Today we had class for Ben's first period. He asked me if he could have a few moments to "wake up". I told him sure, but that I'd like to get this circuit done today. After about 5 minutes I gave him a warning that I'd like to get started in a minute or 2. When time was up, I asked Ben to put away his legos. He complied. We worked on a circuit of problems. When we found the answer to one problem, it led us to find the next problem to attempt. I allowed Ben to lead the way. I asked him questions like, "are we supposed to add the powers here or multiply them?" He participated and did fairly well. He needed a few reminders on the rules. I showed him WHY you add powers when multiplying (x^4)(x^3) really means (x*x*x*x)(x*x*x), and you can see there are a total of 7 x's there. So instead of writing out the x's each time, we remember that when we multiply like bases we add their powers. We reviewed multiplying, dividing, zero powers, and negative powers. At the end of class I complimented Ben on his focus today. I told him that sometimes we have to do things we don't want to do to get where we want to go. I told him I know he doesn't have a LOVE for math, but that he's GOOD at it when he does it.