Guided Math in 5B

Guided Math in 5B

I have been interested in Guided Math for a couple of years now but just this year was I able to attend a session in Vermilion with Dr. Nicki Newton. She is amazing and has so much information and the session was wonderful but also overwhelming. We ordered the books which I have read but I was really struggling to implement this in my classroom. I just couldn't wrap my head around no matter how hard I tried. 

After emailing Jackie, I was able to sign up for another session this time with  Christine Michalyshen who works out of Manitoba. She was able to give a bit more of a Canadian spin on guided math plus she works with remote communities with large Indigenous populations which helped me to see how beneficial this would be for our students at Ashmont. 

But still, after both of these sessions and lots of talking Jennine and Carol, I still could not wrap my head around how to implement. Do I spiral curriculum? Do I focus on one concept? How do I keep students accountable? How do I set up rotations? What about resources? What if the kids goof off and play around? What about assessment? What if I do it all wrong? And that internal discourse went on for about a week or two until I was able to go see Guided Math in action in Bonnyville. 

Jackie and I were able to watch a grade 6 class and a grade 5 class. Both teachers did Guided Math in very different yet similar ways. The grade 6 teacher had students in a small group working on algebra and the rest were in partners playing games around number sense. I loved the organization she had for the games and the students had a large variety. One thing that Jackie and I both noticed was the students who were playing the games, didn't really have accountability for what they were doing. We both spoke about that afterwards and said even a quick formative assessment like an exit ticket would be great. Something to show what they learned that day. I do have to add here that the teacher did a fun warm up with vocabulary that the kids loved! It's definitely something I will try out. 

The second class was a grade 5 class that was working on Area and Perimeter. The warm-up was a couple of area and perimeter problems that students solved in their notebooks and then a couple were able to share their answers. The teacher then broke students into groups where one group was doing an area and perimeter game using dice, another group was on Prodigy with an assigned task based on area and perimeter also. The third group was doing independent work and the last group was in a small group with the teacher. Everyone was working on the same concept which was area and perimeter. 

After debriefing with the one teacher and Jackie, I came back with such a better understanding and the biggest "A-ha" moment - There is NO right or wrong way to implement Guided Math. What you need is an understanding of where your students are at and where you want them to be. 

We had been toiling with fractions in 5B and I was feeling frustrated because it felt like I was teaching the same thing over and over again. Nothing was sticking with the students. After coming back from observing, I knew what I needed to do. Assess. 

I had to assess my students. And they moaned and complained because I refused to assist because I needed to see where they really were with understanding fractions. And then I grouped them based on that information. I have four groups. Two are very capable and can perform grade level or above. Two groups are just at or below grade level. 

 The next thing I did was to plan rotations. The number of rotations you can do are limitless but whatever you are doing, it must be meaningful and tied to the curriculum. I do four rotations. The overarching themes stay the same but the activities change within. 

Group 1	Group 2	Group 3	Group 4
Clifford Samson Faith Hannah Beth-Anne	Ethan Chante Andrez Rhea Heaton Charlize	Cade Kayden Katie Taesin Karissa	Aubrey Simone Danielle Doreen Dashaun Kimberly

Math with Teacher	Math with Technology	Math with a Friend	Math by Myself
	Math Playground (go to Google Classroom)	Math Game Is It Equivalent?	Independent work
Group 1 Group 4	Group 4 Group 3	Group 3 Group 2	Group 2 Group 1

So each group does one rotation for a regular period. I try to make sure that the group doing Independent Work has been with me for a session of small group teaching and then this reinforces the concept. The Math with Technology, I set up on Google Classroom. I find appropriate activities online that, again, reinforce the concepts I want them to be learning. 2Learn, NCTM Illumination, Math Playground and Prodigy all have good resources. I would LOVE to have Gizmos but it's so pricey that it's out of my budget (hint hint to the powers that be). 

Math with a Friend is one that I actually like planning for. I have a Vocabulary Kaboom game that the kids LOVE and then I use our K-5 Math Resources to find games that the again, reinforce the skill I want them to be learning. 

Vocabulary Kaboom!

So how is it working?

Well, a couple weeks ago, I was frustrated and worried that I wasn't going to send these grade 5's to grade 6 prepared and understanding fractions. Last week, we crushed Mixed and Improper Fractions. This week, we have knocked Equivalent Fractions out of the park. Next week.... We are going to do the Skittles Lab which will bring Decimals, Percents and Fractions all together. 

My students have jumped right into Guided Math with me. They love getting time in a small group with me. They love the game aspect of it. They love being able to work with each other. It is my favourite part of the day. And the students have told me they feel they like this way so much more! Heaton told me yesterday that he used to hate math but now he really loves it because he is able to really get the concepts and practice them. 

