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What Can *You* Build?

Building a Love of Math

While many are still recovering from the excitement of NCTM 2016, I can’t help but to think of summer. Partly because my jealousy of not being able to attend this year makes me shut the thoughts of NCTM down in my brain. And partly because the fear of my daugther having a less than stellar 3rd grade teacher frightens me.

To minimize my worries, I have decided to create a summer notebook for her filled with activities to catapult her to a more confident school year. Buying a book from the nearest school supply store won’t make my free spirit want to work when it’s nice out. Although I have my own ideas, reading How to help you kids fall in love with math offered some really great starting points. The idea of learning through play is backed up by this post on Talking Math with Your Kids. Even dot activities like those discussed Joe Schwartz’s post Dot Crazy will help to promote mathematical thinking through art.

Written by Jenise Sexton (@MrsJeniseSexton)

Building a Podcast (and Audience)

Anne Schwartz (@sophgermain), a math teacher recently launched a teaching podcast called Chalkline. Her first two guests are rock-star educators Megan Hayes-Golding (@mgolding) and Rafranz Davis (@RafranzDavis), both of whom join Anne for wide-ranging discussions on issues of equity in education, as well as whatever topics come to mind!

Sometimes I get lonely as a teacher. Even though I’m in a building full of other educators, I rarely find the time to sit down for a casual chat with any of them. So eavesdropping on Anne’s conversations via this podcast is a great way to feel connected to other people who care about teaching and learning.

Written by Kent Haines (@MrAKHaines)

Building Projects…with Math!

I wasn’t lucky enough to attend the NCTM Annual in San Francisco, but thanks to Max Ray-Riek, (@maxmathforum), I saw this tweet:

Written by Audrey McLaren (@a_mcsquared)

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Spotlight on NCTM Annual Sessions

Creating Accessible Learning Environments

As usual, the 2016 NCTM annual meeting & exposition was a whirlwind of excitement, ideas, and inspiration. Bright and early on Thursday morning, I led my first NCTM session about teaching math to students with disabilities called Students with Disabilities CAN Do Math. Christine Roberts took these amazing doodle notes during our presentation!

Our presentation was mainly about creating access for students with disabilities in math class. Whether this was on my mind (as it usually is) or not, other sessions I attended also seemed to have creating access for students (of all kinds) in math class as a focus.

• Marian Small’s session, Becoming the Math Teacher They Need (Click on “SmallNCTM”) was focused on using open-ended questions to create access for all students.
• Both Elham Kazemi and Graham Fletcher mentioned or referenced using Numberless Word Problems to create access in their sessions.
• Robert Kaplinsky’s Digging into Depth of Knowledge presented the different DOK levels as a way to create access and then increase the cognitive demand as appropriate. Dan Meyer described this as turning up the math dial!
• Tracy Zager’s session on relational thinking highlighted question prompts to create access to this kind of thinking.
• Carl Oliver described the process for choosing non-routine problems to use in class and how to create access to them for students.

(PS – Dan corrected me. This was not his quote, but a session participant!)
~by Andrew Gael (@bkdidact)

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Great Blogging Action

Hot on Twitter: #NCTMAnnual starts this week

Global Math Department and #NCTMAnnual

There are a number of presenters at this year’s NCTM Annual Conference who shared talk with Global Math earlier this school year. If you’re not able to go to San Francisco, you can still learn from these speakers by watching their talks below. If you are able to go to the conference, use the links below to find the rooms and times of each talk.
 

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A Little Light Reading

Teacher-Ladies Who Code

This week I attended a screening of a documentary called “Coding: Debugging the Gender Gap”, which was organized by “Ladies Learning Code”, and hosted at the Montreal Google office. It was a fascinating evening, during which I got to meet some wonderful women coders, and as a bonus, get a look at the amazing environment that Google’s employees get to work in.  As a math teacher, I’m especially interested in integrating coding into the math class, something I fancy I’m sort of doing by getting my students to create their own interactive applets using GeoGebra. But I looked for female math teachers who really do use coding and found these:

Dawn DuPriest (@DuPriestMath) has an entire website called “Coding in Math Class” that is all about using coding as a math teaching tool.  I plan to read all of it. It’s exactly what I want to do. She also referred me to Diane Tepylo (@drtepylo) and Lisa Floyd (@lisaannefloyd), whose website contains a huge inventory of programs she’s created for integration in the math class.

Then this post by Douglas Rushkoff (@rushkoff) came along and made me rethink everything. That’s the way it is on Twitter.

Written by Audrey McLaren (@a_mcsquared)

It’s Not What You Got (It’s How You Use It)

Worksheets, lectures, and textbooks are just a few of the many elements of the math classroom that get a bad reputation. And yet each of these elements, when used thoughtfully, can support a deep and engaging math experience for students.

