Introduction
When I was growing up in my parents home in Atlanta, I would meditate in their living room before going to my room to fall asleep because it was so relaxing to sit on the sofa, look out through all the windows, peek through the trees to see the dark sky with all the stars gleaming through. This ritual was very spiritual, and it helped me to love and appreciate life. It is the main reason why I love living in Atlanta. It is a room that I will design in my dream home. These experiences led me to have an interest in astronomy.
A crucial component of American student's mathematics education is algebra. Algebra is the language through which the world communicates mathematics. It is a process that fosters generalizations and insights and provides a means of operating with concepts at an abstract level. Algebra has long been viewed as the fundamental course that can determine the success of any student future in upper level math courses. In fact, it is a basic tool and is called the "gatekeeper" by some. This is because algebraic representation is a prerequisite for further studies in all upper level math courses and other subjects such as economics, physics, chemistry, and astronomy, as well as many jobs.
Although algebra is a requirement, many minorities and students living in low-income areas have not had adequate opportunities to learn algebra fundamentals at an earlier grade before high school. Based on reading several journals and articles over the years, the ratio of students enrolled in algebra is higher in suburban schools and those in affluent communities than in urban schools and low-income communities. The success rate in any math course is low in most inner city suburban schools. However, the achievement gap is decreasing but at a slow rate.
As a mathematics teacher, I often find it a struggle to get my students involved in learning algebra. Mainly, I feel that this has been a problem over the years due to the fear that some students have because the word "algebra" sounds foreign, and because of the negative experiences they have often heard from others. My goal as an algebra teacher has always been to bring in more real-world applications, so that my students can understand the subject better, and make them understand that it is a universal language that is used in other subjects. However, I often find myself in a dilemma because I have not been able to find a variety of real-world applications that have already been written and that will interest my students'. The overall issue for my students is often boredom. The lack of interest often causes them to get off task, which leads them to miss the fundamentals. The integration of other subjects incorporated with algebra must be versatile in order to keep the interest of my eighth grade students, which is a struggle to achieve in the first place.
Why do I consider algebra to be an important class to learn? Some of my students asked me that same question almost daily over the years. In the past, my answers were something like, "you will need it for college," or "algebra is a fundamental skill that you will use on your job." Of course, my students will mumble and say "she does not know; she just wants us to think we will need her class in the real world." Well, my responses are true but I had to realize that I must teach algebra relating it to the "real-world" and integrate other subjects that uses algebra when appropriate constantly, which will make the learning process real for them. If not my students will never understand the importance of algebra.
Algebra is the language of generalization. In other words, if you are solving or working on a process again and again, algebra provides a simple language for describing your process. Algebra is the language through which we describe patterns. Most of the general patterns are simply formulas. The formulas state one quantity in terms of another. Some of the patterns are just rules written in an easier way if you understand algebra. It is a long simple verbal rule written in a shorter algebraic rule.
For the reasons I stated above, I believe that a curriculum unit on Algebra in Elementary Astronomy and Space Science will broaden students' interest in mathematics and science. Learning the correlation between the two content areas will definitely capture the true-science lovers to take an interest in mathematics, and mathematics lovers will develop a secondary interest in science. The context of astronomy and space science will improve learning in my algebra classes because students will develop a fundamental link between the two disciplinary content areas.
The institute will help me to learn and understand Astronomy and Space Science so that I can incorporate it into my Algebra class this year. This unit will be the first Astronomy and Space Science unit I have ever introduced to my students to teach algebra. It will increase my students' knowledge beyond their textbook and will take away the boredom of learning algebra without any integration of another subject not related to pure mathematics or engineering.
I chose the Astronomy and Space Science seminar because the school district that I teach in is currently promoting Concept Based Units. For the past two years, we were given a topic and told to write a unit on that chosen topic. Now we have been given the liberty of creating our own topics, and submitting them for approval. The topics are encouraged to be based on the core subjects' science and social studies. I felt that Astronomy and Space Science was the best seminar for me because I already had an idea of how I can teach my students algebra around the theme, and I know that it is a topic that is briefly focused on in eighth grade science.
The goal of this unit is to create an interdisciplinary approach of some elementary astronomy and algebra to make learning algebra more interesting, as well as to get my students to understand and learn that algebra is truly used in a variety of subjects. Hopefully, this curriculum unit will broaden my eighth grade algebra students' interests in the field of mathematics and science, which are subjects they often try to avoid.
This curriculum unit will also allow me to reach another goal that mathematics teachers are encouraged to accomplish by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM). One of the visions that NCTM has encouraged over the years is for mathematics teachers to teach a curriculum that promotes deep understanding of mathematics that will challenge, engage, and motivate students. My linking of the topics of Astronomy, Space Science and Algebra will encourage my students to become personally involved in understanding open-ended astronomy and algebra investigations. The integration of the two topics will induce my students to learn algebra at a level that is attainable and interesting. My students will also be encouraged to be engaged in reasoning and problem-solving, from which they will develop a conceptual foundation for understanding the correlation of science and mathematics.
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