I'm also going to let you all in on a secret regarding Guided Math. While I spend time digging in my toolbox for resources that are meaningful, the amount of planning I do seems to have shrunk. Where before, I knew what to teach but then I had to reteach because kids were not getting it or there were other issues. Now I'm finding that I'm planning a four day stretch. Once I have the Math with Technology and Math with a Friend done, I really hone in and go after the small group instruction and independent work aspect. Because the focus is so precise with this, the amount of time I spend planning seems to be less and it's way more effective! 

If you are at all interested in coming by to see what is happening in 5B, please let me know and I'll gladly move things around to accomodate teachers! 

3D Pens and Printer in Math

3D Printing Tech in Math Centers

Today in our math Centers, we used our 3D pens to practice doing transformations. The kids used task cards to identify what transformation they  needed to complete, and then used the 3D pens to draw the shapes. It was a really low-prep activity, but the kids loved using the pens and were really engaged in practicing their translations, rotations and reflections. 

We have also been using our 3D printer to create math manipulatives. This week, we made fraction dice. I just found the design online and then downloaded it- it's amazing what you can find for free online! But students can also use a program called tinkercad to design their own prints. This is something we will work more on during some of the down-time near the end of the year. The design program makes use of many mathematical concepts, such as angles, measurement, 2D and 3D shapes, transformations of shapes, spatial reasoning and so much more! 

6A Best Practices--Using Technology in Math

3 h)  Teachers apply a variety of technologies to meet students' learning needs.

This year 6A has been exploring a variety of technologies, including the use of Ozobots.  Ozobots are mini robots that are coded using colour combinations.  These codes can be done using markers or using and iPad app.  Students are quite fascinated with them because they are able to follow the tracks they make using markers.  Even more exciting, the Ozobot can be coded to perform different actions like spinning and going backwards.

We use centers in 6A as a means of spiraling the curriculum.  Ozobots are a great way to explore angles in the math curriculum.  This past week, students were challenged to create a race track that had different requirements, among them the use of different types of angles.  At the end of the math block, the students would line up their tracks and race their Ozobots.

This task had a variety of purposes--

• to review types of angles
• to code using colour blocks with the Ozobot
• to work together as a groups to plan and execute the drawing of a race track that meets the criteria within the designated time limit
• to problem solve (inevitably the students will have to work out something...tech never goes according to plan)!

The students were actively engaged and when circulating it was great to hear the use of math vocabulary throughout the room.  Most groups worked well together, but one group struggled to communicate and discovered that as a result, their track and codes were not as effective as the other groups.  Also, in having a debrief after, we talked about how we could modify the assignment and what changes they would make.  For example, one group had not fulfilled all the requirements and they might get a time penalty or delayed start if that happened again.  In a couple weeks this challenge will resurface in center time
and we will implement the suggestions of the students.

1A Best Practices - Joyful Interventions

KSA: 3i) Teachers gather and use information about students’ learning needs and progress.

Back in October I attended the "Joyful Interventions" literacy summit in Calgary. After attending this summit, I was motivated to make some changes, and decided to start with my literacy block practices. Prior to attending this summit, I had my groups sorted by ability, and student's would filter through various EA led centers that were not necessarily tailored to my student's specific needs, but rather "busy work" centers that allowed me to conduct a guided reading lesson with a small group. Although the students were in fact doing literacy activities, they weren't necessarily designed to help them improve in the areas they were needing to work on.

Before I could implement "Joyful Interventions" in my classroom, I needed to collect data. I started off with re-assessing all of my students on their alphabet knowledge. According to the "program", a student has not yet mastered their alphabet until they can; name upper case and lower case letters, produce letter sounds, produce a word beginning with the letter/sound, and is able to find the letter in text. So I retested each student and recorded my data. (A fully coloured in circle shows mastery, half circles means they either have the name or sound mastered, but not both). Here's a sample of the data from back in November.

For the student's who had their alphabet mastered, I tested them on the fry's sight word lists (At the time, I only had 5 students out of 16 who had their alphabet fully mastered). Using this data, I made each student 5 flash cards. Each flash card had either an alphabet letter or a sight word printed on it that they had not yet mastered. I put each student's flash cards into a bag with their name on it, and filed them in their books bins. During literacy block, my students would filter through 3 different "joyful" centres that allowed them to practice the alphabet sounds/letters and/or sight words from their bags. The student's were split up in mixed ability groups, but were all doing the same activity, just with different alphabet letters or sight words. For a while, the 3 different centres I had going were; rainbow writing (printing alphabet letters or words repeatedly in the rainbow arches using different colours), wikki stick writing, and letter magnets. The EA running the centre would ask the students who were working on their alphabet to tell them the name of the letter, the sound the letter makes, to produce a word that starts with that letter, and to identify that letter in text. The students working on sight words would read the word to the EA, and have to produce a sentence containing that word. After two weeks of working on these words or sounds, I would retest all students and again, record the data. If that word or letter was mastered, they would move on to new flash cards. If not, they would repeat those words or letters for another two weeks.

