Week 8: The last one! (maybe...)

Determine one unit in Differentiating in Practice: A Resource Guilde for Differentiating Curriculum (Tomlinson & Eidson, 2003) that seems appropriate for the grade level of your field/student-teaching class. Read everything about that unit thoroughly.
I chose Unit 4: The World of Geometry
Explain:
1) what impresses you most about the unit? In the unit, I was most impressed with how thorough it was. It covered everything that was basic about geometry. I also liked that it used tiered activities, as well as journal keeping! I think math journals are WONDERFUL and completely underrated.
2) anything you learn about differentiation, just from studying this one unit From this unit, I learned that it is so important to differentiate in every content area. Math is (I would assume) the most disliked subject of all the subjects. If you only have one way for math to be done in the classroom, you aren't working WITH all of your students and their learning needs. However, when differentiated, math can be adapted to the learning ways of all of the students when options are given. For example, in a math journal the students can record their notes however they want. They can reflect on circles instead of learning blah blah blah about "this is a circle" (in a Ben Stein voice).
3) what you don't understand about the unit or how it works This seems like a lot of information to be learned before the final assessment. I don't understand how the students are to remember things from Lesson 1 when they are all the way at the end working on the assessment. Is that what the journal would be used for? So the students can look back on their notes from previous lessons? I guess that's a very general question, but I don't understand how that works. Period.
4) what, other than the content, you believe you would have to modify in the unit if you were going to teach it to your student-teaching class I would definitely have to modify Lesson 8 where they look for shapes in flags. I would make it where the students would look for shapes everywhere!
5) why you would modify it I don't want students to just think that interesting geometry is found in flags; I want them to know that it is everywhere. This would help them think outside of the box, instead of me giving them a flag picture and telling them to find geometric shapes.
6) how you would modify it I would have them go on a scavenger hunt around the school in groups (to keep them under control) where they have to find figures in geometric shapes, interview various faculty members about geometric shapes, and introduce an interesting fact about geometry to that faculty that they did not already know. This would force interaction, but because I would put them in groups, only those who wanted to talk would have to. (Not everyone likes to interact... I know this because I was one of those people!). Or, instead of doing it around the school, they would have to do it around their town as a weekend homework assignment so their parents could get involved too.