Maths - GTC research - three simple steps to success

A report from the GTC (General Teaching Council) recently showed three factors which can significantly lead towards success in maths.

These include:

• viewing mistakes as positive – identifying them and using them in subsequent discussions;
• allowing students to develop and justify their own varied methods;
• encouraging students to set each other problems to solve.

The research concluded that student-centred, collaborative and discussion based approaches to learning were more effective than more traditional transmission methods, especially in the development of conceptual understanding of mathematics.

Nothing too new or earth shattering, but quite reassuring.

What's the point of school? Guy Claxton

This is a great book which prompts lots of thinking!

I read it over the half term break after hearing about the author from Anne (she went to see Guy Claxton when he was in Phuket) and Paul Ginnis (see previous post).

It is an inspirational book which asks the reader to think carefully about how schools are (or aren't) preparing children for life after school.

For me the main messages were the magnificent 8, as well as the importance of modelling being a fallible, eager, curious learner. Thanks to Bruce Hammonds blog, leading and learning for his summary which I have included below:


1 Powerful learners are curious. They are born curious and are drawn to learning. They wonder about things, and know how to ask productive questions. They enjoy the process of wondering and questioning. Curious people, however, can be demanding and skeptical of what they're told.

2. Confidant learners have courage. They are not afraid of uncertainty and complexity. They have the confidence to say, 'I don't know?' - which is always a precursor to, 'lets find out'. They are willing to take risks and try new things. They 'stick' with things and 'bounce back' when things go wrong. They also know when to give up. They have 'mental toughness' or resilience.

3 Powerful learners are good at exploration and investigation they like finding out and are good at seeking and gathering information. They take the time to attend carefully and do not jump to conclusions. They are good at 'sifting' ideas and trust their ability to tell 'good evidence'.

4 Powerful learners requires experimentation. This is the virtue of trying things out to see if it works, or just to see what happens. They make mistakes, keeping what works for 'next time'. They like adjusting things, enjoy admiring their work in progress, and seeing how they can continually improve things. They say, 'lets try'...and, 'what if?' And they also know the importance of practice.

5 Powerful learners have imagination. They know how to use their 'inner world' to explore possibilities. They know how to make use of 'mental rehearsals' of how they might act.They also know how to relax and let idea come to them, finding links and connections ; they have a good feeling of 'rightness'.

6 The creativity of imagination needs to yoked to discipline. They have the ability to think carefully, rigorously and methodically. They are good at 'hard thinking' and ask, 'how come'? They are good at creating explanations, making plans, crafting ideas, and making predictions based on their evidence. They are also open to serendipity and to changing their minds if necessary.

7 Powerful learners know the virtue of sociability. They are happy collaborating and sharing their ideas and resources. They are good members of groups able to help groups solve problems. They are able to both give their views, receive feedback, and listen respectfully to others.8 Powerful learners are reflective. They are able to step back and take stock of progress. They are able to mull over their actions and consider how they might have done things differently. Good learners are self aware, able to contemplate their actions to continually 'grow their learning power'.

Double Whammy with Paul Ginnis

A Saturday course today with Paul Ginnis. He's a great presenter, mixing a blend of theory and in-school evidence backed up by lots of photos. I had seen him almost 2 years ago at NIST.

The double whammy is content and metalearning...his idea is that learning could/should contain both.

Varied approaches to learning, catering for many learning styles, were included in the session. See video below of a re-enactment of the moment of conception. Note the wiggling sperm and the fiercely defensive ovule cell membrane!

Maths assessment at Year 3

In our year group we were talking about how we could best assess children's maths progress and attainment throughout year.  We know what many children are good at, can give next steps and are good at this kind of assessment.  This is the bread and butter of teaching.

It is the big picture/national curriculum level description which is hard to judge for me and many other teachers.

Different strands of maths have different weightings or importance in the maths levels, surely?  How can we judge children's levels if we are unclear about how much importance should be given to each strand?

The APP suggests a solution, but seems to be unwieldy and a huge marking burden.  It is suggested to be used on a sample basis, but how does that inform your judgement of the cohort as a whole?

