Reflection Questions How might using Big Ideas impact how I plan? How might we as educators help students see things from a proportional reasoning perspective? Do you have a full range of manipulatives appropriate to grade level curriculum in your classroom? Do your students have access to these manipulatives for … More Teaching to Big Ideas – Proportional Reasoning »
It is hard to believe that I am coming up to the first year anniversary of my official retirement from full-time teaching. It has been a wonderful year despite my husband having an accident in April resulting in a broken ankle and torn rotator-cuff. It could have been much worse … More Anniversary Reflection 2015-2016 »
As the former numeracy facilitator for our board I had the unique opportunity and privilege of being part of three brand new ministry initiatives right from the beginning. As a result of my participation within these professional learning opportunities: CIL-M, EOSDN Math Project and Small & Northern Boards Spatial Reasoning … More Preciseness Will Impact Student Achievement! »
With the best of intentions we implement something e.g., a model or graphic organizer and think that this will be the solution to difficulties we are experiencing in the math classroom. In an earlier post I wrote that a challenge with writing is that something “three-dimensional” can often appear … More Be a Problem Solving Detective! »
Please comment and share your ideas! Planning for mathematics can seem like a daunting task, so I thought I would talk a bit about a few things I did as a classroom teacher. I began my planning by looking at the whole year and plugging in special times that happen … More Math Can Be Everywhere! »
“It’s fine to work on any problem, so long as it generates interesting mathematics along the way – even if you don’t solve it at the end of the day. (Andre Wiles) This quote reminds me of a couple of key ideas that I have encountered through my work as … More Let’s Focus on the Math! »
“In mathematics the art of proposing a question must be held in higher value than solving it.” (Georg Cantor) The art of proposing a question is critical in our math classes because as educators we want to promote thinking and reasoning. Some questions posed by adults can be very closed … More Everybody Has Questions! »
As I mentioned in the previous post I was a participant on a panel at a local high school’s parent night last year called, “Creating Calculating Kids”. Prior to this evening, I was sent some math quotes to reflect on in preparation for the discussion. One of the quotes, was … More Why Do “Some” Children Dread Mathematics? »
It was so exciting the last week of the school year to see the article I had written for the Leaders & Learners (Summer 2015) magazine in print. The title of the article on Page 33 is “Junior Numeracy Collaborative Inquiry”. http://www.cassa-acgcs.ca The Leaders & Learners magazine is the … More Reflection: A Practice That Moves Learning Forward »
“I strongly believe that it is important for me to continue to motivate and inspire others to love math as I came to do so later in life.” – Math Motivator It is so hard to believe that I am a “newly retired Elementary Mathematics Special Assignment Teacher”. I … More Welcome to “The Math Motivator”! »
