I did a WODB (Which One Doesn't Belong) and it worked effortlessly

Today I put up my own WODB on the board (I couldn't find a scatter plot collection I liked on wodb.ca unfortunately) and had the students identify which doesn't belong and write their reason down. I did this in place of/as my starter for class today.

I don't know of a decent way to make these graphs electronically, so if someone knows of a tool (all I can think of is GeoGebra) let me know.

Anyway, it went swimmingly. The most common answers were A and D. Here are some of the reasons from students:

Answered A

Answered D

Students used some clever ways of describing things which was awesome. They knew that something was different about D, but had forgotten the word for a data point that is drastically different from the others.

For both of these it was great to guide the discussion from colloquial words to more mathematical language. For instance, on A, some students said it was "positive." I asked "What is positive about it?" or "what do you mean 'positive'? These other ones are about the x-axis." We drilled it down to it having a positive correlation or positive slope.

Those who answered C had some interesting ways to describe a weak correlation - usually by just saying it was "more scattered" than the other ones. We were able to formalize that phrase a bit more too. Awesome!

Answered C

Unfortunately no one picked B. I was bummed about this, but I can see why. When I asked students why they didn't pick B, they said things along the lines of "There was nothing special about it" or "It was perfect." I guess "having a strong negative correlation and no outlier" really doesn't slip off the tongue...

Anyway, great activity. Thanks to all the people who told me about this (half of the presenters at the NCTM conference) and especially Mary Baurassa for threatening me for failure to follow through - oh and for running wodb.ca.

I'm planning on doing another tomorrow with functions (we're reviewing everything from the year.)

NCTM Annual Conference 2016 - A Report from Matt part 2

(I tried to find all of the slides, but I'll work on collecting them as time progresses.)

Anyway, now that the conference is over and life is moving on, I should probably make some goals and stuff.

Goals and stuff:

Implement immediately:

• Self Assessment prior to summative tests. Make/find a form for students to fill out that will help them think about their learning - do they know the material or not? Them give them resources to study. Something like this:
• 
  
• 
• Get started on getting students used to talking about math by doing wodb.ca or "create debate" type of smaller tasks.
• 
  
• Pick some tasks to try out that will help my students review what we've learned this year.

Eventually

• Work towards doing better tasks. Use them to teach. Follow framework from mathdiscussions.wordpress.com
• Figure out how to build fluency as well. One suggestion I heard was to pick a higher level task that requires students to do a skill multiple times to find a solution.
• Re-make assessments to hit higher DOK.
• Constantly look at class time and pick more efficient activities (spend less time going over homework).

Other thoughts

• You know, I should keep track of data as I implement tasks. What is the improvement?
• I should keep a journal/blog of this journey...
• I should then present at a local conference about my journey.

NCTM Annual Conference 2016 - A Report from Matt part 1

Going into the conference I had the following questions:

• I don't know how to balance conceptual understanding and procedural fluency. How do I do that?
• How do I get students to stop seeing grades and focus on learning? Take charge of their learning?
• How do I help students help themselves?
• How do I fix holes? Get students up to speed?
• How do I differentiate in a reasonable way?

While I didn't expect to answer all of these from the zillion and a half sessions, I figured I needed some direction going in.

Here are the sessions I went to and a quick recap:

Thursday

1. Session 19: Goal-Setting and Self-Assessment Strategies to Promote Achievement

1. Awesome session. The presenter showed real data from her school on before and after using a self assessment tool. Huge gains. Closed the achievement gap.
2. Session 86: 3 Act Math: A How-To
1. Again a good session, but a bit too much of an introduction for me. The presenter shared some good resources and showed how it works in the classroom.
3. Session 112: Create Debate
1. Awesome session. Presenter shared 15 easy ways to get your students started on a debate. Off to a good start on how to have students discuss things.
4. Session 158: Posing Purposeful Questions
1. Good session. Emphasized picking the right questions. Stop using questions that lower the cognitive demand. A great task can be destroyed when you ask questions that get them the answer without requiring them to think at the level you wanted.
5. Session 197: Geometry Tasks That Promote Habits of Mathematical Thinking
1. A bit dissapointing. Presenters spent a lot of time having us complete tasks - which isn't particularly useful. I had to bail early unfortunately.

