Tonight's homework is an "entrance ticket," in preparation for an upcoming memorization quiz. Yesterday I distributed a photocopy showing the natural numbers, whole numbers, integers, rational numbers, irrational numbers, and real numbers, along with their definitions. Students are going to have to give that back to me on a blank sheet of paper for a quiz we'll be having within about a week, entirely by memory. This is THE most critical vocabulary that they will need coming into high school, and I usually give this quiz two additional times this year, so that they do not forget the definitions.
Students are to take out a blank sheet of paper tonight, and write everything that is on the photocopy (front side only, the one with the definitions above). Their goal tonight is to try to do the first three number types and definitions by memory, but they need to write everything down on the piece of paper tonight. I will collect it first thing tomorrow. Every night I will be giving this as practice. We chunk it; the goal is to increase what the student can do by memory until it is all memorized.
Parents, there is a place for convergent (narrow, militaristic thinking / training) as well as divergent thinking (creative, outside-the-box problem solving). We are using eighth specific thinking strategies in class this year, that the students will know very well. So please rest assured that while there is a place for memorization, it is not the entire course--not by a long shot.
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