One of THOSE Questions...

Okay, Here's My Deal...

If you have ever seen the movie A Christmas Story...you know with Ralphie, who wants a Red Rider BB Gun...you'll shoot your eye out...Scott Farkus? Anyway, in the movie, Ralphie hints at what he wants and he said Flcik saw grizzly bears by Polaski's candy store and his parents look at him funny, to which the grown up Ralphie narrates over the scene, "They looked at me as if I had lobsters crawling out of my ears."

Well, that is how I must have looked my student the other day. Now, even if you don't know a lot about Algebra, I will try to make this understandable. We were reviewing for a test. One problem gave an equation and the kids were supposed to graph it on a set of axes (a big plus sign). It was written in two variables: 3x + 4y = 24. When we graph an equation like this, we find out what y = when x = 0 (called a y-intercept) and what x = when y = 0 (called an x-intercept). So, I said that we needed to find the x- and y-intercepts and I put the two answers on the board (0,6) and (8, 3)...without showing the work because at this level of class, it should be mental math for the kids....plotted the points and connected them.

As I began to go on to the next problem, I heard this question come from the peanut gallery:

"Did you just make up those two points?"

I paused a minute, still facing the board, rolled my eyes and sighed, counting to 5 slowly, turned around and instead of saying what came to mind: "Yeah, that's it...I just made them up...out of thin air...the process I explained as I did it was just to hear myself talk." I said, "Nooooo, I found the intercepts. Remember, the y-intercept is where the graph crosses the y-axis and at that point, x = 0, so I substituted 0 in for x and solved the equation to find y (this time I put the work on the board) which gave me (0, 6)..." and went on to show the other point.

I couldn't believe it. Why did we even do the work in the chapter? I am not sure if I want to grade these tests when they're done...I might cry.

EDITED 2/20...I graded them today. They were not good. Needless to say we will be doing some reteaching.