week 7

How to set up and manage mathematical learning experiences.

There are 10 things that can make Maths teachers create an engaging Maths class. These are the following:

1. Know the students and how they learn (Pemberton, 2020a;  AITSL, 2010) – there are students who have diverse needs. Knowing what each student needs can help teachers create their strategies to teach a content to foster and develop student’s learning.
2. Know the content (Monteleone, 2014; AITSL, 2010) – this is one of the main components of the role of a teacher – being able to demonstrate their knowledge and understanding of the mathematical concepts, substance and structure of the content, using effective learning and teaching sequence and strategies that are aligned with the curriculum, assessment and reporting requirements.
3. Setup the learning environment (Pemberton, 2020; Fraser, 2012) – is considered as the third teacher as it is responsive to the interests of students, provides opportunities for them to make their thinking visible and fosters more learning and engagement.
4. Use Open-ended tasks (Sullivan, 2011; Pemberton, 2020a) –  These are tasks or problems that have endless possible solutions that contributes to learning. Sullivan (2011) elaborated only two types of open-ended tasks that I believe are greatly essential. These are investigations and content specific tasks. Investigations refers to tasks that let students investigate using different mathematical approaches while content specific tasks are manageable for students and teachers and aligned with a sequential and topic specific curriculum.
5. Use Enabling prompt – a strategy that gives support to students experiencing difficulty throughout a given task (Sullivan, 2011).
6. Incorporate Extending prompt – a strategy that makes students who are ready to go further their learning (Sullivan et al., as cited by Sullivan, 2011)
7. Make use of 'Which One Does Not Belong' task (Pemberton, 2020) – this task makes student explore numerous ways of identifying the odd one out of the set recalling mathematical concepts learned and lets students improve their reasoning skills, as well as communication when asked to share their thoughts of their answer.
8. Follow a mathematics lesson structure (Bobis, Mulligan, & Lowrie; Sullivan et al., as cited by Monteleone, 2014; Sullivan, 2011; Pemberton, 2020b; Russo & Hopkins, 2017) – the format Launch, [Introduce], Explore and Summarise/Review is recommended usually to Australian teachers. This format allows students to foster communication and individual and group responsibilities, utilise students’ reports to the class as learning opportunities, with teacher’s summarisation of key mathematical ideas.
9. Utilise models or representations (Sullivan, 2011) – Having interesting models or representations that illustrate main mathematical principles can provide student engagement. This may be a good aid for visual learners.
10. Differentiate (Sullivan, 2011; Pemberton, 2020) –  Differentiation means having the same curriculum and overall experience to all students but the tasks in which they work with are differentiated. These can happen by doing the general principles of differentiation which are giving challenging tasks, having flexible grouping and doing continuous assessment and adjustment.

References

Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership [AITSL]. (2010). Australian professional standards for teachers. [online document]. Retrieved on 14/05/2020 from https://www.aitsl.edu.au/docs/default-source/national-policy-framework/australian-professional-standards-for-teachers.pdf?sfvrsn=5800f33c_64

Fraser, S. (2012). Authentic childhood: exploring Reggio Emilia in the classroom. Toronto, ON: Nelson Education.

Monteleone, C. (2014). What to do in a good mathematics lesson. Retrieved on 14/05/2020 from Australian Catholic University LEO website https://leo.acu.edu.au/pluginfile.php/3878388/mod_resource/content/1/What%20to%20do%20in%20a%20good%20Mathematics%20lesson%20colour.pdf

Pemberton, M. (2020a). Week 9 Lecture. [PowerPoint slides]. Retrieved on 14/05/2020 from Australian Catholic University LEO website https://leo.acu.edu.au/pluginfile.php/4015810/mod_resource/content/1/Week%209%20Lecture%20EDMA241%20262.mp4

Pemberton, M. (2020b). Week 4 Tutorial. [PowerPoint slides]. Retrieved on 15/05/2020 from Australian Catholic University LEO website

Russo, J., & Hopkins, S. (2017). How does leson structure shape teacher perceptions of teaching with challenging tasks? [online]. Mathematics Teacher Education and Development, 19(1), 30-46. Retrieved on 15/05/2020 from https://search-informit-com-au.ezproxy1.acu.edu.au/fullText;dn=218717;res=AEIPT

Sullivan, P. (2011). Teaching mathematics: using research-informed strategies. Australian Council for Educational Research.