End of term One Maths planning reflection

I did an end of term reflection for Maths this term to verbalise what I did, why and where I am going next. Some of the things mentioned in this reflection have also been mentioned already in other reflections I have done on Maths.

What happened? Why did I change?

Well inspiration happened and it caused me to step out of my comfort zone and completely change the way I teach maths. I was extremely happy with the programme I developed for my students last year in Maths. I felt great about their progress. I felt great about their level of student agency and I felt great about how personalised it was for each student. All content was covered. So why change? Well I read The Elephant in the Classroom and it inspired me to try to change the way I teach math. I surveyed my students and many of them had negative thoughts, feelings and beliefs about Maths and their ability. What I did before worked and had children meeting standards etc but this didn’t improve how they felt about maths or the ideas they had about themselves related to Maths. Therefore I set out on a mission to help students love maths and believe in themselves and their ability. There is no such thing as a ‘math brain’. Anyone can be good at math!

Mixed Ability Groups

Well the book and many other pieces of research pointed out the benefits of mixed ability groups and the harm of ability groups to students. I didn’t have ability groups before because learning was personalised and students would choose their own groups. In saying that, it was still probably harmful to the lower learners as it held them back from completing maths at a higher level until they had achieved all the lower level stuff first. Therefore they would probably be thinking they aren’t good at maths because they aren’t challenged to the stuff at higher levels which sends them a message that it’s cos they are not capable or good enough to do it even though that isn’t the case. Ability groups make students feel dumb. There are so many advantages to mixed ability groups. All students can achieve no matter what level they are and the stigma of being in the low group is gone. It’s also beneficial to the higher learners as well so I decided to give it a go. I created mixed ability groups and decided to use them for the maths challenges on the Youcubed website. Sometimes students would work in pairs and sometimes on their own but when in a group, they worked in a pre-determined group with ranges of levels and abilities within.

I think that some people have already started to grow in confidence who previously thought they were no good at maths but for some it is etched in their mind and will take more time to undo their negative thought patterns.

My planning

Well basically my plan completely went out the window. I intended to teach Number Strategy- Add/Sub. I even gave them the strategy test to see what strategies they knew. But then I realised after reading the book, that this was going to end up setting my kids up to be assessment driven learners and this could hinder self-esteem. Assessment is important, don’t get me wrong, but that particular strategy assessment was designed to help them work out which strategies they know and which ones they need to learn when in reality, any strategies are good and I shouldn’t be telling them a list of strategies to ‘tick off’. They should be learning different ways to work things out from each other in real problem solving contexts. I scrapped my assessment and decided to not to give it back to them. 

Then I was left with a big question about how to do things differently. I had realised that problem solving was the way to go but where was I going to find these deep and meaningful problems all year to use? I came up with a few and found some on the internet that worked really well. Then I discovered on Jo’s website Youcubed.com that she had 3 weeks of inspirational math to use. They had detailed lesson plans with videos and supporting resources and they were amazing. My goal was to use her exemplars to get myself started and then figure out for myself how I could carry it on. In the end I finished Week One and it took me all term. All term I spent working out 5 days worth of problems. Her problems were so rich and engaging that my kids wanted to do them. I was so stoked with the learning conversations and problem solving strategies and the gap between the ‘top kids’ and ‘bottom kids’ in math was non-existent. This was exactly what I was hoping for so I went with it. Unfortunately it means that my kids didn’t get the ‘coverage’ that I would normally provide, but I felt this learning was still worthwhile even though it technically didn’t fit with the structure of my long term maths plan.

Assessment

I didn’t teach kids to a test. I am still working out how to assess their learning in this new way. Next term I am wanting to teach measurement. I am going to do a pre-test and post-test, just as I always would. Jo Boaler still did her thing with her remedial maths kids and they still sat a standardised test so I am sure it will work. The difference is that instead of students looking for their learning gaps in the test and trying to fill them before the next one, we won’t look at the test for any other reason other than as a marker for progress. I am going to look at the Measurement content from our school curriculum for levels 3 and 4 and I am going to create problems and projects that cover these. Students will work in their mixed ability groups all term on these problems and projects. Hopefully the learning will transfer and be reflected in the post-test without us referring back to it.

Teaching- What and how will I teach?

I am still thinking about this. Students actually do a lot of learning from each other.They also have access to the internet if necessary. Basically last term I went to each group and had had discussions with them all about their next steps each day and did any relevant teaching on the spot. That is option one.

Option two: I arrange conferencing with groups and they come to me for a conference and any learning needed is covered in the conference. I feel this would work best if I had a project to work through that was ongoing over several weeks so I could see where students are up to.

Option three: I run workshops on specific measurement topics or number strategies each day. Groups attend if they need to learn that content in order to proceed.

Maybe I even try them all to see what works best?

Content Coverage

I am going to continue the year breaking it up into topics as I have done in the past. Will follow the same steps mentioned above for measurement. Pre-test→problems or projects with a strand theme with number integrated within →these are completed mostly in mixed ability groups →relevant learning is acquired in order to complete the tasks. →Post test.

Will follow with a statistics unit and geometry unit. Will teach number strategies in these contexts in an integrated way. In the last term, I will do a big number focus on anything missed.

So basically that is my plan. My next step is to look at the measurement content for my next unit and come up with problems or projects that will help the students learn everything required at Levels 3 and 4. Note I currently have no students working at level 5.

The challenge I now have is finding/coming up with problems and projects that are suitable but I am excited to give it a go. Because I have taught the same year group for so long, I have a very good understanding of what curriculum knowledge, skills and strategies will need to be covered. I know what's in those pre and post tests. If I come across some great ideas, it shouldn't be too difficult to organise them to fit with my goals for teaching and learning.