Jo over at Resourceaholic just wrote a great piece about another maligned element of some math classes: the poster project. She gives an example of a failed poster project and a successful one, both from her own classroom experience. It’s a great reminder that teachers can rescue many maligned teaching devices such as poster projects or worksheets and put them to good use. In the end, it’s not about the poster. It’s about whether the task promoted high-level mathematical learning.

Written by Kent Haines (@MrAKHaines)

28-Day Challenge

Have you been looking for a motivating challenge to get beach body ready? Or how about one to cleanse all the toxins from your system?

Well, then this post isn’t for you.

If, on the other hand, you’re looking for a 28-Day Number Sense Challenge, then keep reading! Christina Tondevold (@BuildMathMinds) is preparing to host a number sense challenge for PreK – 2nd Grade teachers. Even if you don’t work in those grade levels, consider joining the challenge to learn more about what concepts make up number sense and why they are such a crucial part of students’ mathematical understandings. The first challenge is being sent out April 17. Sign up now so you don’t miss it!

Written by Brian Bushart (@bstockus)

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Things to Check Out

Preparing for the end of (next) year

As the best of the #MTBoS books begin to arrive…

…and the excitement builds…

…and builds…

…Michael Pershan (as always) brings up a good point in his new post, “If we’re going to have a book compilation of best posts at the end of the year, then I had better be a bit more scrupulous about collecting my favorite posts.”

Everyone should make an effort to record their favorite blog posts all year in order to have a more annually comprehensive “best of” book. Whether you tweet about your favorite posts, collect them in padlet, or blog about them like Michael (and others), just do it somehow. So this December, we don’t have a “Best of the Math Teacher Blogs in December 2016.”  

Go Blermions!

Thanks to Sam Shah and the goodness of the #MTBoS, we’ve got a keeper for all you geometry teachers! Sam shares Teaching the Crossed Chord Theorem in all its coolness.  

I remember teaching intersecting chords to my geometry students; formulaic and bland.

NO MORE!

After reading Sam’s post, I want an opportunity to run it with geometry students. Jennifer Wilson says it best in the comments, “What a beautiful journey of creation and collaboration and implementation for this learning episode. Thank you for sharing!”

Go blermions!

the good folk over at Achieve the Core have been running a series on Adapting Materials for the classroom. The most recent post is on Essential Knowledge for Adapting Instructional Materials and written by @jody_guarino, an awesome elementary- ed specialist in Southern California.

On the geometry side of things, the initial draft of the CCSSM Geometry Progression for 7-8 and HS is now out!

written by Ashli Black (@mythagon)

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Great Blogging Action

Hot on Twitter: #NCTMAnnual is around the corner

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Looking at the Past, Present, and Future

Simply the Best (of Last Year)

Tina Cardone and Ilana Horn have done yeoman’s work by compiling the best posts of 2015 from around the Math Twitter Blogosphere (#MTBoS). Their new book, The Best of the Math Teacher Blogs 2015, is now available! In it, you will find many of Global Math Department’s favorite presenters and contributors, as well as new faces that you might not have heard from before.

Additionally, all profits from this book go toward scholarships to help teachers attend Twitter Math Camp in the summer. If you want to support this community while getting a compilation of its best work, this is your chance. Check it out.

(Full disclosure, one of my blog posts is included in this book. But I would be a full-throated supporter of the book regardless, just because I think it’s a great resource for our community.)

Written by Kent Haines (@MrAKHaines)

Current Events
 

On my radar this week: Keeping organized, and getting ready for end-of-year exams. Cathy Yenca’s post about how she uses googledocs to keep valuable resources organized. It fits with something  I once heard an organizational guru say: “Organization is really about retrieval.” Amen to that.

In my province, there has been some discussion lately about how to best use tools like GeoGebra and Desmos in an exam setting. This article about Geogebra exam mode explains how access to the internet and other types of software are restricted and monitored during an exam. I haven’t yet given any kind of test other than paper-and-pencil, but this offers an interesting alternative.

Written by Audrey McLaren (@a_mcsquared)

Thinking Ahead

I’m already thinking of next year. This year at school we have focused on implementing formative assessment lessons with fidelity. While this instructional practice has infiltrated the day-to-day instruction of some teachers, others are not quite comfortable doing it without a prepared script. This may ring true for you as well. For many teachers, comfort may come from Dan Ehlert’s post 5 Practices: Stacking Cups.

Within the post, Dane provides a strategic approach to implementing problem-based learning, which begins with a book. I love the excerpts from the book infused into the post as they are aligned with Dane’s thought process. It may be helpful for the reader to follow in the footsteps of this blogger and implement the same or a similar 3-act or problem-based task.

Written by Jenise Sexton (@MrsJeniseSexton)

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Things to Check Out

Binging Professional Development

If you are like most Americans, you love binge watching TV until you pass out on the couch, snoring, with the remote dangerously close to falling out of your hands, crashing to the floor, and waking you up!

Hey man, no judgements! We’re here to help!

