Term 2 - 2020 - Day 1 begins!

What a day! Easter holidays are done and today we kicked off a brand new term in lockdown mode. We started the morning with an assembly using GOOGLE Meet for all Team 5 teachers and students - 75 of us in one hangout - what an awesome start! 

We had two subject MEETs for the day - 9.30am for Literacy and 11.30am for Maths - time enough to touch base with our students see how they have been over the break and ease them back into some kind of learning mode. It was great to see kids in the virtual flesh especially those who had gone to ground at the end of Term 1 and had not surfaced (via their blogs) during the holidays.  18 students out of 26 for Literacy; 12 out of 25 for Maths! Making a start!

The set up of our class sites followed the format from the end of Term 1 to LIMIT THE LINKS!

 and students can access their learning in just TWO CLICKS.
1) Click to the TEAM 5 site then,

2) Click on the individual teachers's learning pages:

So this is how my ROOM 2 Class learning site looks for TERM 2:

Parent feedback suggested it would help them out if we split Literacy learning into Reading and Writing - no problem!

Going forward, the key will be to provide tasks that students can for the most part tackle independently - will  be interesting to see how this goes and am at the ready to make tweaks as needed in the weeks ahead.

Looking forward to Day 2 back in the saddle tomorrow!

Inquiry - Term 1 Update

TALK MOVES - A POSSIBLE SOLUTION?

The DMIC teaching approach uses maths problems rooted in the real world problems in contexts that are culturally relevant and engaging for students and linked to 'big' maths ideas.

For my inquiry then, as an initial starting point, I wanted to investigate how the use of TALK MOVES could support my priority students to improve their understanding and make use of higher level Maths concepts.

I need to working on building up the usage of the five key Talk Moves with my students and continue to encourage and prompt them to use key questions to engage each other in discussions around a mathematical problem.

Fractions and Decimals with Jo Knox

Today Team 5 had the opportunity to watch Jo Knox in action with two different Maths groups (one at Stage 6 and one at Stage 7). The aim was to see her teach students to convert fractions into decimals.

DIAGNOSTIC TESTING Jo asked a series of quick questions to gauge the groups understanding of fractions and decimals based on examples from the Numeracy  Development Project (NPD) resources or ‘Pink books’.

MATERIALS - Decipipes are a really effective tool to help support students to understand the basics of fractions and decimals. They are also easy for students to manipulate, able to break/build up both representations of both fraction and decimal numbers. 

STRATEGY MODEL Start students off using materials then progressing to Imaging and then Materials as students show greater fluency in their use of a given strategy - see NPD Book 3 p5 

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MODELLING BOOK - Number equations were recorded in a modelling book in plain view of all students. A handy reference point for the teacher to guide students in their thinking and to record in themselves (see next note).
STUDENT THINKING - Jo regularly asked students to explain their answers. The focus was on how they got an answer, helped to highlight can be more than one ‘correct’ solution; extended this to give specific roles to members of the group - split group into three - one group explained their answer, while a second group modelled the answer using materials (decipipes) and a third group recorded answer in modelling book - this approach ensure all students were fully engaged!

PLENARY - at the end of each group’s session, Jo asked the students to reflect on what they had learned and together they co-constructed the WALT for the lesson in kid’s language - she feels that sharing the WALT at start of lesson isl ike giving away the punchline of a joke upfront

Example 1: WALT Convert fractions and decimals by turning them into tenths, hundredths and thousandths

Example 2: WALT by add numbers by taking one off one number and adding to another to make a whole number

So many golden nuggets from this session! I would like to try out co-constructing WALTs with my students - it will be interesting to see if what I had planned to teach matches up with what students feel they have learnt.