These tips help add to the teacher's resources to move from the cooperative to the collaborative learning environment - which is key to students mastering 21st century skills for the workforce.
These are the fundamentals of good group work in the classroom that will help you develop small 20 minute lessons that can teach students in a more powerful way. Students will also learn the skills they need to work together to solve problems and create outcomes.
"Today's math curriculum is teaching students to expect -- and excel at -- paint-by-numbers classwork, robbing kids of a skill more important than solving problems: formulating them. In his talk, Dan Meyer shows classroom-tested math exercises that prompt students to stop and think. (Filmed at TEDxNYED.)"
These are the behind the scenes instructions for using the paid version of VoiceThread. If you would like to use Voicethread to post lessons and do discussions, see the ITRT for your license.
Teachers can have students create 15 second movies via Instragram. #tag it with a common class tag and video themselves reflecting on the content or over-arching question for the unit. (Requires students to use phones to video, teacher will need Instagram account and dropbox.com account to post the videos or have students use their own accounts if they have them)
Mathalicious lessons ask real questions in open-ended ways that require students to make sense of problems and empower students to develop their own strategies for solving them. Students must support and justify their own methods and conclusions, and evaluate the validity of others' arguments. Lessons prompt students to model their findings in a variety of ways: numerically, graphically, algebraically and verbally.
Ask your Specialist about this resource.
"Over 250 free printable maths charts or math posters suitable for interactive whiteboards, classroom displays, math walls, display boards, student handouts, homework help, concept introduction and consolidation and other math reference needs."
"Rewordify.com is powerful, free, online reading comprehension and vocabulary development software. It helps people understand difficult English faster, helps them learn words in new ways, and helps teachers create high-interest learning materials from any English text passage."