Exit Slip (2025.10.16)

In this week's session, we opened with PH4 “mathematical poetry.” The constraint was interesting: once you fix the first line, the swaps basically pre-wire the later lines. I tried a six-word set and a weave pattern (AB CDEF → BA DCFE → BDA FCE…) and started wondering about variations—using word clusters, homophones, or anagrams per slot so the combinatorics stay alive without going random. It felt more like tinkering with permutations than “writing,” which I kind of appreciate.

Entrance Slip (2025.10.16)

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How does artificial intelligence contribute to stronger academic performances? 

I am looking more on the use of GenAI, LLM's like ChatGPT, Google Gemini, Deepseek, etc. I personally have been benefited a lot by the use of ChatGPT through part of my studies. The proper use of it, of course, is essential as there are disadvantages to it, but in general, AI is the future. It is inevitable that we will be seeing more AI coming into our lives, so embrace it rather than rejecting it. 

Exit Slip (2025.10.9)

This week's session was quite refreshing. The Fibonacci poem warm-up felt like follwing a random rule to write a poem, which is not usually how I write. Still, the constraint did something useful: it pushed me to edit, pick sharper words, and notice a certain rhythm. It made me think that in class, the right constraint can be a ladder rather than a cage. Apple-cider time was a wholesome chaos in a good way—people swapping stations without fuss, knives and hand-cranks going, press at the end like a boss fight. It was one of those rare moments where group work actually felt like a real production line and not a forced activity. 

Entrance Slip (2025.10.9)

The readings prompted me to look at three threads together: space, language, and assessment. On space, I get the appeal of learning gardens even if I’m not exactly an outdoors person—there is something about fresh air that quiets the noise. If I ever use a garden, I’d keep it lean and purposeful: a portable blackboard, tight notes, a short task that only makes sense because we’re outside, then back to regular tools. Calling ecosystems “co-teachers” is an interesting nudge; at minimum it reminds me to treat the place with respect instead of as decor.

On language, Kimmerer’s “grammar of animacy” stuck. I rely on precise math/physics terms because they prevent us from talking past each other, but I can see how a nouns-only register flattens things. A small shift in sequence might help: let students notice a phenomenon first—growth, pull, drift—then name it, and keep a parallel, verb-ish gloss so the idea feels alive instead of museum-labeled. It’s also a quiet way to signal that more than one knowledge system can sit at the table.

On assessment, the case for refocusing from grades to learning lands for me, with caveats. Grades still translate for parents and universities, but in class we can lower the temperature: more low-stakes completion credit where it makes sense, a retake or alternate demo of understanding, co-making a rubric so students see the target and help define “excellent.” I like the “firm goals, flexible means” framing. It doesn’t throw out standards; it just gives students room to show what they can do without everything riding on one number.

Exit Slip (2025.10.2)

This week’s conics warm-up worked better than I expected. Starting with “where do circles/parabolas actually show up?” and letting us sketch and name our way in made the unit feel like a casual list of shapes. The hands-on locus demo was a nice one as it clicked that why “a set of points” is a useful way to think. Also, seeing the relationships among the conics helped: ellipses with eccentricity less than 1, the parabola as the boundary case at 1—that “family resemblance” made the equations feel motivated. The quick detour to our group's Gabriel’s Horn scratched the pure-math itch too: finite volume, infinite surface area is the kind of paradox that reminds people definitions matter.

Ed Doolittle’s Star Blanket patterns are basically sequences and symmetries people can hold, and scrabble was a smart reminder that games are rule systems we can tune to the language, not the other way around. Between that and the represent-in-many-ways exercise (draw, name), the through-line for me was pretty simple: pick representations that actually carry the structure—whether that’s a string tracing a locus, a blanket encoding a sequence, or a board game redesigned for morphology—and then give the formal math its spine once people can feel what’s going on, for the lower levels of math of course.

Entrance Slip (2025.10.2）

Kimmerer’s chapter nudged me to look at the language we teach with, not just the ideas. In math and physics I rely on technical terms because precision matters; they keep us from talking past each other. I can also see how a nouns-only register can flatten experience—everything becomes a labeled thing on a list. The “grammar of animacy” reframes that: verbs and relational words point our attention to process, change, and responsibility. It also raised the harder question of language loss; when a community’s words for the living world go quiet, the ways of noticing they encode fade too. That feels relevant in school, where the words we privilege quietly train students on what counts.

Practically, I’m not throwing away terminology, but I can change the sequence and the tone. Start with an encounter, then name: watch condensate bead and slide before we say “surface tension,” feel the “tug” in a stretched line before “force,” track a plant’s height over days before “rate.” When we introduce the formal terms, keep a parallel, verb-rich gloss on the board so both registers stay visible. I may also try small translation moves, like rewriting a definition in process language, or telling a proof as a story of what one quantity does to another—so students hear that concepts are relationships, not just objects. I do want to emphasize that none of this replaces the precision we need for problem solving, but it might keep the ideas from feeling mechanical and make room for easier understandings.