ObservationTake Aways

As I like to do every so often, I went to observe my fellow MS math teacher.  She teaches strictly 8th graders, has been teaching math for 13+ years, and is seemingly loved by everyone.  When I talk to students about why they enjoy her class so much, they usually say, "It's hard to explain...she's just so nice."  I usually prod, on trying to gain some insight into the majesty of this beloved educator, but never do I get anything concrete...it all comes back to "she's just so nice".

And I guess I don't have to look any further..."She's just so nice" is the secret, it is the answer.  No matter how good a lesson may be, how many best practices you employ, how many hours of feedback you give, if your students don't perceive you as "nice," and I think that to mean "caring," it's all for not.  Relationships are so important to people, that without them very little learning can take place.

Unfortunately for me, I have to try extra hard for people to perceive me as "nice", let alone "so nice".  By nature, I am an introvert with high levels of self-doubt and anxiety.  These attributes are often construed by others, including my students, as detached and uncaring, but the that couldn't be farther from the truth.  I care deeply about everyone that I encounter, students, colleagues, and strangers alike.  For all of my students, I spend countless hours thinking of how I can help them realise their talents, overcome their shortcomings, and persevere through adversity.  There's nothing I want more than to ensure each and everyone of their successes.  At times, this may manifest in frustration, when I don't feel like I've accomplished those things.  However, students don't understand that my frustrations are never with them, but with me.  With my inability to be "that" teacher in their life to inspire and make change.

This quest will not end with this observation nor this post.  This is year nine of my teaching career, and I have many more wonderful days ahead to make my students believe.  Here's to trying.

Changing Education Paradigms

Can't believe I haven't seen this before.  Excellent history of education.

How to shift the paradigm in my classroom?

Repairing Culture

I had a tough day with my toughest class yesterday.  I feel a little guilty saying that they are a "tough" class, as the kids that I work with are truly amazing.  They are respectful, kind, and work relatively hard. Still, our job is never that easy.

The dynamics of this particular block just drives me crazy, and I don't do a very good job of hiding it.  Simply put, they know they drive me crazy, and that makes everything that much worse.  I struggle implementing changes, giving direct instruction, facilitating discussion, or doing just about anything.  

So, tomorrow I'm going about fixing my classroom culture.  The question is "how?"  

Step 1:  Apologize

Step 2:  Eliminate sarcasm and disrespect

Step 3: Feedback (google form)

Step 4: Discuss feedback

Step 5: Listen to all suggestion

Step 6: Make suggested changes

Let's see how it goes!

Equation, Graph, Table Displays

I just finished a display activity with my 7th graders, and I loved it.  I've used this activity in the past, but not with the success of this go around.  I stole this activity from my days in Oregon and thanks to Shannon McCaw for sharing this and many more activities.

The activity:

• Break up the class into groups of 2 or 3 people
• Distribute a card to each group - the card contains one of the following: graph, equation, table or story
• Students divide a poster into four section and create the other 3 missing parts, depending on what they receive

After the creation of the posters, I did a carousel activity wherein each person wrote a comment(s) on a sticky note complimenting or critiquing other groups work.  Some questions I had them consider:

     1)  Do all representations match or represent the same situation?

     2)  Are all variables defined?  In each section.  (No one had this done)

     3)  Is the presentation easy to read and understand?

     4)  Can you tell what the situation is looking at any given section           (graph, equation, table)

Then, I gave the students 10 minutes to adjust their displays based on the feedback they received.  Every group went back to their displays and changed something.  Most simply labeled their variables, but some groups made more significant adjustments.

The power of this activity is in the critiquing of others work.  Student were able to see how explicit they had to be in their representations, because what is obvious to one person is not to another.  Also, the students had a very difficult time creating a story to match their tables, graphs and equations.  Many groups left the story to the end, and then realized that their representations did match their story.  

This activity lends itself to learning on so many different levels.  I can't wait to do it again!

Learning2Asia

My first time attending a Learning2 conference and I was inspired, energized, and too be honest, a bit overwhelmed.  The theme of the conference was "disrupt" and we heard from people around the world whom are doing some impressive things to disrupt their lives, classrooms, and schools.  