Graham Fletcher just released the third installment in his Making Sense Series: Progression of Addition and Subtraction. Jenise Sexton went in depth into the first episode about the Progression of Multiplication, here. In between, Graham released the second episode about the Progression of Division. So grab the comfiest part of the couch and feel free to binge, because the season finale is on its way, based on some sweet insider info!

Make Mistakes Progress

Audrey McLaren sparked my interest multiple times in her recent post: Rethinking How We See Mistakes. Essentially, she’s sharing her thoughts on how to better react to student mistakes in math class by embracing them, as to encourage students to make progress. I’m all for this! Here’s my favorite response from Audrey you could use in class with students tomorrow, “That’s the best mistake I’ve seen today!”

Read more here. It won’t be a mistake.

+Plus Magazine is an online publication out of the UK “which aims to introduce readers to the beauty and the practical applications of mathematics.” Currently run by two female editors, over the years they’ve published many articles on women in mathematics that are great for sharing with your classes today! This article is filled with with links to information on mathematical heroines from the past (Emmy Noether! Sofia Kovalevskaya!) and present (Dorit Aharonov! Sandy Black!) as well as articles by female mathematicians and podcasts from the International Conference of Women Mathematicians in 2010 and the European Women in Mathematics Conference in 2007.

And never forget xkcd’s contribution to the conversation of women in the sciences.

written by Ashli Black (@mythagon)

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Great Blogging Action

Hot on Twitter: Fraction Talks

Have you visited the Global Math Department Website Lately?

Over at globalmathdepartment.org we have been doing a little housekeeping. Putting some things away, adding some things. It’s worth checking out, and if you have any thoughts, feel free to let Carl Oliver (@carloliwitter) know.  Thanks!

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Mining the MTBoS: Literacy Connections, Perseverance, and Visual Patterns

Literacy and Math

https://sites.google.com/site/literacymath/literature-strategies/-concept-of-a-definition-map

At our school, we are working to create a culture of reading. Our data shows our students’ lexile scores are lower than the average middle schooler, promoting our administration to develop a plan of action. Part of the plan is to incorporate literacy standards within every content area including mathematics. This could be a difficult task but these bloggers are on to something.

Within her Chipmunk Error Analysis post, blogger Rachel lays out how she is able to get her sixth graders to give a lot of thought into the mathematical mistakes of others. It appears within her post, Rachel purposefully creates problems showing the errors of 3 students with famous chipmunk names. Purposeful as she wants her students to consider the use of various strategies. What I love about her blog is her coverage of multiple error analysis based on concept, reminds a bit of Math Mistakes.

On Math Equals Love, there’s a means for having students analyze their own errors. With the reflection sheet posted on the blog, students identify their own errors and develop a corrected solution prior to completing a retest. Consider the evidence they must gather from the text, which is their own work. They also must support their claims of error with reasons as they develop the new solution.

Bringing technology into the error analysis action, the post from Tech Adventures in Middle School Math Class discusses the use of an iPad to help with the analysis. Through the use of an iPad, students are able to upload their error analysis, similar to how Andrew Stadel set up the activity within this post, and complete related practice activities.

Written by Jenise Sexton (@MrsJeniseSexton)

Perseverance

Perseverance is my theme this week. What we do when things don’t work out so well – which happens pretty much every day in this line of work.

My friend John Golden (@mathhombre) wrote this post about his struggles with one particular class, which include not being able to get them to talk to each other. Talk about a problem with which I, and I’m sure many of us, are familiar. John is persevering by changing things up in order to accommodate these students’ challenges, but at the same time nudge them out of their comfort zones. Scaffolded worksheets and math writing are the strategies he describes in this post. I love his assertion that he is “teaching the students in front of me, rather than some fantasy class.”

Jennifer Vadnais (@RilesBlue) persevered with a “Desmos Activity Builder that flopped”. In this post, she outlines two attempts, in two different classrooms, to teach the same lesson using a Desmos Activity. In both cases, the activity started off well, but then lost steam at about the same place. Jennifer redesigned it so that the activity was integrated with vertical white boards, in fact, she switched things around so that the Desmos activity slides played a supporting role to the VWBs. She accommodated not only her students, but the teacher who, with good reason, was keen on using these boards.

Written by Audrey McLaren (@a_mcsquared)

Feedback Around Visual Patterns

Visual Patterns have been a mainstay of the MTBoS for years now. Fawn Nguyen’s site is an excellent resource for teachers interested in using these fun, simple patterns to foster creative math thinking.

Michael Pershan recently posted an essay he wrote about the ways that students think about visual patterns, and the ways that teachers can provide feedback to help them move between various modes of thinking. Michael mentions at the outset of his introduction that this is an unfinished work, but there is still plenty of thought-provoking commentary about the strengths and weaknesses of visual patterns as a math task. If you teach with visual patterns, do yourself a favor and check out this essay.

Written by Kent Haines (@MrAKHaines)