Success!!!

Yesterday (Friday) I had my Algebra students work on a problem solving question and they actually came to the conclusion they were supposed to! We are getting into Systems of Equations and the first step is to solve by graphing. I gave them a question where a person had to choose between two health clubs based on their monthly rate and price per visit, the students had to figure out which club was cheaper.  All of the groups were able to successfully graph both lines and come to the conclusion that it depended on how many times she went. At 4 visits the price was the same, less than 4 one club was cheaper, and more than 4 the other club was cheaper.  Each group had to make a poster of their answer. The poster had to have the x,y chart for both lines, the graph of the lines, and the answer to the problem. I was very impressed with the work they did.

Now, I have to confess that I did get them started before I let them loose on their own.  I did tell them that the easiest way to go about this was making an x,y chart and start at 0. They did fill in the values and graph them on thier own.