Curriculum Materials and Resources

My schools math department really plays by it's own rules in a sense because we are a charter school. We don't really do anything along with the other public schools in our area. We are the alternative to the traditional public school. RPA is the Redmond Proficiency Academy is proficiency based so the students are required to meet the standards that all other students in the public schools are supposed to meet, but it is required for all of our students to meet each individual standard instead of having to pass a class where all of the standards are lumped in to one grade.

There are only two math teachers at RPA and RPA uses moodles in all of their classes which are basically class websites that can be accessed by students and teachers. Both teachers have all of their lessons, powerpoints, homeworks, and extra practice assignments on their websites. The teacher that I work closest with records all of his lectures and posts them online as well so that students have no excuse to not know what is going on. He also has Khan Academy pages set up for each lesson which students use often. We use a program called WizIQ to record the lectures and it shows what we write, say, and video of the classroom. Every student can access any lecture or anything they may need for class to stay on track. It is great because parents can access their child's grades and see where they need to be in class. It helps them to get involved and keep their child on track if their child struggles to do so on their own. This is especially true for younger high school students.

I have started a Facebook and a Twitter for my classes which one of the math teachers does as well. Students don't use it much, but especially the Facebook page you can use to send out updates on what is coming up in class, etc. so students will receive a live update of anything you want them to know assuming they check their Facebook often, which most of them seem to do every five minutes. My Twitter account for class is mostly for following other math related Twitter accounts. They are mostly too advanced for high school students, but I post things every once in a while that are pertinent to class and what we are working on.