Keeping It Real

While our learners certainly dedicate loads of time mastering fundamental math algorithms and formulas, it's equally important that we provide them with opportunities to apply their knowledge and understanding of these skills in real-life math scenarios. Designing learning experiences that model mathematics pushes learners to think deeper about math, allowing them to see the connections and offering meaningful context for their learning. As we often say in The Hive, "We're keeping it real". The goal of our math learning experiences is aimed at doing just that and this week's guest bloggers are excited to explain the value in it. Enjoy.

The importance of connecting math to the real world is HUGE! For example, let's say your pizza parlor is too small and a line of people going all the way around your restaurant waiting to buy your pizza. People wait in line for hours to have your pizza, but this isn't necessarily good for business. You decide to hire an architect to design plans to remodel your restaurant to make it twice the size it is now. The architect would have to use his/her understanding of multiplication and fractions to convert the measurements to two times the size. We did this in class and I remodeled my restaurant to six times the size. This experience showed me how to use the math skills I have learned and how I might use them in a real-world situation.    - "Tazer"

Every single job out there involves math in one way or another. It's important to learn math skills when you are young and have a chance to apply the skills in a real-world situation because if you are looking to get a job, but have no experience with real-world problems, you probably aren't very qualified for the job.   - "Glisten"

Connecting what we learn in math to the real world is important. For example, if you have to bake something for a party and your recipe won't make enough to feed all of the people at your party, you would have to know how to double or triple the recipe so that you will have enough for all of your guests. When we learn how to multiply fractions in the classroom and have a chance to use that knowledge in a real-world situation, it helps us see how important it is for us to learn these skills and how we actually might use them someday.     - "Rianna!"

Every job you do has math in it and if we didn't learn the connections between math and real life, we wouldn't know what skills we'd need to use in certain situations. I think connecting math to the real world is really important and that all schools should teach kids how to make these connections.   - "Mala!"

Imagine you were an architect and the owner of a restaurant wanted you to double the size of his restaurant. You'd have to do a ton of math to figure out how to do that, including multiplying some fractions. I tripled the square footage of my restaurant and had to use my knowledge of multiplying fractions by whole numbers - it was a whole different story!   - "Drain"

My pizza fraction project showed me how math is used in the real world because I had to multiply fractions to make my pizza restaurant bigger. If I didn't do the math calculations correctly, my restaurant would not be safe enough to open (it could collapse!). This was a fun project and I could definitely see the connection to the real world.    - "Lam"

Math is everywhere, so making real-life connections when we're learning new math skills is really important. Even though I didn't choose the pizza parlor project, I can still understand how it connects to the real world. Knowing how to multiply fractions and how you might use that skill is very important.     - "Ritzi" 

The importance of connecting math to the real world is huge because if you know the answer to a simple math problem, that's great, but if you can figure out how that skill can be used in a real-world problem, then that's one of the best math skills you can have. It was crazy for me to see the math connection with multiplying fractions in our pizza projects. - "N.A.S.A."

It's important to apply your knowledge of math to real-world problems because if you're just sitting there absorbing information and never learning how to apply that knowledge, it renders that knowledge useless.    - "Champ"

Being able to use our math skills in real-world situations is really helpful. For example, if I'm planning a party and using a recipe that only serves five people and I'm going to have 10 guests, then I would need to know how to double my recipe (or multiply fractions). People who bake or cook a lot probably do this all the time, so learning how to multiply fractions would help people know how to do this.  - "Lize"

WHY People Explore: Past, Present and Future

One of our favorite questions in The Hive is "WHY DO WE NEED TO LEARN THIS?". We're educating our young learners to frame their experiences around that very question; to continually seek out the relevance in what they are learning each and every day both in school and in the broader scope of their life experiences. "WHY?" should be the driving force behind each of their learning experiences and their curiosity and quest for future knowledge and understanding of everything around them. 

As you may recall from our last blog post, we've been delving into the motives behind early European exploration in North America. Our discoveries (no pun intended) have helped us better understand the past and how it has shaped and influenced the world we live in today. To offer an opportunity to have our learners really extend their thinking on the knowledge they have built around this topic, we asked them to consider some challenging ideas. Specifically: How has exploration shaped our world? How might the reasons for exploration have changed over time? Are there still more opportunities for future exploration? This week's guest bloggers exercise their brain muscles in a big way as they think deeply and critically about the impact of exploration in the past, present and future. This is what the "WHY?" looks like. Enjoy.

One way that exploration has shaped our world is that people have been able to bring resources to new places. People used to explore to find new land and resources and to spread Christianity. Reasons for exploration now include things like scientific research and finding cures for sicknesses and diseases. There are still lots more opportunities for future exploration like oceans that haven't been fully explored. There could be new sea creatures or plants that could help with scientific research.   - "Mala"

There are still more opportunities for future exploration because there is a lot that we don't know about in space, like new planets and resources that we could use on those planets.  - "Santa"

One way that exploration has shaped our world is that many more people became Christian because the motive of some explorers was to spread Christianity. Another way is that languages have been spread as well throughout different parts of the world.  Exploration has changed since the 1500s. People who explore now are more interested in finding things that will help improve science, technology, and civilizations.  There are plenty of opportunities for future exploration, like in space, you might be able to start new civilizations on other planets or you might find new resources on other planets that could be useful to us. -"Cheese"

I think exploration has shaped our world by explorers bringing different cultures with them when they arrived at new places and learning about new cultures in places they explored and bringing it back to their countries. There are still more opportunities for future exploration because there is a whole universe to still explore as well as oceans. If we explore those places, we might find new plants or animals that could help us.   - "Lize"

