Christine Howe

“The Orchard Hideout” Reflection

This unit has greatly improved my understanding of how algebra and geometry connect.
One of the major ways that my new knowledge was formed was through our exploration of the
pythagorean theorem. The formula itself is something that I have been studying in school for
years, but applying it to other situations was something new. Using it to formulate other
equations, prove theories and answers to problems, etc, allowed me to connect the shape (a right
triangle) to the equation in more than just definition. Exploring pythagorean as a shape and an
equation also helped me to be able to understand other shapes and their algebraic partners by
using it to break them down into more understandable things, and into proofs, as I talked about a
little bit in my cover letter.
I also learned a lot about myself during this unit, mostly that I am really bad at
memorizing equations. I also retain things better if we work up to them, as we did throughout
this unit with the larger concepts. However, as I learned in math last year, it is important for me
to not feel like we are working too slowly. Last year we worked on one part of a concept for a
whole semester, and to me it felt as if I was not learning anything. So it was interesting to see
that process of slowly working up to something at a little faster pace, because it felt like I
retained things, learned things, and had good comprehension throughout the whole unit.