My Students

Do you remember how you felt when a concept that seemed so foreign to you finally made sense. I would like to help enable my students understand algebraic equations by giving them a tactile method for understanding.

The 6th grade in which I teach Math is in Arizona.

As AZ is a state that seems to not take education seriously and back it financially, my students suffer. My students live in a low socioeconomic area, with nearly all of my students on free and reduced lunch. That means that parents/guardians don't have the financial means to help out. These students have been passed along year to year without understanding the basic math concepts. They have reached me at 6th grade with extreme deficits in their ability to perform basic addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. I'm working with the students and any other resources I can get my hands on to help them grasp these concepts that have been outside of their reach. I've purchased some materials on my own, recently completed another donorschoose.org project and hope to obtain more manipulatives that will help my students with their understanding.

My Project

The resources that I am requesting are a class set of Hands-On Equations balance worksheets and pieces as well as the SmartBoard software that goes with the balances. This method allows students to give "x" a value and balance an algebraic equation on a scale. Students are able to physically manipulate the numbers and variables until they are able to solve an equation that may have otherwise seemed outside of their reach.

I believe this project is important because math is everywhere around us.

We don't always know the variables that will be involved and these materials can help to introduce my students to algebraic equations. It also helps promote problem solving skills, which is what helps our students to become critical thinkers!