Friday

1. Session 270: Effective Mathematics Teaching Practices: Purposeful Questions and Meaningful Discourse
1. Packed session. Peg Smith, so that is understandable. Solid session. Really gets at the heart of making tasks good - getting students to think, express their thinking, and defend it.
2. Session 320: Ignite! Session
1. Great Ignite! session. I particularly like the 80/20 time principle presentation. I've been thinking about my own classtime use and been working on making it better.
3. Session 368: Fumbling toward Inquiry: Starting Strong in Problem-Based Learning
1. FANTASTIC session! Especially for me - a rookie in this whole inquiry-based activities.
4. Session 410: My Journey from Worksheets to Rich Tasks
1. Also great. Along the same lines as the previous session. Just as helpful.
5. Session 438: A Brief History of Math Education: Lessons for Today
1. Entertaining. Particularly interesting. We can stop the pendulum swing this time!
6. Session 507: Reflect on Your Practice: National Board Certification in Mathematics
1. Not particularly useful for me. I wanted to learn about how other people use reflection to improve their practice.

Saturday

1. Session 518: Forget What You Know; Listen to What They Know
1. Good. Great question stem: "What question would you ask to get the information you need to figure out..."
2. Session 560: Why and How to Let Students Struggle? Thoughts from Research
1. I skipped out on Dan's session because he was going to record it. This was a great presentation on productive struggle. Presented by a professor from BYU (go Utah!). Basically, the research says that struggle is productive if they struggle, but don't get frustrated. The gains in student learning are significant. Retention goes up too.
3. Session 583: Facilitating Meaningful Mathematical Discourse
1. um... I'm having a hard time remembering this session. I'll have to listen to it again.
4. Session 597: Framework for Effective Teaching - Integrate Common Core Math Practices!
1. Possibly the best final session I could go to. The presenter introduced a framework for getting your classes into the habit of mathematical discussions - completing tasks at a high level. Resources on her website.

Getting Caught Up

So... I haven't written anything in quite a while... my bad. Really no excuse other than I didn't make the time for it. My bad.

Summary of the last two/three years of teaching:

My first year of teaching at West Hills Middle was stressful and busy. Just trying to get something ready for the next day and keeping grades caught up swallowed up my time. Oh, and I got started on my Master's Degree form University of Saint Mary. And I made solution videos for the assignments I assigned. Why did I do that to myself?

The 2nd year wasn't much better. But I finished my master's. Boo ya! Take that school.

This year it was my goal to not be stressed out anymore. And so I cut back on a lot of things.

And then I went to the NCTM Annual Conference at San Francisco. IT WAS AWESOME!!! (more on that in the next post) Now I'm working on getting active in the Math Twitter Blogosphere.

NY Times - Why Do Americans Stink At Math?

I know I haven't written anything down in a long long long long long long time (about 10 months). Teaching was crazy. I will elaborate later. I figured I should get started again though. I decided to start with a beautifully written article in the New York Times called "Why Do Americans Stink At Math?" by Elizabeth Green.

Here is a link: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/27/magazine/why-do-americans-stink-at-math.html?src=recg&_r=1

I though this article was a great summary of why any math education reforms haven't worked in the past and why we're struggling now with Common Core. We don't know HOW to teach differently. We aren't trained to. We have some 13,000 hours of training learning the old way and some 2-10 hours of the new way (if you're lucky).

One thing I've struggled with is that we have new standards, but everything else is the same. Tests still focus on algorithms. My district gave us a scope and sequence wherein we can hit each topic if we spend one day on it. My attempts at doing otherwise have yielded backlashes. There needs to be a shift in philosophy on all parties in order for Common Core to fully work.

Educational policy makers probably won't change. It will have to start with me and you. Teachers will have to change on their own. Teachers are going to have to take the risks and take the fall if students don't succeed.

Can I risk losing my job for trying to do better?...

Reflection: Why changing has been unsuccessful

I haven't really posted since my school year started. That is because life has been crazy with the school year starting (and for some weird reason new teachers to JSD have some 40 hours of things to get done but no extra time to do them) and with starting a Master's Program through University of Saint Mary. I finally feel like I can stop going at 100 mph. I can go only 75 now.

Anyway... time for a quick reflection.

