Link Crew Orientation

Mr. Ciccoianni was incredible on Friday's orientation. Over 300 freshmen came, and our Link team in our new red shirts were ready. They showed enthusiasm and pride. As I went around campus to check on the small groups, I found that they were completing the activities successfully. The day ended with a pizza party with the leaders and coordinators in the cafeteria. School starts Tuesday. (This is the best image of the shirts that I have.)

Link Leader Training

We wrapped up a two-day Link Leader training. Mr. Ciccoianni was incredible in leading this amazing event. I led two activities (Life Story and Questions Lists) on day one, and Fast Fingers on day two. In all, I feel very positively toward this training, mainly because Mr. C. was so well prepared. I am so grateful for his enthusiasm and professionalism. We also received huge support from Ms. Curtis and many others. Friday will be the big show: Freshmen Orientation. I will be there to provide Total Support. GO BIG!

Literature Review

My professors have long told me that completing a graduate program while working full-time is a big challenge. Knowing and experiencing is completely different. My journey to my masters thesis has been long and at times painful. Working full-time and coaching while taking 16-units is a quarter that I would never attempt again. The most difficult part, according to many, is the literary review. Today, I am grateful to have finally received approval of my lit-review. It is only one chapter, but a big step nonetheless. Yesterday, I read an e-book saying that setbacks are just setbacks, not failures. I can't put a timeline on when I will finish, but I strive to put in as much effort into my project as I can each day. Someday, I believe, I will finish.

Statistics in Action

Content is king. As I strive to lead a successful course in statistics, I have dedicated a lot of time in preparing for its content. The last two weeks have been devoted to sharpening my technological skills and curriculum development. Between now and the start of the school year, I strive to complete the outline of as many chapters as possible. Currently, I have done three of the 14 chapters. Watkins, Scheaffer, and Cobb are the authors to an organized textbook "Statistics in Action". My goal is to use it as the main focus, but to add digital content sparingly to dress up the course. Though I am very conscientious of the ultimate result, I really should focus on doing my best in delivering content to my students first.

UCLA's SOCR

UCLA's Department of Statistics granted me an opportunity to attend a workshop targeted for high school teachers. The department developed Statistics Online Computational Resources that is free and easily accessible. It is very powerful. I was thoroughly impressed. Professor Dinov and Professor Chirstou showed me many amazing applications, tools, and games that are offered by this well-developed online resource. We were also granted access a visit to UCLA's faculty dinning hall. I had a wonderful experience; it helped sharpen my tools for the upcoming years.

AP Stats Day 4

On the last day of the institute, we covered every type of inference questions on the AP test. Additionally, we learned how to use the TI calculators to do these computations. How I wish I had this tool when I tutored statistics at UCI! Mr. Olsen did a great job, he has prepared me for next year. Now it's all on me to work on the course.

(* This is a picture of the AP teachers enjoying lunch outdoors. It was extremely nice being under the sun during each day's long academic sessions.)

AP Stats Day 3

We talked about software packages that are used in the course. It got me interested in developing my skills in Fathom. There are also plenty of free resources at AP Central from the College Board. In the afternoon, we discussed probability and began inferences. The concepts are all slowly coming back to me now.

(*This is a picture I took of the Pacific. The ocean is only a block away from the hotel I stay at during these four days.)

AP Stats Day 2

We focused on experimental design today. Our presentation did a good job of reviewing the details of sampling and design. In groups, we focused on one experiment and will present on its design tomorrow. One comment from our presenter struck me, he said "Our job isn't to understand that they are kids, our job is to make them into adults."

AP Statistics Summer Institute Day 1

Palos Verdes Peninsula HS is a nice campus not far from the ocean. I arrived very early to beat traffic and enjoyed a quiet morning reading at the campus. Although we got off to a slow start, by midday, my class of 19 teachers dove right into discussions of experimental designs and inferential statistics. Most importantly, I began experimenting with the TI-84+. The presenter said that this is the most widely used handheld. Fortunately, it is much easier to use than the TI-Nspire CAS which I learned last week. It was at UC Irvine when I first learned and tutored statistics. I recalled all of the topics and did quite well on my first try at completing the multiple choice section today. My hotel is just about a mile away from Redondo Beach. Beautiful whether here in SoCal.

An amazing story - the principal of PVPHS, Kelly Johnson, was a janitor at the school 41 years ago. He is retiring this week. He encouraged us to open the AP doors to more students. The two most important people on campus, according to him, were the students and the teachers.

TI-Nspire CAS 3

On our last day of training, we learned a 3-D activity for geometry involving the rotation of a cube. I also picked up on an activity that can graphically represent the exterior angles of regular polygons. Most importantly, I am now comfortable downloaded many of the pre-made activities that are available online onto my TI-Nspire software. To make this training worthwhile, I must incorporate these activities and visuals to my classroom this upcoming year. So much to do and learn, so little time.

TI-Nspire CAS 2

On Day 2, we learned more about this powerful device, including how to create sliders that allow students to manipulate the values of variables and see the immediate effects on the graph. We also learned how to send files from a laptop to handheld and between handhelds. There are numerous free resources online, it is impossible to try them all.

TI-Nspire CAS

I received my own TI-Nspire CAS today at the first day of training. Though the handheld machine has many functions and buttons, it was not too intimidating. We had some technical difficulties which delayed our start in the morning, but the session went well overall. I learned many useful capabilities of this device, some of which I will try to incorporate into my classes this year.