With each new presentation, I felt a bit like a child being scolded for doing something wrong, or in this case, not doing enough right.  Everything was about how our system is broken, and we aren't doing enough to change it. I walked away with an action plan and some solid ideas, but mainly I walked away feeling like a loser.

Now that a few days have passed, I'm able to reflect on the conference with a little more objectivity.  Being back in my comfortable environment, where there's anything but disruption around me, I realize that not everything we do is broken.  Some of our students are thriving, and getting exactly what they need to be successful in the future.  However, it is clear that some are not.  It is my job to figure out how to reach all learners, how to inspires, how to prepare students for jobs not yet created, how to collaborate with their peers, how to apply knowledge, how to create new things, how to identify and then solve problems.  In short it is my task, to educate the whole child for a beautifully complex and unpredictable future. A task, a job, a privilege that I approach with unabated enthusiasm.  

Here's to a controlled disruption, where everyone can be successful!

Driven to Learn: All Children?

We had a professional development day last week, led by our amazing student services coordinator.  She presented on the physiology of ADHD and the strategies that can be applied to negate some of the executive functioning deficits that are often associated with the diagnosis.  Towards the end of her presentation she referred to a common catch-phrase question the many educators use when talking about student motivation, "Have you ever encountered a young child (2 or 3 year old) unmotivated to learn?"  The thought goes that children are born with an intrinsic motivation to learn, and we, as an educational institution, tend to squash that "love" of learning.  In the past, I've taken this point as fact and believed in a child's love of learning and curiosity, but for the first time, I had my doubts.

Don't get me wrong, I still believe that children are curious and eager to learn.  They will continually explore their world to increase their understanding of it.  However, this learning is strictly relegated to an exploratory and self-driven act.  When a child is asked to learn something, i.e. washing their hands, using the toilet, brushing their teeth, they might not be as eager.  Why?  Are we presenting the material incorrectly?  Maybe?  But maybe it's just that the subject matter doesn't interest them.  Maybe, just maybe, they would rather be doing something else, learning about something else, than the thing which we want.

That's where school comes in to play.  It's our job, our privilege, as educators, to provide students with a wealth of knowledge and skills that will allow unlimited opportunity in the future.  Some of those skills, and some of that knowledge, may not be what a student wants to think about, explore, and learn about.  Therefore, it's not us, it's not the institution, that kills the desire to learn, it's simply human individuality.

We must continue to make learning fun, engaging, and relevant to students, but we must not beat ourselves up because we've killed a child's motivation to learn.  We have exposed a person to a new topic or area of study, that may, one day open up a door to their future.

Solving Equations

As I've mentioned before, I'm teaching the same group of kids that I had last year.  This is good and bad.  Good because I have established relationships, know what they can do, and know what we covered and how we covered it last year.  It's bad because, let's face it, sometimes a student (and a teacher) needs a fresh face.

Knowing that we solved one-step equations last year in our 6th grade class, when I approached this topic this year, I thought that I'd have the kids teach each other.  Therefore, I broke the class into groups of 3, and assigned each group a different equation to solve.  They all came to the white board and began solving the equation.  After 1 minute, I had the groups rotate and continue the work of another group.  This continued until all groups had worked or reviewed each equation.  Next, I had the groups return to their original equations and see if the workings made sense, and if they agreed with the final outcome.

My hope in doing this was that each student would see the various types of one-step equations, they would improve on their ability to critique the work of others, and it would get them out of their seats.  These goals, for the most part, were accomplished.  I also made a rule that the same person could not write on the white board twice in a row, forcing everyone to participate.

After we had solved all of the equations, I had the whole class look at a few choice ones and do a bit of critiquing.  My idea was to create a whole class dialogue about the different methods to solving equations, how we communicate our thinking clearly, and how we can check each other's work.  Unfortunately, the whole class discussion didn't progress as I had hoped, and we just reviewed equation and tried to clarify any misconceptions.

Although the lesson wasn't perfect, I enjoyed the different approach to presenting the topic.  It did get all students out of their seats, and most of them were working on and talking about math which was great.

