Professional Goal I: Grow in my ability to apply different techniques to teach

math concepts within the classroom.

Issues Identified within the class and my teachings:
When teaching, there are always a multitude of challenges that arise within the school year and subject matters. These
issues that I wanted to address are some of the main areas that I wanted to focus my attention on.
1. One of the problems that I continually reflected upon in the first few weeks has been the ability to split my time and
focus on both the Grade 4’s and 5’s as well as the higher skill levels and the lower skill levels.
a. What are ways to split teaching effectively between the higher skilled students and the students at the lower
end of the spectrum?
2. In addition to the first difficulty of dealing with the skill gaps between different students, a related question has been
once students with a high skill level are done, what is a way that is best in order to direct their energies?
a. What are ways to continue learning for the students that are regularly done their work? Something that does
not just require more “do” work but is instead purposeful.
3. Personally, I have not had a math class in 10 years. I am someone who has always been strong in math abilities,
however I have never had to teach the topic before.
a. What are different strategies to teach math concepts?

Resources and Strategies:

Resource list
Advice from collaboration with colleagues:
Below are some of the recommendations that I have received through having conversations with my colleagues at my
school as well as other schools.
● Know your students and their abilities and try to find activities that will fit everyone's needs
● Use whiteboards as a formative assessment as well as to assist with the permanency issues that students have
within math towards making mistakes.
● Have daily practicing of math facts and skills like addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division.
● Include games in math as a way to engage the students
○ This can take the shape of whole class games or also games in pairs that the students are working on.
● Include technology within lessons and teachings
○ Use math games online such as prodigy as a reward for those that do their work and motivation for those
that don’t do their work.
○ This is a skills based math game that is engaging to those that maybe have a harder time on different
exercises.
● Include movement within lessons and teachings
○ This can be either as a break or as a way of teaching.
○ Use games as a whole class that somehow involve movement and not just sitting at the tables.
Implementations:

Issue Identified: Implementations attempted Reflections on Effectiveness of the

Implementation:

#1: One of the strategies that I have implemented This strategy has seemed to work well for a
● What are ways to has been to give instructions, followed by an couple of reasons:
split teaching activity. These instructions have been more ● It minimized the amount of time I am
effectively giving direct instruction. For the majority
brief in order to allow the students who are
of the time, we are either working on
between the understanding to get started on their work. problems together or they are moving on
higher skilled Then, transitioning to a smaller group lesson to individual work.
students and the for those who still have questions and require ○ This allows my higher level
lower end of the clarification. students to continue on with their
spectrum? work.
We go through everything by me modeling it ● I am then given a lot of time to either go
one on one and address issues within the
first, then the whole class goes through
topic for students or, if needed, grab a
problems together on their whiteboards, then group of students and work with them in
students continue on with an a smaller setting.
activity/worksheet. This whiteboard activity ● One area that I still need to work on
has allowed me to use this as my gauge in balancing is making sure that this
order to see who would need help and then instruction time does not take too long.
provide additional assistance either one on Sometimes certain students will still have
questions on what we are doing and it
one or with a smaller group if needed.
can be hard to identify exactly the
moment as to when the whole class
discussion is still necessary, versus just
working with those students explicitly.

Being able to have classes where students ● Having classes where the main activity is
are working on an activity and I am more to work on exercises has been helpful in
freely able to go to those that need help. making sure that I get to work with
 students one on one for those that need
it. With the whole class working on these
activities, I am freed up to work with
students in one on one or small group
situations. This has been helpful in
building skills amongst the lower level
students.

Providing tasks with a multiple range of This has been more and more needed as we
abilities so that students are going through a have moved into more complex activities.
task that is at their ability level. Toward the beginning of the year, we could keep
activities standard across the board as we were
going over vocabulary for students in spanish.
This has then progressed into more and more
complex math concepts like multiplication and
division. As we have progressed, I have had to
look at the complexities of the assignments I
was giving and then look at whether they would
be in the abilities of everyone in the class. Next,
I would then work to have activities that fit the
abilities for all students in the class with the
option of having more difficult activities for the
students that required a bigger challenge.

Splitting the class up into different groups and This is a strategy that I have implemented later
teaching specific skills. in my practicum and has been fruitful. The
students have been enjoying it as well. Within
the patterns unit, there were skills and topics
that were quite different from each other within
the unit. This allowed me the opportunity to try
separating the class into two groups.

I thoroughly enjoyed this method and splitting

 the class into two groups. First of all, I enjoy
teaching math in smaller groups because the
range of questions can be so varying. I found it
easier to be more focused in the skills that I was
addressing. Next, I also find it nicer to have a
smaller group of students looking at a specific
problem. It allowed for different students to be
providing input, rather than the same students in
a larger group providing answers.

This strategy was also well liked by the

students. Often, after trying different strategies, I
like to get students feedback on how they think
it went for them as well. 90% of the class
preferred the smaller group setting. They felt like
they got to ask more specific questions for
where they were at. This was the same
feedback for both the lower level students and
the higher level.

