Some Baseline Data

PROBLEM: My kids struggle to explain and justify their thinking and reasoning in maths.

WONDERING: How can I develop the mathematical dialogic discourse ability of my children?

This week I recorded my target kids collectively solving a problem. My goal was to capture and measure their ability to explain their thinking and inquire about other's. I noted done each time each child used any of the phrases, or similar phrases below. The kids worked on the problem for 15 minutes and this is their results.It's worth noting that two of the target group were not there that day. Their row has been marked with a -. 

It's interesting to see that the children did try to express what they are thinking however it often wasn't backed up with a reason. The word 'because' was seldom used and the others were left to infer the mathematica thinking and process from what was said e.g "You add 20 to 100 and then you....". Equally interesting is that only one child asked for further information/explanation from others as they expressed their thinking.

This married up with what I have been seeing anecdotally so it's nice to have some actual data. We clearly have a long way to go in developing a community where kids can confidently express their thinking and inquire of others. My next steps involve explicitly teaching the kids how to express and justify their mathematical thinking. My kids need to view each other as both a learner and teacher. They need to connect with the idea that they can learn from their peers and that what their peers have to say is valuable.

Measuring and Tracking Progress

PROBLEM: My kids struggle to explain and justify their thinking and reasoning in maths.

WONDERING: How can I develop the mathematical dialogic discourse ability of my children?

One issue I had was working out how to measure the mathematical dialogic discourse ability of my kids. Anecdotally I could see that they struggle to explain and justify their thinking but how was I going to get quantifiable data. I discussed my problem with Dr Rebecca Jesson and we came up with (well she came up with) this solution.

I will record my target group during a maths lesson then I'll listen back and note down every time a child uses specific (which is yet to be decided) justifying and explaining language and each time they refer to the context of the maths problem when explaining their thinking.  I will also be noting down how often they need teacher prompts to draw out an explanation. By doing this regularly I should be able track and measure the kids mathematical dialogic discourse ability.

Back to the drawing board - My new wondering

As mentioned earlier my Manaikalani COL inquiry wondering was "How can I use Developing Mathematics Inquiry Communities (DMIC) pedagogy to develop the vocabulary of my kids? The focus was on developing my kids general vocabulary using DMIC maths.

Having done some research into vocabulary development I have since decided that trying to develop general vocabulary requires different pedagogy to that of  DMIC maths. I was also challenged by Dr Rebecca Jesson to think more about the problem I'm trying to solve before I think about how I'm going to go about solving it e.g vocabulary development pedagogy or DMIC maths. This was great advice and I have now identified the problem I wish to inquire in to.

PROBLEM: My kids struggle to explain and justify their thinking and reasoning in maths.

In fact the struggle to do this in other areas too however it is particularly poor in maths (my hunch is if it improves in maths it will also improve in other areas). This lead me to a new wondering. 

WONDERING: How can I develop the mathematical dialogic discourse ability of my children?

This year I will be endeavouring to find a solution to this problem. Any thoughts/ideas you have on the matter would be greatly appreciated.

Further PD with Jo Knox

Today Team 5 teachers had another PD session with Jo Knox.  She modelled two lessons using our our kids. There was a lot of great stuff that I took away from the session. Below are some of my top takeaways/learnings.

Decipipes
Decipipes are an amazingly effective tool for teaching fractions and decimals. I had never used or seen them before but I will be from now on. Jo used the Decipipes in a number of ways from physically modelling a decimal number to adding decimal numbers to converting fractions into decimals. Decipepes were great for the kids to physically see how 1 can be split into tenths, hundredths and thousandths and how fractions can be converted into decimal numbers for example 1/8 into 0.125.

Share/Model/Record
Jo split the group into three smaller groups of 2s or 3s and got them to complete a task. When the smaller groups shared back to the larger group she got the two other smaller groups to either model with the materials what was being said or to record what was said on paper. This was a really effective way of getting the others in the group not to switch and to hone in on what was being said.

Co constructing the WALT at the end of the lesson
Usually I start my lessons by highlighting to the children what we are trying to learn today. To my surprise Jo didn't do this. Instead she co-constructed it with the children after the lesson. She asked them what they were learning about today/what the focus was etc and when the children responded she recorded it in kids language e.g WALT add decimals by taking some from one number and add it to the other to make whole numbers. Clearly Jo had an idea about where she wanted to take the lesson however co-constructing it with the children after the fact made them reflect more on what they learnt and enabled student agency.

