So school has started and here I am diving into the year. What have I done in math class so far? Nothing! Well, that is probably what my students would say, but in reality I have spent the last week starting and working on the most important ingredient of my classroom; having students respect and appreciate each others differences and begin to have them work as a team.
I did not teach the Grade 5's last year like I did my now Grade 6's. So I needed to know more about these individuals. I talked about how important it was for me to get to know them and their feelings toward math. I explained how you think about math and feel about it really makes a difference in how you do it. I had them then write their math autobiography where I told them to be completely honest with me about their feelings towards math, why they liked it or not, what they think they are good at in math and things they have trouble with. Well, they took off. I was a little worried they would kind of not tell the truth to make me happy in saying they all loved math. But they were genuinely honest. Most said they did not hate math, but that it was not their most favorite subject. They felt it got boring on times, especially when they would use the book. They all said they felt they would like math this year and that they hoped I would make it fun for them. I was pleased!!
To bring this classes together more, I decided to proceed with one of my favourite team building activities of all time. I challenged them to build the tallest tower using only plastic drinking straws, paper clips, modeling clay, and tape. I put them into groups of 4-5, gave them the materials and stepped back. I wanted to watch the dynamic of each group and identify the team players and those that think there is an "I" in team. It didn't take long for the leaders to emerge and the followers to follow. I quickly stepped in and got them on track and asked them to start thinking like a team. I was pleasantly surprised to see that after some time, all groups realized they could work faster as a team rather than individuals. All was good.
At the end of the activity we had a great conversation about all the ways they used math. They could not believe how much math was involved such as planning, designing, communicating, knowing how shapes affect the design, predicting how much tape they would need to hold the straws together and so on. I felt this activity was a great way to begin my inquiry based math class and it gave students a chance to dive in and have fun with math, even if they did not realize it!!
Monday, September 13, 2010
Assessment the third time around
Before I begin to talk about how I am assessing my students in math this year, I feel I have to first explain how I am planning to structure my math classroom and learning environment.
In taking on a Problem Based / Inquiry Based approach to teaching mathematics, one can appreciate the importance of providing rich, authentic and thought provoking problems and tasks where children learn the intended math by solving the problems. Over the last two years I have collected and combined many good questions and tasks. I have also discovered the wealth of problems on the NCTM website under "Teaching Children Mathematics Problem Solvers". It is here that I will base my entire year of math on.
To help keep me organized, I have read through all of the tasks that I intend to introduce this year in both Grade 5 and Grade 6 math. I have identified the big ideas, or the main mathematical concept that each of the problems will deal with. In a chart form listing all of the specific outcomes for each grade, I have listed the name of the problem under the corresponding outcome that students would be working on by completing the problem or task. This way I can tell by a glance what outcomes are being assessed for each problem, or what problem I can give a student who needs to work on a particular outcome.
This leads me to the assessment piece. As students are working on individual problems/tasks, I will identify which specific outcomes they have been dealing with and determine the level of achievement they have attained. If I feel for certain they have successfully achieved an outcome, I will use a checklist of outcomes and check off that particular outcome for that particular student. This will give me a quick way of telling which students have achieved which outcomes.
To qualify the level of achievement of these outcomes, I will continue to use my chart where each outcome that students were working on will be identified and a comment about student success of the outcome will be made. I am thinking I will try and do this for each individual problem that students complete, but I think this may get really busy and for little gain. I need to at some point communicate with parents their child's successes in math and share with them the work they have completed. I am thinking I may continue to do the chart making comments on each outcome, but will do so electronically and then once three or four activities or tasks are completed, print off the completed chart and then send it home.
For my purposes, this will solidify my own knowledge about student thinking in mathematics and more importantly provide me with evidence about students' needs.
Does this make sense?
In taking on a Problem Based / Inquiry Based approach to teaching mathematics, one can appreciate the importance of providing rich, authentic and thought provoking problems and tasks where children learn the intended math by solving the problems. Over the last two years I have collected and combined many good questions and tasks. I have also discovered the wealth of problems on the NCTM website under "Teaching Children Mathematics Problem Solvers". It is here that I will base my entire year of math on.
To help keep me organized, I have read through all of the tasks that I intend to introduce this year in both Grade 5 and Grade 6 math. I have identified the big ideas, or the main mathematical concept that each of the problems will deal with. In a chart form listing all of the specific outcomes for each grade, I have listed the name of the problem under the corresponding outcome that students would be working on by completing the problem or task. This way I can tell by a glance what outcomes are being assessed for each problem, or what problem I can give a student who needs to work on a particular outcome.