I wanted to become a completely new teacher at the start of the year. I was determined. I felt like I could do it!... but then school actually started. I instantly had to get into survival mode. I struggled to just get the next day ready. I had emails to answer, evaluations to complete, professional portfolios to complete, and mounds and mounds of homework and tests to grade and put in. I had absolutely no time for anything I wanted to do. Instead I only had time for the things I needed to do to stay afloat.

This has led me to contemplate: why can't I shake out of the traditional way of doing things? Why is it so stinkin hard? Well, before I can do that I need to have some sort of foundation. I need a place to start. CURSE BEING A NEW TEACHER!!! I love teaching, but being new is such a hindrance. I don't know how students will react to anything. I don't know how I'd normally teach anything because it's my first time teaching it. I'm hoping that as the year goes on I can catch up and make something happen, but no guarantees right now.

On another note, during the little bits of time I find in the bathroom or on the train to work, I've been reading John Hattie's Visible Learning for Teachers. He and Dylan Wiliam should be friends. His book says many things that Embedded Formative Assessment says: Make success criteria very clear, find out what students know, and teach accordingly (so far). Hattie's book has a lot about teachers working together to accomplish goals. Overall, it's been a good read.

Exploring MTBoS - What makes my classroom MINE?

I'm excited to be participating in the Exploring the MathTwitterBlogosphere activity! There's nothing like having a huge online community of people crazy enough to want to teach math collaborating together.

So one thing that I think is a defining characteristic for my classroom is that I refuse to have students just practice a skill on their own via a worksheet or book assignment. I always have turn that practice into an in-class game. I love games! My students seem to like it as well... unless we've played the game too many times recently (my current use of my collection of general practice games hasn't been thorough enough). If you ever have a game that let's students practice algorithmic skills, let me know about it. It will probably end up in the game collection.

A game that turned out to be fun :)

I did this game this week in all of my classes - honors and regular. I don't have a name for it yet, so if you've got an idea for it, let me know. Maybe someone else made it up before me, but feel like I discovered it on my own. Here's what happened:

0. I split the class into teams. I prefer groups 4 or smaller. Four is even a little big. The goal of the game is to get the most points.

1. I cut some scratch paper up into 1/8th sheets and pre-made a bunch of inequalities that students need practice solving. I had enough for about 1.5 per group.

2. I handed out a paper with an inequality on it to each group. Each team's job is to solve the inequality on a SEPARATE piece of paper and then bring their solution with the card to me.

3. I then sat at a desk with my handy-dandy 10-sided die of fate and a colored pen. When a representative of the team showed up with a solution  I would quickly look over it and offer changes they need to make it right. They then had to go fix their mistakes (even little ones.) A line quickly formed. Even simple mistakes puts you at the end of the line.

4. If a solution was presented to me that was correct, I would say so and roll the Die of Fate. Whatever number showed up would be how many points I'd write on their paper and initial. I would then give them a new paper with a new problem and they would solve that one. This continued until I decided it should stop (about 5 min before the bell to take care of business.) Winners got a prize - candy.

Comments: I absolutely love the random amount of points awarded. Difficult problems can end up being worth 1 points while easy ones can be worth 9. I think it helped my "un-engageables" become involved because even though they didn't answer as many questions, they could still win the game due to the random factor. I also gave them easier questions to start and worked them towards the harder ones. I also like how this game is very general: I can put whatever problems I want on the cards. Take that! classic worksheets. Why do a worksheet when you can play a game?

Concerns: It is difficult to monitor the class while you're looking over solutions. One team member could be doing all of the work.

Two weeks in and I'm already back to habit

I'm now two weeks into the school year and I'm noticing a lot of similarities to past experiences:

1. Having a top-down approach to pacing is bad for me trying to be better. Our district has dictated the scope and sequence for the year's standards to be met. With my math department we (they) drew up a calendar for when we're teaching what. This has been horrible for what I want to do: not be a traditional math teacher. I want students to discover things on their own. Our first two weeks was all about solving equations and non-compound inequalities. I wanted my students to decide on "rules" for solving equations by having them create equations and challenge each other to solve them (the one day we spent on it was actually a lot of fun and they came up with some great stuff!) But we couldn't fully develop the ideas and test them out because we needed to "cover" other things like solving inequalities. The result is my students have an incomplete understanding of solving equations and I had to do some crappy lessons using direct instruction methods which my students were immediately turned off by. I feel like my good plans can't fit in the top-down system... can't we focus on learning rather than teaching?

