Hello and welcome again to my blog. Today I am back with another blog post. This is another PLP post with the subject of Scimatics. This Scimatics project was a little different as we got to decided and make what our own driving question was. The criteria for this project was “displays knowledge of polynomials language-project shows skills of combining like terms-personalized and authentic-some form of presentation to the class/public.” With the making of the driving question we also got to make what the end product would be (with evaluations from the Teachers first of course. Well, enough about the project, lets get into the learning.

The first milestone for this fun project was a really interesting and fun one. The task for this first milestone was to learn a little bit about polynomials. We had to use a digital lego building website to build a lego set that was a close to ten dollars as possible. Using the lego site we had to find the cost of each brick and then put that in to and equation. The competency being assessed for this milestone was “Demonstrate care for self, others, and the community through individual and collaborative approaches.” I feel that I used the competency by collaborating with my group mate Anthony to create a fun little online build.

The second milestone for this project was another fun little milestone that saw us making an algebraic flow chart in a group. This was a useful and fun to help us find out a little more about polynomials, like terms and algebra. I felt this created more understanding of how polynomials work. The competency being assessed was “Demonstrate care for self, others, and the community through individual and collaborative approaches.” I feel like the competency didn’t really need to be reflected while doing this milestone so I didn’t really use it.

The third milestone for this project hasn’t been completed yet. This one is a little different as it is a unit test on like terms and algebra. This milestone is a very straight forward one that uses non competencies. The reason we do these tests is because our teacher, Mr. Gross feels that it is good practice to do proper tests even if we are in PLP.

The fourth milestone for this project was one of the best ones. This milestones task was for us to make our own groups and then within those groups make a driving question for our project.  We had to discuss how we would present our results and also a back up driving question if the first idea did not get approved by Mr. Gross. There were no competencies assessed for this milestone but It was still just a fun time. In my group was Anthony and Noah. Our driving question is “how can we show how games involve polynomials.” Our idea was to build a Minecraft mini game a bit like build swap but it involved monkey like the lego assignment in milestone 1.

Now we are on to the fifth milestone. The fifth milestone was another fun little short one. The task for this milestone was to make a poster using the whiteboard that explained our game and the rules and how it involved polynomials. It also could include a sketch of the idea and how polynomials and like terms could be related to the game. After we build the poster we got to walk around the class with a couple of sticky notes and pencils to give feedback to other groups on their project ideas. The idea was for the feedback to be useful and constructive. There were no competencies assessed in this milestone.

Now for the final milestone. This milestone is (you probably know) present the final project and then make the blog post. This is always one of the most fun but most stressful but fun milestones. Our task was to create a short presentations or something like that to show the class. After we had to be prepared to answer any questions or feedback that the teachers and other students might have. For our group, we decided to make a keynote presentation that included the video of us making the arena for the Minecraft building and also the videos of us building the structures that would be judged. We also included the math of the building and how many blocks we used. Down below is our final keynote. The second task for this milestone is to make a blog post that reflected on all of the project. The competencies being assessed are “Understanding and solving: Apply multiple strategies to solve problems in both abstract and contextualized situations Communicating and Representing: Represent mathematical ideas in concrete, pictorial, and symbolic form Connecting and Reflecting: Connect mathematical concepts to each other and to other areas and personal interests.” I used these competencies along with my group mates to complete a good and meaningful presentation and blog post.

I feel that through out each Scimatics project I improve on the subjects and ideas that we learn. This shows how I grew as a learner throughout this project by using the competencies. I feel that I could always improve more at a certain subject. I think that I definitely improved on how to use polynomials and like terms through out the project but I think that the way I am going to show my understanding is by getting a good grade on the Scimatics test. Thank you very much for reading through this entire boring blog. If you have any questions just go into the comments and send one my way. And again thanks for reading my blog and I will be posting very, very soon. Bye.