Order of Operations Fun

A few days ago, I was looking across the courtyard into the upper school classrooms, and all I saw were students sitting in their seats and teachers standing delivering content.  This prompted me to take a quick stroll around our campus to see whether this was the norm.  I wandered the halls of our upper school, middle school and lower school.  Do you know what I found?  In only ONE classroom were students actually standing and working in groups.  In every other classroom, the teacher was talking and the students were seated at their desk.  I'm sure this isn't always the case, but it prompted me to rethink my next lesson.

I was designing my lesson(s) for teaching the order of operations with the objective of getting students to interact with the skill in multiple ways (mainly out of their seats).  So, with the help of a colleague, I created some stations to teach the concept.  

First, I had students work in small groups to simplify a challenging expression.  This led to a variety of simplifications, and we discussed the reasons for the varience, and

My notes for the interactive notebook

the importance of having a set of rules to follow when simplifying expressions.  Next, I used an interactive notebook entry to provide some background knowledge for those that haven't been exposed to the order of operations. 

After I felt like students had a basic understanding of the orders of operation, I split them up into 3 groups of 5.  I know, I only have 15 students in this class...so lucky.  These were the groups:

Pemdonkey

1)  Pin the tail on the PEMDONKEY:  I traced a large donkey on the white board and divided it into PEMDAS sections.  I asked one student in the group to put on a blindfold.  I gave the rest of the group and expression to simplify.  The group had to direct the "blind" member to the correct operation using verbal instructions.  Then they would complete that step of the simplification and continue doing this until they had simplified the expression completely.

2.  Simplifying Expression worksheet - Nothing exciting here, but it gave the student a chance to start the homework.  This also gave me a chance to formatively assess their progress and do any necessary scaffolding.  Notice the small white board in the background.  

Worksheet practice

Hop Scotch PEMDAS style

 3.  PEMDAS Scotch - In this station, students were asked to play a variation of hopscotch.  First, the just completed 5 rounds of hopping through the game board while shouting out the order of operations.  Next, I gave each student a separate expression to simplify.  They had to throw a paper clip marker to the correct operation, then hop to pick it up.  They continued this process until they had simplified their expression.  They repeated this process with a new expression once they had finished.

Each station lasted 12 minutes, but it wasn't nearly long enough.  I should have allotted 18-20 minutes, because each group needed vebal instructions and demonstrations in order to get started.  Also, I did not leave enough time for an adequate wrap-up.  All I was able to do was a quick 1-5 scale of how well they felt they could apply the order of operations.

I know there will need to be some follow up, but, at least for today, my classroom was filled with students out of their seats and engaged in their learning.  Let's hope it lasts!

Week of iMath Day 1 - Thank you!

Thank you Jo Boaler and the Stanford University team for breathing some math life into my first day of school this year. Typically, my first day of school is filled with community building activities, helping me to get to know my students, and creating an active learning community. However, these activities have rarely been associated with math content. This year, thanks to the youcubed website, I was able to get the students thinking about math while building community and creating an atmospher of learning.

I started the class by reviewing some procedures, i.e. how to enter the class, materials needed, warm-up routine, etc.  Then, I had the students get started on the first warm up activity, "What's Missing" from AIMS educational resources. I really wanted to set a tone of "hard work" this year, so I decided to do some math right away. I'm trying a new warm-up routine this year, so I wanted to get going on it right away. This also provided a quick formative assessment of where students were at in regards to their math thinking and perserverance in math.

After we finished the warm-up, we did a quick name game to get acquainted, and then I went into Day 1 of  the Week of iMath.  We began by creating some group work agreements.  All I asked the students to do was think of 2 things they like and dislike others to do/say when working in groups.  We shared out, and I compiled a list of agreements.  Following the group agreements, we watched the short 4 minute clip on brain development and a growth mindset form the iMath website.  This, although not exciting, set a good tone for the notion that everyone can be successful in math.

The real beauty of the day came during the activity "Four Fours".  Students were asked to work indpendently, or in groups, to find the numbers 1-20 by using four fours and various operations.  Before they began, we brainstormed the different operations they could use.  I was thoroughly impressed when one of my seventh grade students offered factorial and square root.  I then made note of some sentence starter posters that I had created to promote productive conversation, and asked students to use these sentence starters when speaking in their groups.  Then, they were off.  The students worked for a solid 20 minutes on math...the first day.  After we had created our lists, I had the students critique other's thinking and work.

