There has been a lot of talk about math (at least in the area I am from) lately. Some talking about going back to basics and others talking about problem solving. For those that have been reading my blog you know that I tend to lean more to the problem solving approach; however, there is need for fact recall and learning basic arithmetic in a constructive and engaging way.
With this in mind many of us in our board (@mathewolridge, @keriewart) and neighboring areas (@avivaloca @moojean) have been talking a balanced math manifesto (#balancedmathmanifesto). Thought I would share my thinking in hopes to start the conversation rolling. Please keep in mind that this is still a work in progress and our only my opinions. I would love input from any readers. Hopefully these ideas and all the other collaboration can be added to our Balanced math manifesto. So please add your voice, would love to hear from you.
- Promotes mathematical strategies and offers students the opportunities to practise varying strategies
- Links to the problem they will be exploring
- Fosnot “String” lessons are great insertion here
- Does not need to be a minds-on activity, can be done while other students are solving problem
- Rich, truly problematic situation
- Authentic to students
- Allows students to generate and explore mathematical ideas
- Multiple entry points
- Supports mathematizing
- Important that teachers have anticipated student strategies before students work on a problem
- Students work in homogenously levelled pairs
- Allows the teacher to monitor and conference (see the next section)
- Provides students opportunities to explore while discussing
- Allows for assessment, anecdotal and observations of growth and development
- mathematical theories and concepts
- Allows students to see themselves as mathematicians. They feel comfortable and experience fluency when making connections to other problems
- Develops fact fluency, patience problem solving
- Students demonstrate their knowledge of mathematical big ideas and concepts
- Increase comprehension as students explore related problems
- Asking why questions or building varying types of questions
- Can sometimes feel like an interrogation
- Developing a sense of where the students are mathematically
- Comparing student work to learning trajectories or landscapes of development
- Planning for “Congress”
- Teachers ask critical thinking questions
- 3 Types of Questions are: “building upon”, “comparing too” or “going beyond”
- Teachers job is to promote thinking and elicit thinking and strategy based mathematics
- Students converse and communicate thinking strategies
- Solidify understanding
- Teachers give the students a consistent and on-going opportunity to build their knowledge and skills while learning and practising the basic math facts
- Math games build communication
- Fact recall
- Problem solving strategies
- Promote further learning of concepts
2 thoughts on “A Balanced Math Program”