Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Really? Really?

Have you ever had the feeling that you have totally lost control of your class?

That was me today. We have spent the last couple days going through a three part gas law lab and due to circumstances beyond anyone's control, we ended up talking about all three graphs at once today.

Big mistake. Huge. I have to go shopping now...

Every graph we make, we write the equation for the line. At first, when the kids stared at me with those blank looks, I chalked it up to not being around much math in the last few weeks. Now, we are trying to write our fifth, sixth and seventh equations and still, I get those stares.

It's like they aren't even trying...wait...

I swear if one more kid asks me how to find slope, I will have my nervous breakdown and be done with it. A nice long hospital stay might do me some good.

And heaven forbid I actually have them try to SOLVE the equation with some known value.

Here is the actual equation we were trying to solve for T:
0 kPa = (0.221 kPa/C) T + 90.85 kPa

I tried that first hour. After the alloted 43 seconds of wait time, no one had ventured a guess as to how to solve for temperature. I gave them a hint. Nothing. I moved the 90.85 kPa for them. Nothing.

I'm not sure what to do about this. I truly do not believe that every single one of them has forgotten every single math skill they have ever learned.

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