#2: Having the students work on creating a math This has seemed like an engaging secondary
● What are ways to worksheet with stumper problems for their activity. For my class specifically, they were able
continue learning peers that are also advanced in other to then improve their math skills from a different
for the students classes. lens, as they used their creativity and
backwards engineered problems, for example.
that are regularly
In addition to this, they were also practicing their
done their work? Spanish as they created various word problems.
That does not just
require more “do” Having an ongoing project for students that This was a project that was implemented by
work but is are regularly finished their work that another teacher closer to the beginning of the
instead incorporates their imagination. This is a practicum. This was an engaging activity that
project that has been designed by another the students were excited to get to once they
purposeful.
teacher and was then implemented for some were done with their work. Students would finish
students in my class. their work and then instantly want to go work on
this other project. The work was both engaging
and student driven and was a good example of
what I can do to provide options for projects for
students that are regularly done or looking for
more challenging activities to do.

Have a real life application project with This is a project that I have implemented later
relevant material. This was a project that within the semester as we have entered the
students could work on when they were done patterns unit within math. These were booklet
with their work. projects that were focused on real life situations
regarding math. These projects allowed the
students to have choice within the project as
well as work within the subject matter in a real
life situation.

This became a project that the students could

then work on when they were done, but
provided a challenging and real life situation in
order for them to utilize their skills. This has
seemed to be a productive way for students to
use their time when they were regularly done
with the day's activities.

Math games- these are fun ways that Using math games was another way that I
students get some “free time” while still allowed students to continue working within the
practicing relevant math skills. realm of math but not just giving them more
work to do. Although I have found other work
that was fruitful and engaging such as the
examples above, I also found giving the
students a reward of playing math games was
rewarding and motivating. Students would still
be practicing their skills within their skill levels
 but it was in an environment and activity that did
not feel the same as an additional worksheet or
challenge.

#3: One of the different strategies that has been “This last week I was able to teach lessons with
● What are different primarily recommended to me has been to movement aspects within the math teaching as
strategies to teach include movement when possible to my math well as being able to adapt on the spot to
math concepts? lessons in order to change it up.
problems within the lesson as well. Students
were making a number line with decimals by
getting in order from least to greatest. First they
would make a decimal and then line up in order
within small groups. This went well and then
they were doing it as one large class. One of the
things I noticed when they were doing it as one
large group is that they all wanted to have the
same numbers like 8.99 because it’s the biggest
decimal. So at the end of the line, there were 5
of the same number. Next, I shifted them so that
if they ran into someone with the same number
they had to rock, paper, scissors and the loser
had to then change their number so that we had
a number line with 24 different numbers. This
went really well, although it did take much
longer than I was expecting. That being said, it
was a productive class with the students
evidently working on their skills and the students
who were struggling with this concept were able
to see those around them. The environment of
the class was also very enjoyable with a change
 of pace as the majority of the class was
movement focused.” - an excerpt from my
weekly reflection.

Allowing for students to play within the One of the strategies that I used typically
material through the use of technology and towards the end of the units, once students had
Prodigy. been taught a majority of the topics, was
allowing them to play math games online such
as prodigy. This was a way to provide engaging
practice of the material they have been working
with. Normally, worksheets or activities are a
good way to help practice when the topic has
just been taught as it allows for me to go around
and help students where they are in need of
help. I found the use of prodigy was useful for
further practice with the material as well as a
motivating factor for students to make sure that
they are getting their previous work done.

Use of whiteboards as we work together as a This is a strategy that I think is crucial for direct
class teaching instruction in math. The use of
whiteboards allows myself as the teacher to see
where students are at with the problems we are
going through as a class. Not only did it serve
as a form of formative assessment, but it also
allowed me to have the students active and
engaged when going through material. Rather
than having only one or two students involved
by being at the board or answering, every
student gets a chance to work on the problem
and try solving it.
Having harder logic puzzles in order for This is a strategy that I would use toward the
students to work on the concepts or to beginning of the classes as a warm up,
reintroduce the topics specifically in the patterns unit. Students would
have a harder logic problem on the board and
work together or individually to solve it. This was
used as a hook in order for students to be
interested in the topics at hand. I enjoyed this as
an initial hook for the students and to help them
with their problem solving skills. Most of these
problems engage all students with a wide
variety of skill levels

Real life applications Real life problems were ways of showing

students how math is useful in day to day life.
This was done in the form of problems within the
material they were working on, logic problems,
as well as real life projects that students worked
on once they were finished their work.

Songs incorporated within concepts This was one of the most popular strategies
from the students. I used numerous songs
covering different topics in math specifically.
Students regularly loved the songs and would
ask for them outside of class time and sing
along.

Providing opportunities to regularly practice Toward the end of the practicum, I started every
core skills. math class with 5 minutes of math facts. I
created the routine for students to copy down
and complete various math facts. This routine
had various skill levels attached with it. Students
had to start with addition problems and then
 work their way to harder multiplication problems.
This allowed students to work within their skill
level.

Online Skill quizzes - such as blooket Using online quizzes like blooket was a method
that I used in order for students to have a
repetitive use and practice of their math facts.
These quizzes allow for students to use their
skills quickly and repetitively to reinforce these
skills. These quizzes are incredibly engaging
and I like how it brought a lot of enjoyment to an
activity that is historically not as engaging or fun
for the students. Lastly, I specifically like Blooket
for the way that the scoring systems work; a
student of any ability can win because the prizes
are random. This means that my lower level
students were also winning the games and not
only the students who have a high level of skill
with their math facts.