What am I teaching?

For those of us in the Northern Hemishpere it is coming around to that time where we are gearing ourselves up for the start of a new term. Whilst I try and get the most out of the last days of the holidays I do get very excited by this time of year and all the new beginnings it brings with it. I am buying stationary and filling up pads with spider diagrams to flesh out new ideas, making calendars and so on! This year, to coincide with the launching of this site I am exploring ways of sharing a planning diary through this blog. I havent quite decided on a format but I thiought it would be good for me and maybe interesting for others to see the considerations I am making for my classes. For now, I am just thinking about starting the year and how to kick off on a high note.

For my new IB1 class I am going to start with arithmetic and geometric sequences. There are lots of reasons for this, but the most persuasive is pragmatic. We wanted the HL, SL and Studies classes all to start with the same topic so that movement between classes in the early stages would be easier. Of course there are other reasons too and I think the topic is mostly new to students and provides lots of opportunities to show what the studies course is all about. I am going to start with one of my favourites Visual Sequences ... more to follow

For IB2 I have more of a challenge since we finished the year before the unit of work and so we have some 3D geometry and trig to do before we can move on to the stats I planned. In the first week or two I think we will look at Making cones and 3D uncovered.

Anyway, I will give some more thought about how best to share my planning through this blog!

thanks!