 

Book Da Teacher Update

Back in June I initiated Book Da Teacher. This is a system where the children can book in time with me one on one or in groups of up to three to work through something they are struggling with or want help with. This came about after data I received from a student survey that indicated the children would like more time with me to help them with their maths.

Initially Book Da Teacher got off to a rocky start as none of the children booked in. After some clarification about it soon a trickle of booking started coming through. However, now in Term 3,  one and half months on Book Da Teacher is still struggling to take off. Week two, term three and I have no bookings despite my best efforts to remind the children about it. This makes me think that maybe the data was wrong and the children don't really want more teacher time or  I need to scaffold the system more so the children feel confident about using it. I suspect the latter is more likely.

Going forward I will be endeavouring to scaffold Book Da Teacher discussing it daily with the children and booking them in myself. My hope is that this will get the ball rolling. If you have any ideas please let me know.

Fraction Challenge - Google Class OnAir episode

The learning intentions for this lesson was to participate 100% as a member of a group and to visually represent a fraction of a whole. I chose this create lesson/activity as a way of concretising my kids fraction knowledge. Click here to go to my Manaiakalani Class On Air site where you will find a detailed lesson plan, a reflection of the lesson and an example the the kids final product.




This lesson highlighted to me how effective create lessons are in engaging the children. I was delighted to see one boy who struggles with maths and often disengages really light up when doing this activity. It was the first time I had seen him genuinely engage in a maths activity.

Multiplication inquiry reflection

Term 1 is almost over. It's been a long one but a good one. The post below contains information about my term 1 inquiry that we presented to our professional learning groups in staff meeting last week.

The Question
Evidence from IKANS test and conversations with the kids suggested they were lacking in their knowledge of multiplication basic facts. This got me thinking ‘How can I significantly improve my kids times tables knowledge within a learn, create, share pedagogy?’ Below are some of the strategies I tried and the results.

The Humble Tumble
I introduced a tumble to my maths program. This ensured each child got at least 20 minutes a day       to work on the multiplication basic facts they needed to.

Basic facts station
The basic facts station included multiplication/division wheels where the kids would test themselves or play with a partner. It also included multiplication snap. Each child played a card then it was race to multiply the two numbers together. First person to say the correct answer won that pair of cards.

Multiplication songs
The kids could also watch and learn the multiplication songs we found on youtube. They had access   to the 2 - 12 times tables songs through our class site.

Regular tests
To track progress,  the kids were tested on their knowledge of the first 100 times tables basic facts

The results

This graph shows the amount of shift the kids made in their times table score from the start of February to the end of March

Reflection

Overall the inquiry was successful. The children made gains in their times tables knowledge and were generally engaged and wanting to learn them. I will be carrying on with the basic facts station into term 2 however I will be changing the activities to ensure the kids don’t get tired of them. The children who have a great understanding of times table 1-10 will be encouraged to learn the 12’s, 13’s and the division basic facts.

The basic facts station also promoted self monitoring which was great for the kids. At times it got a little messy when some kids went of task but after a word or three from myself they were back on track.

Manaiakalani Community of Learning

“Recognising and spreading sophisticated pedagogical practice across our community so that students learn in better and more powerful ways...”

The Manaiakalani Community of Learning is working together on this task using the expertise existing in of our community of learning.

In 2017 for my inquiry I have selected the following CoL achievement challenge 

#6. Lift the achievement in maths for all students years 1-13.

More specifically my focus question is :

How can I significantly improve my Year 7 & 8 kids mathematical knowledge within a Learn Create Share pedagogy?

The teaching as inquiry framework I will be using in 2017 has been specifically co-constructed for Manaiakalani schools using our familiar Learn Create Share structure.
The elements in this framework share close similarities with other models New Zealand teachers use.

I will be labelling my posts as I update my inquiry throughout the year to make the content easy to access.

Labels:

LEvidence, LScan, LTrend, LHypothesise, LResearch, LReflect,

 CPlan, CTry, CInnovate, CImplement, CReflect,

SPublish, SCoteach, SModel, SGuide, SFback, SReflect

Label Key:

LEvidence	Learn - Gather Evidence	CPlan	Create - Make a plan	SPublish	Share - Publish
LScan	Learn - Scan	CTry	Create - Try new things	SCoteach	Share - Co-teach
LTrend	Learn - Identify Trends	CInnovate	Create - Innovate	SModel	Share - Model
LHypothesise	Learn - Hypothesise	CImplement	Create - Implement	SGuide	Share - Guide
LResearch	Learn - Research	CReflect	Create - Reflect	SFback	Share - Feedback
LReflect	Learn - Reflect			SReflect	Share - Reflect