This activity was a wonderful way to introduce group agreements, math dialogue,and creativity in math, while creating the precedent that we're going to be doing math this year, and it can be fun!  I even overheard a student leave the class say, "That was fun!"  I think that's a first!

Boring!

Have you ever been in the middle of a lesson/period and thought to yourself, "This is so boring!"  Well, it happens, and it happened to me today.  I have a total of 5 class periods left with my students until we take semester exams, and I feel like I'm pushing as much content at them as possible without any regard for best teaching practices.  We've spent the better part of the last 3 classes talking the basics of probability.  For the most part, I've used the traditional stand and deliver approach with an "I do, we do, you do" mindset.  While it seems to be going well, mainly because I'm doing most of the talking, I notice students either dosing off or not engaged at all.  It's okay I tell myself, at least they're getting the content that they need.

Eu contraire, they have no idea what probability is or how to find it.  This was evidenced by a few short formative assessment, and by the classroom discussion that does and doesn't take place.  I finally came to terms with the tedium of the day during my last section today, and decide to add a very small bit of energy and engagement into the lesson.  It's amazing what a pair of dice can do to liven up a sixth grade classroom.  I'm not sure if they learned more than my other classes, but at least they were throwing some dice, engaged, and maybe thinking about probability in the process.

I give up

I officially throw in the towel...and the winner is traditional math education.  I've tried for the past 2 years to alter my math teaching practice to be more of a problem/inquiry/project based teacher, but it just isn't working.  I don't have the skills required to facilitate the discussion and scaffold the learning to help students succeed.  Therefore, "I do, we do, you do" I'm back.  It sure will be easier on me, and I don't think the kids will mind a bit.

So sorry to have failed, but I just can't take the constant disappointment which has become my math instruction.  The students don't seem to be learning any more than they were before, and I'm more stressed than ever.  Hello page 540 #1-50 odd, I hope you help!

Project Zoo

I'm a firm believer in the notion that traditional math instruction is not the best option.  The old adage, "I do, we do, you do" just doesn't work for a majority of the kids in my class, and it does nothing to develop their problem solving skills.  The only problem that they end up solving in these direct instruction lessons is: how to stay awake?

With that in mind, I try not to be that teacher, but occasionally (more often than I'd like) it happens.  So, I decided to do a project based unit with my sixth graders in order to teach perimeter and area.  I found the unit on TeachersPayTeachers (thank you).

Unit Resources

A couple big take-aways from the unit:

1.  It was more fun than stand and deliver
2.  I need to give more class time and direct instruction/intervention throughout the project
3.  Sample projects would be helpful
4.  Scale needs to be a multi-day lesson
5.  Some kids just don't like projects

The last point was the toughest to grapple with. Here I thought that I provided an excellent opportunity for students to be engaged in their learning, and some kids just felt like the project was an extra burden to overcome.

I'll try this unit next year with a bit of tweaking.  I haven't given up on project based learning, but I'm doubting whether I have the skill set to make it work.

It's Not that Easy, but shouldn't it be!

My first post about teaching middle school math, and I'm going to keep it pretty short.  This is just my second year teaching MS math after teaching 7 years in the 4th and 5th grade, and the only thing that I know is that teaching math isn't that easy, but it shouldn't be that hard either.

I'm concluding my first year at an international school in the Philippines after leaving a wondeful public school in Oregon.  The contrasts between jobs is stark.  In my current position: I have an abundance of prep (500 minutes a week during contact hours), only teach two grade levels, no emphasis on standardized testing, complete freedom to teach how I feel is best.  My old school: I taught 3 levels of math (6-8), 1 social studies block, 1 reading intervention block, and 1 math intervention block, had 200 minutes of prep a week, every meeting revolved around test scores or how to improve them, and I felt very little freedom in the classroom.

Despite the contrasts, the one big similarity that I face is that there's no easy way to teach math.  Some students walk through the door with a predisposition of hatred towards the subject and anything to do with it.  This will chronicle my attempts, my success, and my failures at reversing that mindset.  Let's see how it goes.