The purpose of this blog is to document our Professional Learning sessions.
Showing posts with label Maths. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Maths. Show all posts
Monday, 13 February 2023
Tuesday, 17 May 2022
Maths Moderation and Number Grids
This idea comes from Ruth Merttens. If we are consistent with this across the school, then students will have a good representation of patterns with numbers and place value.
We finished the session with making OTJs on 2 students (5 and 6E)
We use these tools when moderating:
Assessment for planning (learning lines/ used to be called Sally lines)
Base Maths Concepts: https://lpf.mathsnz.com/ loosely linked to stages. The framework, descriptors, big ideas and illustrations / exemplars are from the Ministry of Education.
Monday, 24 August 2020
Sunday, 15 March 2020
Leading PLD- Leading Student Agency by demonstrating Teacher Agency
Effective PLD:
● Links to identified student needs and learning outcomes
The 3 big drivers for 2020 are Positive Education, Sustainability and Te Ao Māori. All 3 intersect and all 3 will receive the same time and attention. Additionally all 3 will have a team of staff driving the components, based on passion, knowledge/ expertise.
End of 2019 data in reading, writing and maths will determine TAI and help fine tune PLD.
As well as ongoing assessment for learning and tracking progress against annual targets the science curriculum will be reviewed to determine effectiveness. The science curriculum also has strong links to Sustainability and Te Ao Māori.
The PE/ Health curriculum, with it’s close relationship to Positive Education will also be timely to review.
The Wellbeing and Te Ao Māori goals link directly to the umbrella goals of the Kāhui Ako
● Links to identified student needs and learning outcomes
● Integrates knowledge and skills
● Operates within a learning community and culture of trust
● Offers sustained, multiple opportunities to learn (= TIME)
● Is collaborative, shared, collegial
● Active role taken by leaders
● Is inquiry-based
● Operates within a learning community and culture of trust
● Offers sustained, multiple opportunities to learn (= TIME)
● Is collaborative, shared, collegial
● Active role taken by leaders
● Is inquiry-based
CONTEXT from Staff Business Plan 2020
The 3 big drivers for 2020 are Positive Education, Sustainability and Te Ao Māori. All 3 intersect and all 3 will receive the same time and attention. Additionally all 3 will have a team of staff driving the components, based on passion, knowledge/ expertise.
End of 2019 data in reading, writing and maths will determine TAI and help fine tune PLD.
As well as ongoing assessment for learning and tracking progress against annual targets the science curriculum will be reviewed to determine effectiveness. The science curriculum also has strong links to Sustainability and Te Ao Māori.
The PE/ Health curriculum, with it’s close relationship to Positive Education will also be timely to review.
The Wellbeing and Te Ao Māori goals link directly to the umbrella goals of the Kāhui Ako
We got into our PLD groups and started to brainstorm initial ideas.
Monday, 24 February 2020
Targets and what next... Teacher Agency
Planning and next steps for target groups.
We completed an activity in teams around Effective Literacy and Numeracy practice - Big picture planning
Senior Team:
Junior Team:
We know our target students and are shaping our programmes to meet the needs of our learners. PLD for 2020 will come from what our students need. We want to lead Student Agency by modelling Teacher Agency.
We completed an activity in teams around Effective Literacy and Numeracy practice - Big picture planning
Senior Team:
Monday, 19 August 2019
Number Talks Planning and Discourse
We have set goals around our levels of discourse in the Maths Classroom. We will come back to these at team meetings on September 4th.
Monday, 11 March 2019
Sunday, 10 March 2019
Talk Moves
Learning Questions:
How can we (teachers) use Talk Moves to generate rich discussion?
How can using Talk Moves (students) improve understanding of Mathematics?
Talk Moves-
What teachers are doing? What students are doing?
Nic: Explain 5 talk moves. Have discussion with group. Everyone has copy of sheet.
Ximena: Number Talk
Introduce progression line
Unpack
What would teachers be doing? What would students be doing?
Select one or two things that you would like to do/ practise before next session. Stretch goal: Can you use these with the kids?
Wednesday, 21 November 2018
Celebration of Maths TAI and where to next...
On 5th November, we all shared our Teacher Inquiries in small groups.
Autahi
Using materials to build up number sense
Numeral ID connected to making and breaking numbers
Problem solving with materials
Building around fun contexts
Tautoru
Number Talks
Opportunities to collaborate across groups
Talk Moves- Discussions
Collaborate in different ways
Using more Seesaw reflections with oral reflections (rotate)
Identify those lacking in confidence and give them a chance to develop confidence and status using growth mindset activities.