With the exception of a few, most students master all 5 of their words or alphabet letters at the end of the 2 week period. The students are often eager to sit with me when it comes time to retest them, as they are often really excited to show off what they know. All but 2 of my students are now working on their sight words. I just recently changed the "Joyful" centres, and have the students; using playdoh to write their words or letters, playing "roll it, write it" with their words or letters, and writing sentences using their words or letters.

I've only implemented the "Joyful Interventions" program during my literacy block, but I am excited to explore it further next year as I've truly seen some great results.

Great Literacy Resources

Great Literacy Resources

When the Division One teachers did the RSST training with Lana earlier this year she shared The Florida Center for Reading Research site. It is full of amazing, high-quality literacy resources. There's great phonemic awareness, phonics, vocabulary, and comprehension activities and resources on it for grades K-5 (I'm assuming it largely aligns with the Common Core, so I'm sure grade six will find these really useful, too). 

Check it out for some great Guided Reading and other activities! 

http://www.fcrr.org/resources/resources_sca_2-3.html

6B Best Practices

3. A teacher applies a current and comprehensive repertoire of effective planning, instruction, and assessment practices to meet the learning needs of every student. 

In my classroom this year, more than half of my class is reading at or below a third-grade level.  As we all know, this presents many challenges when it comes delivering grade level curriculum in science and social and then meaningfully assessing what the students know without their reading levels hindering their ability to share their knowledge. One of the ways I have differentiated my teaching and assessment is through the integration of a variety of technology tools (I'm sure that is a shocker!)

More Tech Tools & Ideas from Jennine!

With all the create tech tools out there for text to speech, I still haven't found anything that will read Google Slides to students. I often use Google Slides within projects as another way to give students information for their research. To get around this gap, I use a Google Chrome extension called "Screencastify" to make videos of myself reading the slides. The reason this extension is preferable over some of the others that exist is its ability to import the videos directly into Google Drive. So using the webcam, I record a video of myself reading each slide (with a sticky note over the camera so it just shows up as a solid color), and then I insert the video on the corresponding slide. I then go into the video settings and set the video to auto-play in presentation mode. This means that when the students open up the presentation, the recording will play automatically without them having to do anything special. Adding these recordings allows students to access the information whenever they need it, and without their reading ability getting in the way of their capacity to learn the social or science content. 

Here is an example of an automatically reading slide deck: 

The second thing that I do is put my assessments in Google Forms. Using an extension called "Select and Speak", students can highlight the questions and have it read to them. For chunks of text that are an image (We use a lot of past PAT questions to help prepare students), I will insert a youtube video of me reading into the quiz. An added bonus of using Forms is that it has the ability to be set into "quiz mode" now, and if you set up your assessment properly, it will grade all your multiple choice questions automatically for you, which you can then open in sheets and print out for your assessment binders. Below is an example of an assessment that includes a youtube video for one of the questions. 

One last example...
Below is what is called a hyperdoc- (Melanie and I are the founding members of the hyperdoc fan club down in the boonies) Hyperdocs are a great learning tool that I love to utilize in my classroom because they allow students to work through the content at their own pace, and the kids find them really engaging. This is also an example of how I use the slide decks with the recordings in my classroom to differentiate the learning for students. 

Other accessibility tools that I find helpful for students are

• Voice typing in Google Docs
• Kaizena in Docs for leaving voice feedback- Great tool!
• Read and Write Gold for reading their documents to them (And Read and Write for Google Chrome)
• Select & Speak Extension
• Announcify: Cleans up the website and removes distractions so it is easier for kids to read. 

6C Best Practice: Stand up Problem Solving

TQS Connection:
 i) there are many approaches to teaching and learning. They know a broad range of instructional strategies appropriate to their area of specialization and the subject discipline they teach, and know which strategies are appropriate to help different students achieve different outcomes

In my classroom last year I really focused on math and how to engage students in the lessons through dynamic openers and various activities. This year I have added in math centers and math fluency but I am very pleased with how my stand up problem solving has been refined. This has allowed all my students to feel successful at one aspect of math.