2. I'm some students' favorite teacher because I let them sit by their friends, and some students hate me because I'm not a traditionalist and don't just tell them exactly what to do. I had a few students tell me I was their favorite on the second or third day and this past Friday I signed at least two forms transferring students out of my classes.

3. We had a quiz that I know my students weren't ready for. Another interesting tradition that schools have: we give tests because that's when they're scheduled. Some people say it is so you can stay on schedule. I say we should just schedule better. Personally I'm a fan of giving students a quiz they're not ready for. It helps them see what they do and don't know - we just need to make sure they have an opportunity to redo it later.

4. There are a lot of things I want to do, but I don't have the time to do them all so I only get to do half of them halfway and so nothing works out close to what I planned and now my students don't know as much as they should. Wow, that was a long sentence, but it get's to the point. I need to choose my battles better. Maybe this isn't the year I have a complete problem-based approach to teaching. Maybe this is the year that we do a cool task once or twice a week while we focus on Assessment for Learning techniques everyday.

I think this is what I'll try: Focus on one cool task a week and Assessment for Learning. I am really new (2nd yr teacher) and I've got oodles of extra stuff to do: Go to district classes two nights a week, finish moving in, get all of my Master's Program homework done, and spend time with my wife. This is sounding like a good plan to me. And I don't have to be a traditional teacher during the rest of the week either. I can turn typical guided/individual practice into games which I love playing :) I think I'll actually use that Game Library that I've been building.

Pre-School Jitters

I'm starting my second year on Monday... and I'm scared out of my mind. I'm sure things will be great and I'll have students I'll instantly connect with, but I'm not sure of how many. Luckily I'm new at the school, so students haven't heard anything about me.

I'm also worried about how my ideas will pan out. Will my laid-back-ness make them completely unruly? I don't want to be a dictator, but will they be crazy without it? I don't know, but I'm going to stand by my philosophy that if you connect with the students, then good classroom management will inevitably follow because students will be willing to do what you ask. We'll see how it goes...

I'm also worried about trying out an Assessment For Learning classroom. (Read the book by the same name if you don't know what that looks like.) It is definitely non-traditional (yay!) but will it work with 30-36 students in each period totaling up to almost 200?

Well, most of these fears will either be realized or dispelled next week.... :s

Another book done: Assessment for Learning. And what I'm going to do about it.

So I finished another book on using formative assessment to change your classroom procedures. It is called Assessment for Learning by Paul Black and a bunch of other people. If follows a similar vein to Embedded Formative Assessment. It reads a lot like a research paper. They got a group of teachers together and had them come up with assessment strategies to use in their classrooms and they tried them out. The study covered the course of two years.

I didn't find this book as engaging as Embedded Formative Assessment, but it was definitely more real. This involved real teachers using strategies they collaborated on with real students. The authors were also real about the implications of their study: the teachers had success, but there is no "one size fits all" strategies that they can prescribe to all teachers. Everyone has different students and each teacher has a different style. So the strategies that one would use is different from the ones another teacher would use.

Reading this book brings me to my final conclusion before starting school next week: I need to pick a few (2-ish) strategies to try out and implement right away. I need to make changes slowly which is completely against my typical tendency to just go crazy with ideas.

My strategies to try first:

• No hands up. Pick students/groups at random.
• Provide feedback that is useful, meaning students will be able to make improvements on their work based on what I wrote.

Even this will probably be too much at the start. We'll see. I just need to remember not to give myself too much to do.

So what do you think? Do you ever want to try out a bunch of ideas all at once? What are your suggestions on not going nuts with all of the "shiny new toys"?

Article about someone else changing from a traditionalist

Read this article called "Never Say Anything A Kid Can Say." It is a lot about questioning techniques, but I wanted to focus on his shift from traditionalist to non-traditionalist point of view.

My favorite quote form this article is My definition of a good teacher has since changed from "one who explains things so well that students understand" to "one who gets students to explain things so well that they can be understood." I thought that was fantastic. We teachers aren't the best when we're talking, we're the best when we can get students to talk.

