*Describe an assignment or activity that engaged students in a meaningful way.

Ms. Serr wanted to help her students understand about surface area and volume. She brought cereal boxes in from home and had the students use them to design cereal boxes of the their own. She had the students calculate how much cardboard would be made to create their own cereal box and helped the students see that covering the box (surface area) was different than filling the box (volume). Later, Ms. Serr helped her students to better understand volume by allowing them to build “swimming pools” out of cubes and calculating the cubic feet, or volume, of water required to fill the pool. Mental light-bulbs are constantly illuminated in her classroom as she helps her students to understand.

*Describe this teacher’s use of best practices in their instruction and assignments.

Ms. Serr works hard to help her students learn to communicate mathematically. She helps her students to learn how to work in groups, and use words, symbols, graphs, and pictures to communicate their mathematical ideas.

*Describe a time this teacher added to the collaborative efforts of her fellow teachers.

Ms. Serr is constantly contributing new ideas and lessons to her department. She is never afraid to try a new lesson in her classroom and pass it along to the other teachers in the school. She is constantly thinking creatively and researching new ideas for teaching.

*Any other wonderful, inspiration, or commendable wonderfulness about Ms. Serr we should let everyone know about?

Ms. Serr cares about her students. She wants them to be successful in the classroom and successful in life.

*What is Ms. Serr’s favorite snack (candy bar, etc) just in case students or teachers would like to shower this Falconer of the Week with their snack of choice?

Ms. Serr likes most candy, cereal, and dried mango slices.