Building Thinking Classrooms--My new passion

Have you ever read something and gotten so excited by it that you got that same feeling of euphoria you got the first time you were able to stand up on water skis or the first time you made it to the top of a challenging mountain? That was the feeling I had after reading the first chapter of Building Thinking Classrooms by Peter Liljedahl. 

I've followed Peter's work for several years and implemented some of his changes, but it wasn't really a whole program, just changes to my existing teaching methods. This book takes all of his research and puts it together into a program that you can implement that will completely upend the way you teach math. I bought the book almost as soon as it came out and read it the first weekend. As I said, the first chapter had me hooked and ready to move to Canada to get a PHD with Peter--that's how excited I was! Combine this with the shitshow that teaching has turned into for the last year and I was ready to jump in with both feet. I implemented parts of the book in November while we were teaching online, and prepared to commit to the complete change when we went back with students face to face at the end of January. 

It has been a month now and I think it's time to read back through the book and do more of a deep dive into all of the facets of Building Thinking Classrooms, incorporating the lessons I have learned so far with the knowledge in the book. 

This blog series will be more about me writing notes to myself, but if someone else gets any good information out of it or has comments about their experience, that would also be a good thing. 

Welcome to my journey!