Oerb Workshop

Several months ago, I had the chance to attend a costless OERB Energy Education Workshop at Ponca City High School inward Ponca City, OK.  This was my 2nd OERB Workshop to attend.  I attended my outset OERB Workshop only a distich of weeks earlier I started my outset yr of teaching.  I blogged nearly that sense here.

OERB stands for the Oklahoma Energy Resources Board.  They are funded yesteryear a voluntary revenue enhancement paid yesteryear oil as well as natural gas producers as well as liberate energy owners.  They are known across the nation for cleaning upwards abandoned oil good sites at no accuse to the landowner.  They also seek to educate children nearly oil good safety.  And, they render a costless curriculum to teachers that relates their bailiwick affair to the oil as well as natural gas industry.

Oklahoma teachers tin sign upwards to attend a costless workshop here.  They have got workshops from pre-K through high school.

OERB Energy Education Workshop

One of the outset questions my workshop facilitator asked was, "What role does oil as well as natural gas currently play inward your life?  How much hit you lot know nearly the oil as well as natural gas industry?"

To survive honest, I spent many years of my life genuinely non thinking nearly the oil as well as natural gas industry.  Yes, I drive a car.  And, I know it couldn't run without crude products.  But, I never gave much idea to how that oil gets to the store or the gasoline gets to the gas station.

Then, I moved to Drumright.  You wouldn't mean value that moving sixty miles due west of the expanse I grew upwards inward would brand that large of a difference.  But, a lot of days, it seems similar I'm living inward a whole dissimilar world.  I grew upwards eastward of Tulsa.  There are farms as well as ranches.  But, most people piece of work inward either Tulsa or its suburbs.  I don't e'er recall a unmarried classmate announcing that they planned to larn to piece of work inward the oil field.

Drumright began equally an oil boomtown.  Oil was struck inward 1912, as well as the town sprang upwards overnight.  It is impossible to pass anytime inward this town as well as non realize only how of import oil is to its existence.  Our paper is called The Drumright Gusher.  Our schoolhouse yearbooks are also known equally Gushers.  Our community theatre is the BoomTown Theater.  Drumright is the smallest town inward Oklahoma amongst a community theatre group.  You tin pass the nighttime at the BoomTown Inn.  Our population is correct only about 3,000 people.  We're also a null halt low-cal town.

Even our town celebrations as well as festivals are centered on oil.  You tin attend Drumright Discovery Days every summertime to celebrate the regain of oil inward Drumright.  There's an Oil Patch Jamboree inward the fall.  And, there's a Summer Oil Patch Festival every Fourth of July.    

Our high schoolhouse was built inward 1919 when oil production was high.  At ane point, the high schoolhouse was graduating classes of 90-100 students.  For the 2 years I have got been there, nosotros have got graduated solely only about 32 or so.  The town is real attached to this historic building.      

Drumright High School

The route inward forepart of the high schoolhouse is withal covered inward the original bricks.

Brick Covered Streets

To celebrate the town's centennial, an 84 human foot tall oil derrick was dismantled, moved into town, as well as donated to the town's museum.

Drumright Centennial Oil Derrick

This postcard from 1913 shows how the oil derricks used to dot the Drumright landscape.

Drumright Oil Derricks 1913 - Photo Courtesy Oklahoma Historical Society

It's difficult to drive anywhere inward town without seeing a pumping oil well.  This ane is only a distich of hundred feet off of Main Street.

Drumright Oil Well

Additionally, nosotros are less than 10 miles from Cushing.  Cushing is the Oil Pipeline Crossroads of the World.  Cushing is also dwelling to the world's largest tank farm.  They have got the capacity to store over 66 meg barrels of oil.  President Obama fifty-fifty visited the town inward 2012 to brand a speech communication nearly the Keystone Pipeline.  

Cushing Pipeline Crossroads Sign

Why am I telling you lot all this?  Well, the oil as well as natural gas manufacture is a major share of the town I alive inward as well as learn in, as well as it's a major share of my students' lives.  When I inquire my students how many of them have got at to the lowest degree ane solid unit of measurement fellow member who plant inward the oil field, 90-95 pct of hands volition larn up.  Oil is everything inward this town.

H5N1 lot of days, I wishing this wasn't the case.  So many of our students prepare their sights on working inward the oil field.  After all, that's where their parents, aunts, uncles, as well as cousins work.  It's all they know.  My pump breaks every fourth dimension I hear a educatee tell me that they don't fifty-fifty genuinely demand a high schoolhouse diploma since they're only going to piece of work inward the oil field.  When colleges are a minimum of 45-60 minutes away as well as the oilfield is five minutes away, the oilfield seems to win out agency to a greater extent than than it should.