Book Review: Embedded Formative Assessment by Dylan Wiliam

I just finished reading Dylan Wiliam's Embedded Formative Assessment. I highly highly highly highly recommend it for all teachers - and no I'm not getting paid to say that (even though it would be awesome to get paid to say what I think about stuff.) First off, I don't know if you know this, but Dylan Wiliam is one of the world's leading experts on formative assessment and why it raises student achievement. This guys has done his research... and it's a lot. Most claims in his book are followed by a citation. The book has an impressive 17 pages of references - most of which come from peer reviewed research journals. He also did some of the research himself.

Soooooooooo many teachers have formative assessment all wrong, which is why I didn't understand it until I read Dr. Wiliam's book. There is no such thing as an assessment that is itself formative. Instead, you use an assessment formatively. Whether an assessment is formative depends on how you use it. Wiliam gives many examples of how to do such a thing.

I also like his framework for how to focus learning in the classroom. The 5 key strategies he suggests are:

1. Clarify, share, and understand learning intentions and criteria for success.
2. Engineer effective classroom activities that elicit evidence of learning.
3. Provide feedback that moves learning forward.
4. Activate learners as instructional resources for one another.
5. Activate learners as the owners of their own learning.

I'm finding it difficult to describe how awesome this work is. The research he cites explains a lot of the problems that are hindering student achievement in schools today. They also provide practical ways to solve those problems. Most of those strategies aren't even difficult, they are just uncomfortable for us to do because we have been doing things wrong for so long.

This is starting another project for me. I'm going to collect practical strategies to do the above 5 strategies. I've actually already started. Here is a link.

Once again, I highly recommend it. It is a great book for non-traditionalists and traditionalists.

Teaching Philosophy. CMI Framework = Awesome. Why all sides are better than one.

First off, check out this CMI Article. I think this is absolutely brilliant. It puts all the important philosophies to learning mathematics together. A major problem with most teaching frameworks is that there is always too much emphasis on something. Traditionalists emphasize algorithmic skills. Purists emphasize definitions and concepts. Application-ers emphasize models. 

After reading this article, I realized that we need to emphasize all of these things. Too much of any one of them isn't good. I think the Common Core gives us the right standards, we just need to teach them evenly.

So if I'm going to teach everything fairly evenly, what will be my approach? I still favor taking an application-er approach, but perhaps the other focii can be incorporated as to not lack the other things that students should learn.

Your thoughts? How can we emphasize everything? Is there a curriculum that does so?

Resource: The Start Of A Games Library

Hello y'alls. I've started a Games Library on a Google doc. You can look at it here. You can have it if you want. You can steal all of those wonderful ideas that I stole from other people. I just ask that you don't forget to give credit to the people I took them from. I also ask that you comment on things. Try them out. How did they go? Did they fail miserably or work out? What would you change? I've made it so you can comment, so comment away :)

What makes good games?

What makes a good game to use in class? This is half rhetorical (as is becoming typical). I have a few ideas, but I'd love to hear what you think.

Here are some guidelines I like to use:
1. The game needs to involve everyone most of the time.

2. If the game is for practice, the time spent practicing math skills during the game needs to be roughly equal to or more than the time spent doing the game mechanics.

3. The game needs to be fun.

4. Competition helps, so the game needs an element of it. (Caution: competition can turn into a monster!)

5. The simpler the game, the better. The cheaper the better (since it is disguised as "fun" some schools aren't willing to pay for supplies.)

6. Ideally every person can contribute to the success of the team throughout the game. People who struggle won't ruin it for the rest.


What do you think? What makes a good game to use in class for practice, review, or learning?

Games in Class?

Yeah that's right! It's time to stop being boring and bring games back into class. For some weird reason traditional teachers stop letting kids play when they get out of elementary school. Then they proceed to suck the life out of them via "learning."

I want to bring them back!

Games make life so much better. I love games and so I want to use them in class. They really do have all sorts of uses.

Purposes for games in my Math classes are:
1. To break the ice, allow students to become strong team members, and learn life's important lessons. Students have no idea how to interact with each other. If you don't believe me, look at teenage couples. So... awkward... Games can help students learn to work together and stop being jerks.

