Working together makes it better!

Chalking up some change unknown problems...

Rich learning discussions with our partners and making it big and visible really helped us to clarify our thinking. 

 Money money money!

Using money to learn about place value and trying to work out how many tens are in any number. It was great fun justifying our decision on whether Mrs Singh Ali had enough money to take us to the zoo!

Check out these THINKING facials!

Maths Tag on the New Playground

Learning our basic facts within 20 at altitude!

Check us out playing Maths Tag on the playground. It helps us to make sure that we know our basic facts within 20 really fast. Every right question we got we could make two movements (the flying fox is just one movement) and we had lots of fun UNTIL Whaea Emma got out!

Some images from week one

A week of building knowledge.

We have been building on our basic facts knowledge by exploring Family of Facts, what makes 10 and 20 and our doubles. We have also been working on our place value understanding, but most importantly we have been developing our knowledge of each other and how we are going to work together and build our relationships so we feel comfortable and able to discuss our learning with each other.

We made little families of facts who lived in a house together

Milania showing us what it means to 'be responsible
 for each other's learning' - one of our guidelines.

Everyone had a fact on their back and had to work out 'who'
they were by only getting clues like 'Your brother is 5 + 2 = 7'.

Playing NUDGE the place value game.
What did it take to Nudge  Milania? 999 of course!

We all like playing Traffic lights.

Someone even got it within three goes!

Making sure we work as a team.

It was going well until Whaea Emma forgot HER number!
Thank goodness for the ALiM@SPS team!

Let's start at the very beginning...

Our First Session

We begun our first session by reviewing what ALiM is all about and why we are here. Then we got on to talking about what we like and dislike about maths and why this needs to be different if we are to succeed. 

What we like about maths

What we don't like about maths

This flowed well into the development and co-construction of the guidelines of our learning community. 

Developing our learning community.  

Questioning that I used to elicit the co-constructed guidelines below.

Why are we here?

What do we want from this?

What could stop us from reaching our goals?

How does maths make you feel?

How would we like to feel about maths?

How can we do this?

What sorts of guidelines should we come up with?

How can we feel safe and secure to ask and answer questions and also disagree with others in our group?

The co-constructed guidelines

Introducing the learning site.

I launched the learning site with the ALiM students and showed them where to access this weeks Knowledge Development games.

Click here to access the ALiM@SPS learning site

Some students did a short video diary before they left. This will develop over time and I hope that it will become a great record of our collective learning and growth.

Milania was the bravest and the first to
start her video diary.

Developing our mini-mathematical community. Professional reading.

Teacher entry

Notes and reflection on professional reading

BES Exemplar 1 Nga Kete Raukura – He Tauira 1 Developing communities of mathematical inquiry.

(see below for reference)

What it is all about...

This exemplar describes how two teachers worked to develop classroom learning communities in which students learned to engage with the teacher and each other in mathematical inquiry, reasoning, and argumentation. It traces significant changes in teacher knowledge and pedagogy and in student behaviour and mathematical practices through a collaborative, school-based, professional learning process.

Notes from the reading that pertain to my inquiry question; Will a focus on my deliberate acts of teaching enhance student discourse?

Outcomes Focus

The teachers aimed to develop their students’ abilities to explain mathematical concepts, justify their arguments, and make generalisations.
Each student had high expectations for their own outcomes.
The teachers' became adept at recognising and addressing barriers to learning and remained OUTCOMES FOCUSSED.

Teacher knowledge and Inquiry

Filming yourself teaching and critically analysing this - a way to identify points to change.
A way to identify who is doing the talking?

Opportunity

Opportunity to learn is effective and efficient.
Ensuring that they resolve cognitive conflicts through peer interaction.
Opportunities for practice and application
They used MIXED-ABILITY groups rather than fixed ability groups.

Caring and inclusive learning communities

Create 'rules-for-talk' guidelines and review them at the beginning of each session.
Used collective first person pronouns - Show US how you worked that out...
DISPUTATIONAL TALK - Assertions and counter assertions that go unexamined - members just defending their ideas.
CUMULATIVE TALK - Members avoid questions and arguments by building on each others thinking. Students come to a collective view but it is not evaluated.
MATHEMATICAL REASONING - listen, discuss and question to make sense of the reasoning used by OTHERS.
Use modelling to scaffold students into how to construct mathematical explanations.

Building the students’ capacities to act as a learning community is not a prelude to the mathematical work but is integral to developing mathematical discourse.

Use 'think time' as a form of social nurturing for less confident members.
Are my groupings right? Can these 9 students work together/are comfortable together?

Reflection

Although I read Best Evidence Synthesis as a student teacher reading this Exempla has given me the words and possible ways forward which before now only existed as 'gut feelings' and 'guesses' for what might work for my ALiM group. I can clearly see the importance of the development of the learning community in order to enhance mathematical discourse. As soon as the withdrawal groups begin I will ensure that I film the sessions so that myself and my tutor teacher can critically reflect and place our group on the Mathematics communication and participation framework in order to inform our next steps.
I am feeling empowered and further determined to ensure that the next 10 weeks of teaching are effective, efficient and outcomes focussed.

Alton-Lee, A., Hunter, R., Sinnema, C. & Pulegatoa-Diggins, C. (2012).  BES Exemplar 1 Nga Kete Raukura – He Tauira 1 Developing communities of mathematical inquiry.  Iterative Best Evidence Synthesis Programme Hei Kete Raukura.

Retrieved from http://educationcounts.govt.nz/goto/BES

Lots of questions...

Teacher entry

To make a difference I need to do things differently...

I need to start by asking questions and seeking the answers. The following question and sub-questions are based around the theme of Mathematical Discourse. 

Teaching as Inquiry

Will a focus on my deliberate acts of teaching enhance student discourse?

What are my listening skills like?

How long am I waiting for the answer?
What kinds of questions am I asking?

How am I using student response to clarify and inform the next line of questioning?

What does effective student discourse look and sound like?

What type of environment do I need to create to elicit student thinking/discussion?

How can I develop risk taking?

What are possible strategies?

Is there professional reading that I need to do?

Who can model this for me?

To track progress of the Inquiry question

How will I know at any given time I am making progress?

How will the children?

Every journey starts somewhere.

Student entry

The students find out that they have been selected for ALiM...

I asked them to do a quick written reflection on how they felt...

I felt so happy because last night I told my mum that I need to work on my maths to move up to a higher level and it so amazing and I am so nervous.

Ana

I feel nervous, happy and grateful. I'm starting to get goosebumps.

Prashneel

I feel amazing and great because my learning got a little bit harder but I want this special group to be extremely hard. I feel like I'm proud of myself because I just can't wait for lots of hard work. 

Tufui

I feel nervous, my heart is beating fast. Well, I feel good but I'm really nervous doing the Gloss test alone and I wish that they don't give me hard questions because I don't know all my timestables but I'm still super excited because we are going to have our own blog and 200 schools will share their work and stuff. I am proud, it will be hard work but at least it will improve my learning.

Rahil

I feel so amazed and shocked because I always tell my mum that my maths is going very well and she will be happy. Thank God I am here.

Sione

I feel so happy because last night I told mum that my maths in class needs to be a lot harder and I should be doing a lot better in maths. And guess what? I am going to be! So I am so happy and blessed.

Milania

I feel nervous and happy. I am so nervous doing the test and I feel happy because I will be making my learning high.

Pomphan