Mathematical Mindsets Impact [#MTBoSBlaugust]

It's #MTBoSBlaugust 2016!  I'm challenging myself to blog daily throughout August, and you can too.  Join the fun!

 
This summer, I finally got around to reading Mathematical Mindsets by Jo Boaler.  This book really needs to be required reading for anyone (elementary or secondary) that is teaching math.  If you haven't read it yet, there are a ton of summaries on other blogs.  (I have been avoiding them like the plague while reading the book for myself, but now I'm excited to read them.)  Keeping that in mind, today I'm blogging about the changes that I will make in my instruction as a result of this book.

• "When we teach students that mistakes are positive, it has an incredibly liberating effect on them." (page 15) - Jo Boaler suggested highlighting your favorite mistakes that students make.  The focus should be on conceptual errors.  What you do is share the mistake with the class and discuss where it came from and why it's a mistake.  You can also ask students to share their mistakes on the board.  I love this idea!  It reinforces a growth mindset, and changes the negative connotation of mistakes by valuing them as an additional learning experience.
• "I strongly believe that if school math classrooms presented the true nature of the discipline, we would not have this nationwide dislike of math and widespread math underachievement." (page 22) - Students need to discuss mathematics together.  I now see it as a critical component of math instruction, and not as an additive.  I really want to make discussions a daily practice. 
• Teach definitions with examples and non-examples.  There is so much new vocabulary in Geometry that this tip needs to used.  Jo Boaler says to give multiple examples, including some that barely meet the criteria, and to include non-examples so students have a more thorough understanding of the word.  The first instance where I can see using this method is teaching angles formed by parallel lines.  The diagram always looks the same, and then when it doesn't, students are lost.
• "One of the very best things we can do for students is to help them develop mathematical mindsets, whereby they believe that mathematics is about thinking, sense making, big ideas, and connections - not about the memorization of methods." (page 47) - I always gave students homework that included a challenge question, but this question was rarely completed or even attempted beyond reading the problem.  One suggestion (if you give homework at all) is to assign reflection questions for homework.  I will definitely be incorporating this.  I also plan on assigning 1 - 3 basic questions each night (depending on the type of homework assignment it could be more - for example if I was doing a matching assignment it would have to be more than 3 questions).  So after answering the questions, students will have a reflection question to answer about the day's work. 
• I want to incorporate the number talks that Jo Boaler described into my Do Now repertoire.  I think it will be especially beneficial for my SAT Prep class because we need to develop our mental math skills and number sense for the no-calculator section of the exam.
• I'm excited to give students an applied problem to work on before we learn the method.  I'm hoping that students will be intrinsically motivated to learn.  I have done this once or twice before, but it was not as intentional.  (Hey Geometry teachers, where do you find your applied problems?)
• "No one is good at all of these ways of working, but everyone is good at some of them."  (page 121) - This year, I am going to have students sitting in groups.  I like the suggestion for group roles on page 132.  I want to incorporate these into my student groups.  I would also like to read "Designing Groupwork" as Sarah has suggested, but I think that will have to wait until after the school year has begun. 

There are other smaller changes I would like to incorporate in my instruction, but these will be main focus for this coming year.  In the next few weeks I will write goals that reflect the changes I want to make.  Stay tuned.

#GAFESummit Reflection

Monday was my first official day of summer.  It also happened to be the day that my school was hosting its first ever #GAFESummit.  The GAFE Summit is a day of training in Google Apps For Education provided by the Ed Tech Team.  If you ever have the opportunity to attend a GAFE Summit, I strong recommend going.

We had four sessions to fill our day.  My first session was dedicated to using Google Calendar.  If you haven't figured it out by now, my school uses Google apps for just about everything.  We've been using Google Calendar ever since I started working there, but I never totally understood how it worked.  I was always worried that if I added my own appointments on the calendar it would appear for the whole school to see, or that if I made a change it would mess things up for the whole school.  I learned to make new calendars for my own purposes.  I made a calendar for all of my appointments, etc. to help me keep track of what I've done for my evaluation.  I made calendars for all of my classes.  I shared these calendars with my co-teacher so we can stay on the same page of what is being taught and when.  I have a Google Site for my Regents Geometry class, and I figured out how to embed the calendar for that class into my website.  I plan on keeping track of lessons, homework, and tests on the calendar.  It will be helpful to both students and parents.  We also learned how to create appointment slots so others can sign up for time on your calendar.  I cannot see actually using this strategy just yet though.  The Google Calendar session was my favorite by far.

My second session was on how to "Save Time with Google Extensions".  I've known about extensions from a conference I previously attended, but was hoping to learn about some new ones.  (FYI:  Google Extensions are add-ons for your Google Chrome browser.)
The five main suggested extensions are:

• Google Dictionary, 
• Google Docs Quick Create, 
• Share to Google Classroom, 
• Ad Block Plus, and 
• Google Calendar Chrome Extension

Here are some of the other extensions I'm excited to try:

• Nimbus Screenshot and Screencast, 
• goo.gl URL Shortner, 
• Google Translate, and
• Honey (an online shopping app)

My third session was "Supporting Community with Google".  I was really excited for this session, but was disappointed by the fact that my school does not have 2 of the 4 methods enabled.
The four ways to use Google to reach out to communities are through:

• Google+ Communities (It's the Google version of a social network)
• Google Groups (Communicate with groups that you arrange)
• Google Sites (I already have this set up, and I love using it.  I just wish my students would use it as often)
• Google Spaces (I don't know much about this because we weren't able to access it during the session)

I'm really interested in using Google+, but since it's a lesser used social network, I am considering creating a class Twitter or Instagram to share what's going on in class with parents.  Our presenter told us about how much his parents love when he posts photos of what they did that day.  The benefit of Google+ is that it is monitored by our district, so I wouldn't have anything major to worry about.  It is also a more professional platform, in my opinion.  Using Twitter or Instagram is easier for students/parents to access, but is a little nerve-wracking because it is not a website that the district can monitor.  I would have to worry about interactions on those sites with parents or students, especially those that can happen "privately".  To be honest, I'm not sure exactly what I am afraid of, but it was beaten into me during my undergrad that you cannot interact with students and parents on social media.  I would have to have a discussion with my administration if I wanted to pursue this.