Here are some things I stumbled on:

curriculum map for Y3 from South Gloucester

simple selection of level descriptors for maths from learninglive

various uninvestigated maths assessment links from the shambles site

I feel I have been trying to figure this one out for many years.

At my last school I tried using key objective lists which were organised by year group...this could then be used to infer a level.

Does anyone have any answers?

Are there any online maths assessments out there? Are there any which are free?  How do these weight the strands of maths?

Prezi - presentation software education version

I first saw Prezi at a Debating workshop run by Ben Friend...it is a visual and dynamic presentation tool.

Here's an example of a Prezi, taken from the prezi site. This one is by a lady called Annette Evans:



I've just signed up and will be having a play.

Look here for the freetechnologyforteachers blog review.

Editing the size of video in your blog

Freetechnology for teachers brings you a step by step guide to resize video so that it fits your blog.

Go here to find out how

Book review: Reinventing Project Based Learning, Boss and Krauss, ISTE

This book looks at mainly technology driven project based, cross curricular learning.

The part that I am reading at the moment talks about possible pitfalls:

• Long on activity, short on learning outcomes
  
• Technology layered over traditional practice – internet research then powerpoint is not a quality project.
  
• 
  
  Trivial Thematic units – really this points at theme based learning not necessarily being project based. What this means , I think, is that it does not naturally hang together as a cohesive mass of learning. I know from experience that sometimes it isn't possible to make a project that includes all of the elements you need to cover, if you are curriculum led. Some themes can be effective – year long themes such as:
  • change,
    
  • survival,
    
  • justice...
    
  • another one which came to my mind was the theme of connections...this crops up more and more with me in my classroom.
    
• Over scripted with many many steps – this will lead to learning which looks very much the same – again,, I think that sometimes you need to have learning which looks the same. PBL is not always the best way of learning or teaching for every student (I can think of many students for whom the lack of structure is at best confusing and at worst, terrifying). Educating children to have the confidence, resilience and persistence to tackle open ended projects is the challenge which faces teachers.
  

 
Chapter 4, p65

Best projects:

• Are loosely designed with multiple learning paths
  
• Are generative, causing students to construct meaning
  
• Have a driving question
  
• Capture student interest (compelling reallife or simulated experiences)
  
• Are realistic and multidisciplinary
  
• Involve others outside school – this really lends itself to blogging/wikis
  
• Tap into rich data or primary sources
  
• Enable students to learn from each other
  
• Promote enquiry
  
• Incorporate 21^st century skills such as communication, project management and technology – didn't we do these things in the 20th century as well? I must find out what that phrase is commonly meant to mean
  
• Encourage/rely on key learning dispositions such as persistence, risk-taking, confidence, self reflection and cooperation.
  
• 
  
  Make students learn by doing...maybe we should rename schools as Doing.
  
  
  
  

Chapter 8, Building connections and branching out
One section focuses on parents as a bank of experts. One such connection (Kathy Cassidy)was with preservice teachers.  This made me wonder how technology is being taught at PGCE courses in UK.
Are students at University of West of England, where I graduated, being taught about either PBL or 21st Century skills?  Is their training to mine, 15 years ago? Kathy Cassidy has a great site dedicated to primary web 2.0...I've been looking for an age specific site for a while ...this is a wiki and has some interesting wiki links for sifferent areas of the primary class.  Great to see them in action rather than just some ideas about how they could be used.  Here's one - a choose your own adventure about a tennis ball, which was written collaboratively.
I like the idea of linking up with preservice teachers.  A pool of interested, knowledgable adults mixing with a pool of children writers.
I stumbled, via the Kathy Cassidy link, onto Dr Strange, who teaches an Ed Tech based course (here's a link to becoming great at using twitter in 15 minutes a day) and has lots of online conversations here.  He mentions MrC, a teacher whose blog I follow.  
It made me think about how closely connected our blog/web connections are.




Things I want to look at:

www.projectapproach.org

http://coe.ksu.edu/pub

http://www.edutopia.org/project-learning

PBL schools in SW England

PYP schools in UK

Flat classroom


 
Sites I have looked at: