Small Paper Books.

 My school district is having a three day inservice with all the teachers meeting in one place.  The district flew everyone in from the various sites to enjoy some really awesome training.

One of the sessions I attended was on art in the classroom.  It had some things like tableaus I was not particularly interested in because I wasn't sure how to integrate them into the math classroom.,  There was one activity I could see integrating into my classroom.

It was on using a six page book made out of one piece of paper.  Basically, you fold one sheet of  paper into 8 equal parts.  Once this is done, you fold the paper in half using a hamburger fold and cut from the fold in to the next fold so you have a slit running ac ross two sections in the middle.  Push it together, wrap and you have a book.

 The instructor recommended we create a book on a topic we'll be teaching sometime before December.  The idea is that we make a book so we know how easy it is and then we'll have our students make some.

I decided to make one on compound inequalities for my Algebra I class but honestly, I'm not sure I can get them to make any because they are more "Math is to torture humans", than wanting to try.

I drew the front page using pen but colored in the words using a colored pencil.  I didn't know about the colored pencils until I got it done.

The next page, I devoted to real life examples of "and" compound inequalities for putting gas in the tank or bullets in a handgun.  Out here, students regularly use guns for hunting but since I didn't know how many bullets a normal rifle held, I settled for using a hand gun.

I wrote an explanation for the and so they could see the and is actually two equations combined into one.

The next set of pages focused on "or"'s using distance.  The fish are up to 12 miles south or more than 16 miles north.  South being the negative direction while north is positive.

I then wrote out the equations for the or and the final page showed the graphs for each one.  I think I need to redo the book and improve on my writing and the way its organized.

This is the best suggestion for art the presenter had in her arsenal.  I really enjoyed making the book but I had more fun making geometric lights.  I'll talk about that later.

Let me know what you think, I'd love to hear.  Have a great day.