Using reflective tools like Blob Tree.
Using visuals and materials consistently access freely.
Investigative maths play time (e.g. different activities to choose from).
Matariki/ Mahutonga
Check number sense of learners and respond with programme based around the use of materials.
Entrench Dylan Wiliam’s messages about formative assessment. I
Conferencing oral and immediate while ‘roaming’. Immediate Teacher feedback
Helping Circle in Maths
Building collaboration
Building a community of Inquiry for problem solving
Mistake detectives/ Error spotters
Getting students to do the work- going back to check mistake
We need to give students opportunity to look at own work.
Developing proofs
Entrench Maths Talk Moves
Raising the status of students
Monday, 15 October 2018
I am Powerful and Planning for Triples
We discussed the I am Powerful Wellbeing and Documentation:
We also planned for our triples and checked in with our TAIs.
Monday, 24 September 2018
Ulearn Presentation: Developing Mathematical Communities of Inquiry by Nic and Ximena
Nicola and Ximena shared their Ulearn presentation with the staff.
Tuesday, 18 September 2018
Parent Evening Planning- Tues 11th Sept and Mon 17th September
We started Tuesday with a reading from Scott and Ximena:
We begun to plan for our parent evening in our teams.
Word cloud (Ximena, QR Code or Tiny URL)
When you were at school, what did Maths mean for you?
Sorting into 4 groups (Suz)
Jude introduction
4 workshop rotation:
In last rotation parents answer question: For your children, what does Maths learning look like at Worser Bay?
Thanks Suz for Pos Ed starter:
We connected to Ranginui and Papatūanuku through our Pos Ed Started today :-)
The Five Ways to Wellbeing will help inspire and motivate your students to:
Connect with Ranginui/Sky Father and Papatūānuku/Earth Mother
Keep Learning about and Māori ancestral knowledge and our New Zealand history
Take Notice of the natural world and everything within it, including ourselves.
Monday, 3 September 2018
Exploration of Mathematical Ideas
PPI: Savouring through capitalising
Share a standout positive experience of yours with someone else.
In doing so, provide specific detail about the event and how you felt with the aim of generating and reliving that positive experience.
Here are the slides from today's session:
Anna and Gillian shared Number Talks Build Numerical Reasoning
Strengthen accuracy, efficiency and flexibility with these mental math and computation strategies
By Sherry D. Parrish
We also begun to plan for our parent evening in Week 9: Planning Doc We will have some more time on Tuesday.
Share a standout positive experience of yours with someone else.
In doing so, provide specific detail about the event and how you felt with the aim of generating and reliving that positive experience.
Here are the slides from today's session:
Anna and Gillian shared Number Talks Build Numerical Reasoning
Strengthen accuracy, efficiency and flexibility with these mental math and computation strategies
By Sherry D. Parrish
We also begun to plan for our parent evening in Week 9: Planning Doc We will have some more time on Tuesday.
Thursday, 30 August 2018
Maths PLD: Formative Assessment continued...
Carl: Starter (Philosophy for Children Discussion about Artificial Intelligence)
Therese and James: Shared Reading about Cultural Responsiveness/ Maths
We reflected on our Seesaw Goals and discussed what we have achieved. Where to next? with a Maths focus.
Exit/ Entry tickets. We spend some time in teams making, discussing, etc.
Therese and James: Shared Reading about Cultural Responsiveness/ Maths
We reflected on our Seesaw Goals and discussed what we have achieved. Where to next? with a Maths focus.
Exit/ Entry tickets. We spend some time in teams making, discussing, etc.
How can we use these as formative assessment? Seesaw Maths Folder
We also looked at Assessment Strategies 10 ideas (beyond exit tickets)
A bit of thinking for homework…
We are thinking about the Parents meeting in week 9.
What are your ideas? What do parents need to know? What do we want them to take away? What worked well at the last meeting? How can we bring your culture/ home culture/ lives into Maths?
We also looked at Assessment Strategies 10 ideas (beyond exit tickets)
A bit of thinking for homework…
We are thinking about the Parents meeting in week 9.
What are your ideas? What do parents need to know? What do we want them to take away? What worked well at the last meeting? How can we bring your culture/ home culture/ lives into Maths?
Monday, 20 August 2018
Maths: Talk Moves and Formative Assessment
We started the session with a Number Talk. We worked in groups to discuss the benefits of Talk Moves as a way to elicit student thinking.