This leads me to the assessment piece. As students are working on individual problems/tasks, I will identify which specific outcomes they have been dealing with and determine the level of achievement they have attained. If I feel for certain they have successfully achieved an outcome, I will use a checklist of outcomes and check off that particular outcome for that particular student. This will give me a quick way of telling which students have achieved which outcomes.
To qualify the level of achievement of these outcomes, I will continue to use my chart where each outcome that students were working on will be identified and a comment about student success of the outcome will be made. I am thinking I will try and do this for each individual problem that students complete, but I think this may get really busy and for little gain. I need to at some point communicate with parents their child's successes in math and share with them the work they have completed. I am thinking I may continue to do the chart making comments on each outcome, but will do so electronically and then once three or four activities or tasks are completed, print off the completed chart and then send it home.
For my purposes, this will solidify my own knowledge about student thinking in mathematics and more importantly provide me with evidence about students' needs.
Does this make sense?
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
Assessment
One of the biggest challenges for me was getting my head around assessment. If I were to implement this Problem Solving approach in my class, how was I to assess student learning? I found from the last two years organization and thinking ahead are two essential ingredients to getting assessment done right. I found that I needed a way to track student achievement of individual outcomes as each student was at a different place at different times. I needed someway to monitor their progress as they worked through concepts and I needed some way to communicate all this to home.
The first year I collected every piece of work students completed and assessed each and every one. At that time I was still in a unit base mind set where I would have students solve problems based on a set unit of work. For example, students may for a month work on problems concentrating on measurement or fraction. I would then list all the outcomes completed in chart form and report on each one individually and identify what level of achievement the student accomplished. This was very time consuming and I found I was reporting on a lot of the same outcomes more than was needed. I also found that I was not communicating with home very often as it was taking a over a month, if not more to complete the unit of work.
Last year, I tried a similar approach but decided to not collect every piece of work. Instead, I gave students specific questions and tasks that would assess their understanding of the work they were completing. I used these one page tasks for their assessment of the unit work and found it less time consuming. However, I still had to complete the chart of outcomes and report on each one individually. During this year, I found by keeping on top of this work and reporting on the outcomes when I was sure a student had achieved instead of waiting for the unit of work to be completed, saved me a lot of time and torment. I like the chart form which lists the outcomes as it gives me and the parents an in-depth look at where their child is in terms of the curriculum. More importantly, it lets me see without a doubt where a child's needs are and guides me to providing them with the help they need.
This year, I am doing it differently again!
The first year I collected every piece of work students completed and assessed each and every one. At that time I was still in a unit base mind set where I would have students solve problems based on a set unit of work. For example, students may for a month work on problems concentrating on measurement or fraction. I would then list all the outcomes completed in chart form and report on each one individually and identify what level of achievement the student accomplished. This was very time consuming and I found I was reporting on a lot of the same outcomes more than was needed. I also found that I was not communicating with home very often as it was taking a over a month, if not more to complete the unit of work.
Last year, I tried a similar approach but decided to not collect every piece of work. Instead, I gave students specific questions and tasks that would assess their understanding of the work they were completing. I used these one page tasks for their assessment of the unit work and found it less time consuming. However, I still had to complete the chart of outcomes and report on each one individually. During this year, I found by keeping on top of this work and reporting on the outcomes when I was sure a student had achieved instead of waiting for the unit of work to be completed, saved me a lot of time and torment. I like the chart form which lists the outcomes as it gives me and the parents an in-depth look at where their child is in terms of the curriculum. More importantly, it lets me see without a doubt where a child's needs are and guides me to providing them with the help they need.
This year, I am doing it differently again!
On My Way!
Welcome to my Blog!
I really hope you enjoy reading about my journey into teaching mathematics in a Grade 5 and Grade 6 classroom through an inquiry based approach. I have been playing with the idea for the last two years now and I have finally come to a place where I think I am ready to fully implement this into my math classroom.
So why a blog? I felt I needed a place where I could communicate my findings as I go and more importantly a place where I could reflect on the days/weeks activities. I also needed an informal avenue where others could make suggestions as to what went wrong in the lesson and/or what went right! I would also like to see the conversation about teaching this way open up where more teachers and educators start talking about the possibilities of going outside the box and daring to be different.
So let's begin!
I really hope you enjoy reading about my journey into teaching mathematics in a Grade 5 and Grade 6 classroom through an inquiry based approach. I have been playing with the idea for the last two years now and I have finally come to a place where I think I am ready to fully implement this into my math classroom.
So why a blog? I felt I needed a place where I could communicate my findings as I go and more importantly a place where I could reflect on the days/weeks activities. I also needed an informal avenue where others could make suggestions as to what went wrong in the lesson and/or what went right! I would also like to see the conversation about teaching this way open up where more teachers and educators start talking about the possibilities of going outside the box and daring to be different.
So let's begin!
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