Group items tagged

"Student takes a picture of work with his high-res camera phone and texts it to the other students in his group. Student then leaves the room. This kind of remediation is really common. I will often run little clinics during odd liminal times of the day. The students who get left off the Socratic train during class often just need a small piece of direct instruction that they can back-fill under the conceptualization. I didn't see the phone coming. I can only imagine how that student's brain may have engaged differently if he had to copy everything I was writing while listening to me while hoping to go to lunch quickly. "

"Inside Mathematics provides a resource for educators around the world who struggle to provide the best mathematics instruction they can for their students. Too often, teachers who excel at reaching students have few ways of sharing these strong practices with others - and teachers who struggle, struggle alone. Our classroom doors have remained closed too often and for too long. Inside Mathematics opens those doors: to tested demonstration lessons presented to children and groups of observing teachers; to guided tours of reflective mathematics practice, identifying what makes teaching, learning, and improving instruction in mathematics a difficult enterprise and providing resources for teachers to improve their practice; to mathematics teaching and learning tools and resources to support classroom teachers', math coaches', and administrators' daily practices; and to a professional learning community in which you are invited to open your own classroom door and engage in conversation about your own mathematics teaching and learning. This initiative grew out of the Noyce Foundation's Silicon Valley Mathematics Initiative. SVMI is based on high performance expectations, ongoing professional development, examining student work, and improved math instruction. The initiative includes a formative and summative performance assessment system, pedagogical content coaching, and leadership training and networks. Coaches in SVMI learn strategies of re-engagement with students around mathematics assessments, and demonstration lessons on re-engagement are featured here."

What I am writing to others in my school... I am again teaching statistics and would like my students to engage with real data collection and analysis. The Australian Bureau of Statistics runs the Census at School project that allows students to engage with real statistics about themselves and other Australian school students of their own age. I am seeking permission - ongoing permission- for participation in this project to be at the core of our statistics education program for middle school here at Carey Baptist College. You will find the necessary documentation required for us to go ahead.

"Looking around, there are lots of activities for collecting and analysing data using small boxes of Smarties. Here is my version. The package includes three worksheets to scaffold the collection and representation of data: Collecting Data - this is where the student collects their individual data and records the whole classes data. Collecting Data 2 - students take the whole class data and display in Frequency Distribution Tables. Representing Data - from the Frequency Distribution Tables, students create Frequency Histograms and Polygons. The Excel file is used by the teacher, on a projector/IWB, to collect the data in the class. It allows the teacher to collect the raw data and represent in Frequency Distribution Tables. "

Something I find incredibly valuable for my teaching practice is to regularly seek anonymous student appraisal of my teaching.

"In a digital world where we can easily "find an app for that" to help solve many problems, rarely do teachers have a one stop shopping place for all their classroom digital needs. There are many individual tools that can aid a teacher in retrieving student's digital work, polling/quizzing students or assigning work, but each of these tools usually requires a separate account. However, there is one, free, Web 2.0 app that brings everything together that you need for your classroom, including a social learning environment. The app that does all of this is called Edmodo. Here are just a few features that make Edmodo so great for teachers and students:"

"Calculation Nation® uses the power of the Web to let students challenge opponents from anywhere in the world. At the same time, students are able to challenge themselves by investigating significant mathematical content and practicing fundamental skills. The element of competition adds an extra layer of excitement."

"Welcome to Inside Mathematics, a professional resource for educators passionate about improving students' mathematics learning and performance. This site features classroom examples of innovative teaching methods and insights into student learning, tools for mathematics instruction that teachers can use immediately, and video tours of the ideas and materials on the site. We are glad you're here and look forward to learning with you! News - Inside Mathematics is aligning its resources with the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics."

"I picked this idea up, like so many things, from Dan Meyer. He claims that it's one of those games-like chess or mancala-that just has always existed. My students have become enamored with the game, which we've dubbed "Lone Wolfs." It's an unintentionally awesome play on words spoken by a student earlier this year ("We're just two lone wolfs") The time spent trying to understand whether that was poetry or paltry grammer was longer than you'd expect. Anyhoo… Here are the rules: Choose a positive integer You lose if you choose the same number as someone else Lowest number wins"

"Students will plot points on a coordinate grid to represent ships before playing a graphing equations game with a partner. Points along the y-axis represent cannons and slopes are chosen randomly to determine the line and equation of attacks. Students will use their math skills and strategy to sink their opponent's ships and win the game. After the game, an algebraic approach to the game is investigated. "

"The New York State Mathematics Test is administered to eighth grade students in early May. Seventh grade students being considered for placement in an accelerated high school program may also be tested. The purpose of this test is to find out which concepts have been mastered in grades 5-8 and which need further development. This is a timed test that is to be administered under standard conditions. The test will be given on two consecutive days and includes multiple choice questions, short response, and extended response questions. "

"Students need many concrete experiences with fractions to develop a deep understanding of the three models of fractions: area, linear and set models. Teachers need to address all three models in well-designed instructional activities so that students develop a rich concept of fractions that they can use to make sense of numbers, operations, measurement and probability. "

"Students often forget geometric language they learned in earlier grades The meaning - precise or vague - of words such as parallelogram, rhombus, angle bisector, acute angle, escape them. They have not learned to talk "geometry". But the language is only a small part of the issue. Much harder is that their teacher is almost certainly thinking about geometry in ways they cannot imagine: they cannot know what they do not know."

"We are in the middle of our polynomial unit and I decided now would be an appropriate time to teach exponent rules. I had prepared a concept attainment for the exponent rules before I talked to my coach. She suggested that we stray away from teaching 'rules' and rather teach the concept behind it. So basically, I only taught the concept of multiplying the coefficients and adding the exponents. When it came to the power to a power rule, we literally expanded it out and then multiplied coefficients and added the exponent. The more that we practiced the concept and writing them out, the more students figured out the shortcut of taking the coefficient to the power and then just multiplying the exponents. "

"Group work in mathematics is a tricky one. At times students can see it as a "sit-off" and chaos without any real learning can ensue. However, when it is successful, group work is an extremely powerful learning tool"

Free Fractions Tools. These interactive, visual fractions tools are ideal for teacher-facilitated, whole-class instruction in fractions, "Number Talks" and for parents supporting their students at home. Each math tool is supported by Common Core State Standards alignment, key vocabulary, and IEP goals.

I call it Make it Right but I'm sure it goes by other names. The instructions are simple. After selecting the correct answer the students need to rewrite the question so that the other choices now become correct.