Monday, 13 August 2018
Maths PLD: Talk in the Classroom
MATHS Reading Term 3 2018: How to get Students Talking!
Reading presented by John and Carl
Definition of discourse .
……….ways of representing, thinking, talking, agreeing, and disagreeing; the way ideas are exchanged and what the ideas entail; and as being shaped by the tasks in which students engage as well as by the nature of the learning environment. It is not a natural way that children interact and thus has to be modelled and practised.
Garcia goes on to say...
that one way to deepen conceptual understanding is through the communication students have around concepts, strategies, and representations.
Five Teaching Practices for Improving the Quality of Discourse in Mathematics Classrooms
1) Talk moves that engage students in discourse,
2) The art of questioning,
3) Using student thinking to propel discussions,
4) Setting up a supportive environment, and
5) Orchestrating the discourse.
Talk Moves:
Questioning: Questions which promote reasoning might include…..
How did you reach that conclusion?
Does that make sense?
Can you make a model and show that?”
Does that always work?
Is that true for all cases?
Can you think of a counterexample?
How could you prove that.
This discourse helps to extend thinking and engage all learners in discussion around proving an answer is correct.
Questions which promote Problem solving, inventing etc.
What would happen if?
Do you see a pattern?
Can you predict the next one?
What about the last one?
Finally, teachers use questions to
Questions which connect Mathematical ideas….
How does this relate to . . .?
What ideas that we have learned were useful in solving this problem?
Student Thinking Propels Discussion:
Discussion demands that students summarize and synthesize the mathematics they are learning
student thinking is a critical element of mathematical discourse.
misconceptions are made clearer to both teacher and student,
conceptual and procedural knowledge deepens.
Mistakes and misconceptions are considered and enable students to challenge their own thinking and the thinking of others
Environment
Physical, students facing each other
UDL
Emotional, a safe environment where students can challenge each other
The focus is the person who is talking and being listened to.
Orchestrating the Discourse
The teacher like a conductor
Five Practices Model
The Five Practices Model
The teacher’s role is to:
1) anticipate student responses to challenging mathematical tasks;
2) monitor students’ work on and engagement with the tasks;
3) select particular students to present their mathematical work;
4) sequence the student responses that will be displayed in specific order
5) connect different students’ responses and connect the responses to key mathematical ideas.
6) Hold students accountable to their ideas and keep discussion on track.
Modelling the behaviours necessary to make it work
Explicit teaching of the necessary behaviours
Modelling the language, eg. I expect to hear you discussing vertices, faces etc.
Modelland describe how they need to be listening to each other
Use goal setting and reflection for students to track their learning
Make the students do the work
Concluding:
Maths Teachers must decide what to pursue in depth, when and how to attach mathematical notation and language to students’ ideas, when to provide information, when to clarify an issue, when to model, when to lead, and when to let a student struggle with difficulty, and how to encourage each student to participate.
Students that are encouraged to share their thinking and engage in mathematical debates are furthering their own knowledge and challenging misconceptions.
The whole Article
Five Practices Model
The Five Practices Model
The teacher’s role is to:
1) anticipate student responses to challenging mathematical tasks;
2) monitor students’ work on and engagement with the tasks;
3) select particular students to present their mathematical work;
4) sequence the student responses that will be displayed in specific order
5) connect different students’ responses and connect the responses to key mathematical ideas.
6) Hold students accountable to their ideas and keep discussion on track.
Modelling the behaviours necessary to make it work
Explicit teaching of the necessary behaviours
Modelling the language, eg. I expect to hear you discussing vertices, faces etc.
Modelland describe how they need to be listening to each other
Use goal setting and reflection for students to track their learning
Make the students do the work
Concluding:
Maths Teachers must decide what to pursue in depth, when and how to attach mathematical notation and language to students’ ideas, when to provide information, when to clarify an issue, when to model, when to lead, and when to let a student struggle with difficulty, and how to encourage each student to participate.
Students that are encouraged to share their thinking and engage in mathematical debates are furthering their own knowledge and challenging misconceptions.
The whole Article
Monday, 6 August 2018
Maths PLD: Moderation and Assessment
We looked at types of assessment and categorised them.
Matariki/ Mahutonga:
Tautoru:
Autahi:
We discussed these questions/ ideas about assessment...
Friday, 3 August 2018
Maths Triples Planning
We will be starting our Maths sessions with something that has been been going well in our Maths lessons. We started with this today.