My fourth session was dedicated to using Google Search.  We learned all kinds of shortcuts to find what we are really looking for when we search.  It was very informative, but really did not need a full hour dedicated to the topic.

My only gripe is that I feel I missed so much by not being able to attend every session.  I'm hoping my school is able to host again in the future so I can learn more.  I didn't get to attend any of the Google Classroom sessions, and I really want to learn about using Google Classroom.

The day ended with a Demo Slam.  Each presenter had a 3 minute time limit to show how to use an app or an extension.  I loved the demo slam.  In less than 15 minutes we learned about creating an animation with Google Photos, how to use Google Keep, how to eliminate choices in Google Forms (after it has been selected a certain number of times), and more.

Overall it was an awesome way to spend a day, and a great start to a productive summer.

Never Work Harder Than Your Students Takeaways

I finished the second book on my summer reading list recently.  If you aren't familiar with the book, there are seven principles that the author walks you through, and "Never Work Harder Than Your Students" is just one of them.  (I felt that the title was misleading.  I had completely different expectations for this book based on the title.)

I'm going to be honest.  While reading the first two chapters, I absolutely hated the book.  I didn't feel like I was getting anything out of the book that was really helpful.  Then I got to chapter 3, and I pretty much felt that my life as a teacher had changed.

The third principle is "Expect to Get Your Students There."  In this principle, the author referenced all of the famous teaching stories we've seen in movies.  It is always assumed by the viewer that because the teacher believed in the students, the students were able to perform above everyone else's expectations.  It also reminds me of the classic story that a teacher was told her class was all of the smartest kids when it was really a class where the kids all had learning deficits, and because she expected them to be able to do things that smart kids could do, they did.  The author suggests that the reason these teachers were able to do amazing things with challenging groups of students was because they believed in their abilities as a teacher.  For me, this principle shifts the power.  It's not their abilities that I have to believe in (and really this comes out to hoping), but my abilities.  I'm hoping that a "fake it 'til you make it" approach will suffice until I'm truly confident in my teaching abilities.

The exercise the author suggested was listing your strengths as a teacher.  For me, I listed that I'm caring, intelligent, enthusiastic, a role model, honest, and organized.  As I'm writing this, I realize that I also need to add reflective. ;)  Then list the challenges your students have.  I listed that we are in a small school where there is a lack of resources, students come from difficult home situations, students are (seemingly) apathetic, many students are living in poverty, and they lack the skills necessary to be successful right away.  Then you have to ask yourself, "are my teaching strengths enough to overcome the challenges I face?"  I feel absolutely empowered by this revelation.  If there is something that you feel you do not have the skills to address, then seek out the help you need to acquire that skill.  For me, I'm going to work on student engagement and motivation.

The rest of the book had good information too.  I plan to refer back to it throughout the year.  The thing is that there is SO MUCH information, that it is overwhelming.  The point is to implement one principle at a time.  I'll try to do this throughout the school year.  (Right now I'm thinking that I'll implement some of the planning ideas, and then after a few weeks into the school year I will be able to start actively making changes.)

My Summer Reading List

On my list of things to do this summer is READING.  I'm so excited to finally have more time to read, both for professional development and for fun.

First on the list is Mindset by Carol S. Dweck.  I just finished this one, and it was great.  I highly recommend it.  To be honest though, I skipped the chapters on sports and business.  I read the chapter on relationships because I thought it would be helpful to teachers, but you could just as easily skip it as well.  I find that the great challenge is in applying what I've learned because this book is not spelled out for teachers.

The next book I plan on reading is Never Work Harder Than Your Students by Robyn R. Jackson.  I remember this being one of the most buzzed about books a few years ago, but as a new teacher I had other things to focus on first.  This summer I'm ready to finally read it.

While shopping for the two books above, I found Accessible Mathematics by Steven Leinwand under the recommendations.  It's subtitle is "10 Instructional Shifts That Raise Student Achievement."  One of my goals for this summer is to work on my methods for improving student achievement, and this one targets math specifically.

I found Teaching Smarter at Barnes and Noble while looking for another book that I will mention next.  The book promises to present "simple ways you can help kids get higher grades and test scores and be more engaged in school - all while streamlining your work as a teacher."  I might be saving this book for last to make sure I remember everything for the up-coming school year.

The fifth book (not pictured) is Total Participation Techniques by Persida Himmele and William Himmele.  I found out about this book through ASCD and thought it would help with my second goal of improving my classroom engagement.  I tried to find this book in two different Barnes and Noble stores, but I had to order it on Amazon.

Note:  All book titles are linked to their listings on Amazon if you would like more information about them.  Or if you would like to purchase these book, however I am not trying to sell anything.

My Teach Like a Pirate Thoughts

I began typing the following post this past winter.  I'm just getting around to finishing it now.  I have since finished reading the book, and I do recommend reading it if you haven't yet.