with a better understanding of what limits are, and the stage was set much better this year for coming up with the limit definition of a derivative.  I'm hoping this will lead to my students to a much better understanding of the relationship between limits and derivatives this year, but we'll have to wait and see.

I didn't end up with a ton of time to plan this activity, and though I'm happy with what came of it I would welcome any comments you have for improving it.

Yearbook Signatures

Posts have been lacking in the last 2 weeks because I've started developing a math note/workbook program for students to more easily take notes or do work on problems, which has been taking up all of my free time.

Pretty much every time I try to write words in a yearbook for a student it comes out completely and utterly cliche. (You're a great student! Have a good summer!  Good luck!)  So, I've decided to stop writing words altogether and usually draw a picture or do some sort of relevant-to-them thing.  Here's a solid work of genius I came up with today:

The answer is pretty worth it, IMHO, so give it a try if you've got some free time!  You can do the harder parts with wolframalpha if you want to cheat. (The integral from ___ of ___, the derivative of ___ at ___, the lim as x approaches ___ of ___)  Sam and Dave, this is a no calculator question for you!

PS- I triple checked the answer would come out right, but I still have a sinking feeling I messed something up.

The Rainbow Rule

A couple weeks ago Sam urged people to talk about little tips and tricks done in their classrooms.  Since I found THE CLAW so helpful, I thought it would be only fair if I shared a trick of mine.

The Rainbow rule, a Sweeney original, is my favorite as it's useful for all of my classes from Algebra 1 to Honors Calculus.

Whether my algebra students come across this...

or my calculus students come across this...

...they either don't seem to know how to do it, or are confident about doing it the wrong way.

 Enter the rainbow rule:

Since we don't all have the luxury of excess time and image editing software when working out problems, the actual version looks and works like this:

This rule has been very helpful for my students because it gives a name to this situation which is both easy to remember and helps to avoid the common mistake of crossing the two lines (rainbows don't do that, after all).  While not every students gets it totally right, it still has really improved my students' ability to deal with fractions, especially those who I've had for more than a year.