I have got had a coworker tell me that the students inward this town don't demand Algebra 2 because their destiny is the oil plain - non a project equally a rocket scientist.  Comments similar this brand me livid.  I desire my students to have got a vision beyond the oil field.  I desire them to larn to college as well as THEN create upwards one's hear if the oil plain is the correct fit for them.  Oil plain workers are important.  But, I don't desire students thinking that is their solely option.    

The outset fourth dimension I attended an OERB Workshop, my original intention was to larn costless supplies for my classroom.  This is how I got a costless degree prepare of xxx TI-30 Scientific Calculators.  They've been used inward my classroom almost every unmarried 24-hour interval since I got them.  This time, I was withal eager to larn costless supplies.  But, I'd also gained a novel appreciation for the industry.  I'd lived inward Drumright for less than a calendar week when I attended the outset workshop.  After living at that topographic point for almost 2 years now, I have got a greater agreement of the importance of oil to this expanse that I instantly telephone call upwards home.

The novel Common Core aligned curriculum that they would render me amongst would survive applicable to my students.  These lessons would give me a peril to present my students how math plays out inward existent life inward an manufacture that they are almost all familiar with.  The lessons weren't fluff.  They were relevant.

We each received a binder of curriculum materials.  I attended a preparation that was specifically for high schoolhouse math teachers.

OERB Curriculum Binder

We worked through each of the lessons together.  And, I brutal inward beloved amongst them.  I could genuinely run into myself using these lessons inward my classroom.

We wrote systems of equations to compare the costs as well as profits of diverse oil wells.

Systems of Equations

I solved the occupation algebraically earlier solving it graphically.  Then, I couldn't larn my graphical respond to tally my algebraic answer.  I wrote myself a reminder to permit my students grapple amongst graphing the organization yesteryear manus outset earlier introducing them to the technology scientific discipline that tin notice the solution for them amongst a few keystrokes.  

Solving Systems of Equations yesteryear Graphing

Another lesson had us performing linear programming.  This is a topic that I've never genuinely taught before.

Linear Programming

We used the pythagorean theorem and/or distance formula to calculate the toll of drilling.

Drill In The Right Direction

We looked at a nautical chart of Oklahoma Oil Production to position areas that looked equally if they could survive modeled yesteryear quadratic, cubic, as well as quartic functions.  Then, nosotros used the information to perform the selected regression.

Oklahoma Oil Production Graph

It was fun.  It was hands-on.  It was existent life.  I left the workshop excited to have got these lessons as well as materials dorsum to my students.  I also left the workshop amongst a costless tub of goodies!  Let's await inside...

Tub of Classroom Materials

They emphasize that the supplies are our ain personal property, non the belongings of our schoolhouse districts.  So, if I move, I larn to have got my calculators amongst me!

Laminated mats for some of the activities.

Laminated Mats

Laminated Mats

Vis-a-Vis markers to usage to write on the laminated mats.

Dry Erase Markers

TI-SmartView.  I'm almost persuaded to larn dorsum to using the TI-84 instead of the TI-nSpire only as well as thence I tin usage this.  (I've got other reasons, too.  I beloved the nSpire, but our standardized testing computer program gives students a TI-84 to use...)

Smart View Software

Books nearly the oil as well as natural gas industry.

Dvd documentaries nearly the oil as well as natural gas industry.

Pencils.  You can't have got plenty of these!

Free Pencils

Colored pencils.  Yay!

Colored Pencils

Protractors.

Protractors

Rulers.  My students have got a bad habit of bending rulers as well as accidentally snapping them.  These are much needed!  

Free Rulers

Graph Paper.

Ream of Graph Paper

And the best part?  Three TI-84 Plus Color Graphing Calculators as well as a Charging Station!

TI 84 Color Graphing Calculator

Set of iii Graphing Calculators as well as Charging Station

This box is only a niggling spell of math instructor heaven.  Calculators.  Pencils.  Rulers.  Protractors.  Graphing Calculators.  Graph paper.  Dry erase markers.  Colored pencils.  A storage tub.

Since I'm writing this months later, I tin tell that I've used several of the OERB lessons amongst my students.  More posts on that later, though.

To the OERB - thank you lot for the resources you lot have got provided for my students.  And, give thank you lot you for giving me the materials I demand to present my students that math plays a role inward the oil as well as natural gas industry!

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