Marea Channel
Mathematics Resource Teacher
Los Angeles Systemic Initiative, LAUSD
Van Nuys Math, Science, Technology Center
What's different about the rapidly changing world of mathematics in elementary classrooms? A great deal. Teachers are reading literature books to their students and children are playing with blocks. It looks like an art class, and kids are talking so it's noisy. Students are writing; they're even using overhead projectors.
By reading counting books such as Anno's Counting House and Donald Crews's Ten Black Dots, young children become involved with numbers in a variety of delightful and creative contexts. Eric Laithwaite's Size: The Measure of Things and Manfred Ridel's Winning with Numbers make mathematical ideas easily comprehensible while literature, in general, often illustrates the relationship between mathematics and the fine arts and the uses of mathematics in other cultures. It provides a context that makes sense to the students and reveals a realworld purpose for math.
The use of objects like blocks and manipulatives helps students model concepts, discover relationships, and investigate patterns in geometry, fractions, decimals, measurement, algebra, and other areas. The noise is the sound of students working together, investigating, sharing ideas, organizing and interpreting data.
By working in groups, they learn from each other, value each other's contributions, and discover, by themselves, effective problem solving strategies - processes and conclusions that make sense to them.
When students "teach," they are explaining their reasoning to get feedback, and they learn from that feedback, whether it comes from other students or the teacher. It provides acknowledgement that what they are thinking, saying, illustrating, and writing makes sense. This strategy encourages group activity and cooperation.
As they work, students find themselves immersed in pattern-discovery investigations that reveal the relationships among basic facts and operations. Calculators let students explore mathematical concepts and work with numbers that are beyond traditional grade level expectations, while math games, such as various forms of NIM, do essentially the same thing, demonstrating that knowledge of basic facts and skills is necessary to develop winning strategies.
Teachers in these classrooms constantly assess student performance to ensure that students are doing more than learning by rote for a test. Their goal is to help students understand and apply mathematical concepts and processes. Success is evident when students can communicate their thinking, make generalizations, and justify their results.
It is evidence gained over time, and it may not be as apparent in worksheets as it is in students' compositions, portfolios, self-evaluations, and performance tasks. Yet it clearly demonstrates confidence about mathematics. Tests, as a result, look very different.
At the conclusion of the lessons, the teacher (working, in some cases, with colleagues) reviews student work and, based on how well each student grasps the concepts, makes decisions about appropriate next steps. Whether they all hit the bullseye or not, all students are allowed to participate in the total mathematics program and discover, in their own language or modality, the beauty and fascination of mathematics.
