Measurement today. Not one of my personal favourites, and I unfortunately haven't spent a lot of time teaching area and perimeter to my students. I've mostly focused on time, angles, volume, temperature etc - this absolutely needs to change! We teach Measurement in term 1 of each year so I've made it my goal to focus on area, perimeter and volume for my next unit plan. It will mean finding or creating a suitable assessment in te reo Māori, but I'm sure with my amazing mentor's support it can be done.
Classroom practise: I am finding it easier to stick to the system that I am already using for my maths website so I haven't started using taskboards yet. I think if I just focus on using them for teaching strands for now (algebra for term 4, measurement for term 1 2025, and so on) then that will be an easier approach.
Rich task Thursdays (or Fridays on an MPI week) are becoming a normal part of the classroom programme. I try to allow 40-45 minutes for this - the students are often finished way quicker than that! I obviously need to find some more challenging tasks. However we are still developing the discussion aspect of the activity - it doesn't seem to matter how I change the groupings, there is always someone who dominates, or someone who will quite happily say nothing at all - so while the maths element of rich tasks seems to be pumping, the discussion side of it is not.
See you soon Manaiakalani Summit Rarotonga :)
Hi Lynda, so nice to see you in the last couple of days actually in person! I like how you're adapting for your context and your learners, and just taking the pieces that work. Interesting reflection on the rich tasks and how you've embedded them but the discussion isn't quite there yet - have you thought about getting the more talkative to do it independently first, and getting the ones who would be better to do it collaboratively to start in pairs, and then after some "thinking time," use the talking roles to begin the discussion in proper groups? Just an idea, in case it's helpful :)
ReplyDeleteGeorgie