2. To have FUN! Fun isn't a bad thing. Sometimes students are feeling groggy or down or bored even before class really gets going. Use a game to wake them up! Use a game to get students into a happier mood or to celebrate successes.

3. To practice and review. Part of hating the traditional math class to me is hating worksheets. If I ever want to crush children's delight in math, I'd give them worksheets. Why can't we turn practice into a game? Take the problems from a boring worksheet, put them into a game, and now students can practice while enjoying themselves. I don't know why teacher insist on only using games for review. Why can't we use them to practice before review time?

4. To learn Math. Some games are perfect tools for learning mathematics. Look at poker: a game of probabilities all over the place. We don't necessarily need to teach gambling games (someone somewhere will probably throw a fit over it) but we can use other games to teach mathematics. Then math becomes the tool students use to become better at something they want to be good at. Sweet!

Note: Game-Based Learning
There is a movement going on to have game-based learning in schools. I like the idea, but I'm not sure how it will pan out. I've seen some mighty bad "educational" games made. If software developers can make games that are cool that teach students real skills, then I'm all for it. If a game can engage a student so he/she is intrinsically motivated to learn more, then let's do it!

What other purposes can you see for using games in class? Are any of these purpose not okay with you? Do you think Game-Based Learning will succeed?

TED talk: Change Isn't Hard, It's Uncomfortable

Just finished watching this (thanks MindShift). I recommend it. It is good to hear that there are schools pushing to break the industrialized way we have been teaching. My favorite point that he brings up is that change isn't hard, it's uncomfortable. We can do it! My favorite way to deal with uncomfortable things is just to dive in and surround yourself in it and then deal with things as they come up.

What did/didn't you like about what Grant said? How can we "Teach into the unknown?"

Book Review: Accessible Mathematics - 10 Instructional Shifts That Raise Student Achievement by Steven Leinwand

Things I like: I read this book quite quickly. It took about a week with reading only 20 minutes a day. In addition to being short, it has some fantastic ideas that are backed up by oodles of research. All of the "shifts" he writes about are things that a good math teacher should do:
1. Incorporate cumulative review each day.
2. Learn from reading programs: ask questions about inference, focus on process rather than the answer, etc.
3. Use multiple representations
4. Have language rich classrooms
5. Take all opportunities to develop number sense.
6. Build from charts, graphs, and tables
7. Increase the natural use of measurement throughout the curriculum
8. Minimize what is no longer important
9. Embed mathematics in realistic problems and real-world contexts
10. Make "Why?" "How do you know?" "Can you explain?" classroom mantras.

All fantastic things. If all math teachers did these things, I probably wouldn't have created this blog and there probably wouldn't be this huge education reform (with regards to math at least).

The book also has some neat articles in the appendix. The one on what we can learn from Singapore Math was quite interesting.

Dislikes: Not much really, mostly a perspective thing. This is not really a "Break Tradition" book. I got the feeling that it would take a traditional teacher, and turn him/her into a traditional teacher that uses research based methods. Good, but not my cup of tea - it's peach (yum!)

I recommend this book to all traditional math teachers or teachers that are unfamiliar with the research regarding these ideas. Good ideas to keep in mind as I break tradition.

Anyone else read this? Your thoughts about it? What other "shifts" would you recommend Math teachers do?

Stuff I'll Be Posting On This Blog

Now that I've put oodles of things on this blog, I feel like I can actually post stuff I've wanted to get going. With the base laid out, I can put down posts that will relate to my mission: to overcome the traditional math teacher. Some categories that will show up are as follows:

Book/Article/Literature/Blog/Media Review - Whenever I read/hear/watch something that has effected my teaching, I'll post it and share my experience. I'd love to hear from others on their thoughts.

Break Tradition Idea - As gems come along, I'll post them. The education world is soooooooooo incredibly full of ideas, I'll probably only post stuff that seems good to me.

Classroom Experience - Ideas are great, but if nothing is tried out in the classroom then they essentially fell on deaf ears. I'll try things out and share how it went. You should share your experiences too!

Resource - If I find something I think is awesome, I'll post a link to it. These will be similar to the Review category, except they will have resources for teachers.

Game - As I find games to try out in the classroom, they'll go up!

Other - For other stuff duh! (Most likely comics and memes).

Is there anything else you'd like to see me post and write about?