Our TAIs and Triples with fit in with one or more of the hunches that we developed together in session 1:
- Some of our students do not like Maths (girls…) Attitudes to Maths have a huge impact on achievement. (Girls, Societal/parental messaging, stereotypes etc.) Some students lack engagement in Maths (have little connection to the relevance, application, beauty of Maths) parent community don’t understand current approach to maths Teaching/learning.
- Developing discourse in Maths will have an impact on student achievement. Discourse in Maths is less rich than in Literacy. Including unpacking the meaning of Maths vocab and ideas.
- Formative assessment practices need to be enhanced in order to capture and track achievement day to day. How can assessment procedures align with teaching and learning. How can stress be removed from assessment?
- Many students lack Number Sense (as a result of abstract nature of Maths teaching,procedural learning in Maths?)
- Students in Maths are less likely to be in ‘Flow’, an investigative/Inquiry cycle would bring more meaning?
In our triples teams we shared our planning.
Critical Questions for our Triples Discussion:
How will/might this learning impact on achievement for your Target students?
What are you investigating in Maths? What hunch is this connected to?
How does this plan/lesson connect to your TAI?
What are the innovations you are trialling?
What are the desired outcomes for learners?
How do you think the action you have selected going to impact?
What are the desired effects for your practice?
What are the shifts in your practice you are working towards?
What will this mean for you? How will that make you feel if you achieved these?
Reading for Monday (in reference to triples): Maths: Accountable Talk Ain't just for kids
"How often and how deeply do teachers, coaches, principals or district supervisors explicate their reasoning and hold it out for scrutiny by the professional community? How often do we speak up, ask questions, challenge assumptions and dig deep when it comes to questioning our practice and beliefs? How many of us avoid these behaviours for fear of offending someone or being seen as resistant or difficult? When people around us do question our beliefs or practice, how many of us receive these questions with an open mind and an inquiry stance?"
Monday, 30 July 2018
Maths PLD: Overview, 1st July 2018
Imagine you are going to a Maths conference: What are the titles of the workshops you will go to?

We are all working through the Stanford Online Jo Boaler Course: How to teach Math. Here is a summary of what we have implemented so far.
Matariki/ Mahutonga
We are all working through the Stanford Online Jo Boaler Course: How to teach Math. Here is a summary of what we have implemented so far.
Matariki/ Mahutonga
Monday, 29 January 2018
Teacher Only Day 1: TED Talks
Welcome back everyone! A new and exciting year for lots of growth and learning...
Today we all had a chance to share a TED-type talk with each other- anything goes under 'Educating for the Future'
Jude started the day with a session called Know thyself and be thyself where we were able to explore our passions in our personal and professional lives and how we can use these in our teams.
Nicola and Ximena spoke about Number Talks and how this has a big impact on student outcomes.

Steph shared ideas about communication and how we connect with our parents- not always easy!
Today we all had a chance to share a TED-type talk with each other- anything goes under 'Educating for the Future'
Jude started the day with a session called Know thyself and be thyself where we were able to explore our passions in our personal and professional lives and how we can use these in our teams.
Nicola and Ximena spoke about Number Talks and how this has a big impact on student outcomes.
Gabrielle spoke to us all about resilience and how we can teach this to our students.
Susie talked about Positive Purpose, what she has been researching and how she has been focusing on this when working with her students in Tautoru.
Anna discussed the importance of getting students moving. You can read her notes here.
Cloe spoke about the changes that she has been making, moving away from a traditional way of teaching to a focus on Positive education. She compared this process to Metamorphosis.
Suz shared the learning that she has done with David Keane and how this has helped her to be present in her professional and personal life and the importance of working in Quadrant 2.
Hayley spoke about ‘Heroic Recovery’ and the benefits of working together to try new things accept challenges and reflect together.
John talked us through the model of the Hero's Journey and how students can relate to the characters.
Gillian talked about the importance of language. She said, "I spoke about the power of language, looking at both our internal and external language. I looked at the power of the words we think to create our realities and the words we speak to affect those around us. With little words like yet, we can change a statement from one of despair, "I can't do it," to one of hope "I can't do it yet!" The words we speak can change our mindsets and those around us. Let's use our words to make better worlds for ourselves and for our learners!"
Scott shared his thoughts about the Environment and why it is important that our learners take action!
Therese and James (Masters of Teaching and Learning students) spoke about teachers and people who inspired them connecting this to what kind of teachers they would like to be in the classroom.
Shona showed us some valuable resources for students for English Language Learners:
Steph shared ideas about communication and how we connect with our parents- not always easy!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)