One way that exploration has shaped our world is if exploration didn't happen, people might not desire new and interesting resources or technology. People would be stuck in the way that they lived a long time ago, knowing almost nothing. There would also be a lot more people dying every day due to sickness and disease because cures would not be shared.  One way that reasons for exploration have changed is that more people today are interested in finding new medicines or cures for sicknesses.  - "Cat"

There are still more opportunities for future exploration because there are many things to explore in space. I find space interesting and I think that you could find new resources or even things that could help make new medicine in space if we try hard to find it.  - "Ritzi"

Exploration has shaped our world by bringing people to new places and having people settle and colonize in new places. People have moved around and found new places to live and they bring their culture with them when they do. This shows other people new ways to dress, introduces new foods to eat and maybe you even bring your language with you and other people start to speak that language. You also might bring resources with you and introduce them to the new place you live in. There are still more opportunities to explore - years of research and exploration in space and in the ocean!  - "Soda"

Exploration has shaped our world so much since the 1500s. For example, if European explorers hadn't discovered some of the resources and materials that they did, like certain spices, then life in 2020 wouldn't be all that it is now. Those spices represented a different culture and with those spices, people could make foods that originated in different parts of the world. They were able to experience different types of foods right in their own country. Reasons for exploration have changed somewhat because now there are people who want to explore space and the deeper parts of our oceans. Some people believe there may be life on Mars and that it could help us in some way. Others believe that there are ocean plants and animals that haven't been identified yet that could benefit us in some way. There are definitely still more opportunities for future exploration.  - "Glisten"

Hold Onto Your Sails! Experiential Learning is Taking a New Turn in The Hive

Understanding how much benefit the kids reap from actively experiencing their learning through PBLs, design thinking and field experiences (even when field experiences happen via Skype), we hoisted our sails as teachers presented learners with a new way to experience their learning: through interactive simulations. As we continue to strive to foster deep and meaningful learning, we find that interactive simulations really seem to hit the mark when it comes to exploring historical events. They can be both motivating and empowering, providing opportunities for learners to put their investigative interests and skills to work, to take on responsible roles and develop important critical thinking and problem-solving skills as a result of their interaction.  

This week, learners engaged in two different interactive simulations that offered them an opportunity to deepen their understanding of some of the challenges that early European explorers faced during their expeditions to the "New World". This week's guest bloggers reflect on their experiences. 

The simulations helped me to understand how hard it must have been for explorers to try and find land, explore, and be successful. I didn't know that explorers first had to find someone to finance their expeditions, that they had to load certain supplies on their ships and after they were at sea, their boat could sink, they could run out of supplies, or they might not find new territories or resources and be unsuccessful. I think the biggest challenge for explorers was finding someone to finance their expeditions.    - "Cat"

These simulations helped me to better understand what explorers might have experienced on their voyages to the New World because I realized how hard it was for them to navigate without a lot of knowledge about where they were going (they did not have the best maps). Also, they didn't know how long they would be at sea and they could run out of food and supplies. In my opinion, the biggest challenge that explorers faced while they were at sea was keeping morale high.     - "Blinga"

The simulations helped me understand how hard it must have been for the explorers - something I never thought of. I learned that a lot of bad things would happen on their voyages because they didn't have the technology to help them navigate. In my opinion, some of the biggest challenges explorers faced while they were at sea were getting blown off course or running out of supplies.      - "Clover"

The simulations helped to develop my understanding of what explorers might have experienced when coming to the New World because during the simulations, I kept going back and forth between "Europe" and "Visit With the Royals", which meant that it must have been hard to get funding for expeditions. I also learned that if you didn't have a reliable crew, your expedition would not go very well. In my opinion, the biggest challenge or obstacle that explorers faced was keeping the crew's morale high and the possibility that they would run out of supplies.      - "Glisten"

These simulations helped me to understand some of the challenges that explorers faced while at sea. It was important for everyone on board to do their job correctly because the rest of the crew was relying on you. In my opinion, the biggest challenge that explorers faced on their voyages was keeping the food from spoiling and eating only a little bit at a time so that they didn't run out of it before they got to their destination.     - "Water"

The simulations helped me develop a better understanding of how hard it actually was to get across the Atlantic Ocean. For example, their caravels could freeze in the ice (navigating through the Northwest Passage) and they could be stuck in it for a long time, sometimes years. I think the most challenging obstacle that the explorers faced was the lack of food on their ships. If they ran out, they could starve to death - especially if they were stuck in the ice for a really long time.      - "Wifi"

In my opinion, the biggest problem that explorers faced on their expeditions was keeping morale high so that their crews would not commit mutiny.    - "Yo!"

The simulations helped me to better understand some of the problems that explorers experienced while at sea, like running out of supplies, weather, and going off course. In my opinion, the biggest challenge for explorers was trying to keep the food from going bad.     - "Fia"

The simulations helped me learn a lot about what explorers experienced on their expeditions to the New World. I learned that keeping the crew's morale high was really important, otherwise, they might commit mutiny. Lots of sailors would get seasick on their journeys and that made things worse for the crew. In my opinion, I think the biggest challenges that explorers faced were getting funding for their expeditions and not finding new land or territory to claim.     - "Cheese"

In my opinion, the biggest challenge that explorers faced was navigating their ships because maps weren't that helpful back then and they did not have a lot of tools to help them find new land.    - "Champ"