THE ANNUAL TARGET – MY VISION
For lack of a better word I will use the word, “design”. I knew early in September 2012 what type of class I want to have in June 2013: a community of learners of mathematics, fluent in the language of mathematics, comfortable with each other’s feedback and support, knowing at all times, where they can place themselves in the mathematics learning continuum, and who are permanently concerned with improvement, while enjoying math.
READY? GET SET. GO! THE MATH UNIT DESIGN
Each unit in mathematics is seen as a journey meant to make everyone meet success and being able to see the “change” at the end of it when a comparison with the entry stage is needed.
THE LEARNING CONTINUUM: Even before a unit starts I familiarize myself with the learning continuum as described in the Ontario Mathematics Curriculum. I look at the previous year’s expectations, this year’s and the following’s. I record the expectations in a simplified manner on an anchor chart making sure I do not leave out any terminology that I would need my students to know and use while working through the unit. I number the expectations as they correspond to sections in the student portfolios where students will insert their work addressing individual expectations.
THE STUDENT PORTFOLIO: The portfolio is the students’ tangible collection of evidence attesting to their progress through each unit. The first section is entitled: Entry Point. The last one: Exit point. The backbone or the internalizing and continuous monitoring and control of learning targets is done through the Learning Log that students complete the after each class.
a. The ENTRY – this is the diagnostic assessment tailored for the previous year’s expectations and directly rooted in the curriculum. Each diagnostic test is accompanied by a form on which the number of each question and the corresponding expectations are recorded. the students were taught and are always reminded to use that form as it describes their initial ‘strengths’ and the highlighted areas translate into their ” learning targets”.
b. The LEARNING LOG: the log is completed throughout the unit. It is work in progress and an “organic, fluid” document leant to record growth. Self-monitored and guided growth, ideally. Students add new ones to the initial strengths as they become aware of them during the unit. To the previous learning targets, students add the new ones that match the grade 6 curriculum and are stemming from the previous ones. This way students can see how their knowledge develop on the foundation provided by previous ones and the focus is all on GROWTH.
c. THE WORK SAMPLES: I use three part lessons during every class. Bansho plays a great role in developing metacognition as it invites students to describe their strategies, compare them and build the new learning collectively. Of course it implies the fact students work collaboratively on tasks and that tasks are challenging enough and lend themselves to a variety of strategies to solve them. Research on metacognition has emphasized the fact that for critical knowledge and self-knowledge to develop the problem solving must be challenging. These work samples are: problem solutions, independent practice questions with success criteria checklists attached to provide descriptive feedback, investigations and reflections. They are sorted according to the section number describing the curriculum expectations addressed.
ADDITIONAL COMPONENTS DURING THE UNIT:
a. STUDENTS OBSERVING STUDENTS SOLVE PROBLEMS – two times a week ( with Assessment for learning sheet, metacognitive reflection and teacher -student conference)
b. USING LIVESCRIBE PENS TO SOLVE PROBLEMS COLLABORATIVELY
C. MID-UNIT SELF ASSESSMENT AND PEER-PEER SUPPORT CAROUSEL ( students are paired according to their self- identified strengths and targets and rotate partners to help each other with difficult or unclear concepts)
D. STUDENTS LISTENING TO STUDENTS SOLVE PROBLEMS followed by metacognitive reflection on problem -solving
d. THE EXIT TEST: Just like the entry test, students are given the opportunity to see their end point and compare themselves to the entry point. This is the time in the unit when I ask them to reflect on their learning and become aware of the progress they made. I am a strong supporter the growth mindset theory. I also came to believe that students need to see and measure the extend of their progress. They need to see that they did not just “cover” the content but that they actually learned and grew. This is about their individual learning. This is also the moment, at the end of the unit when I evaluate them. Until this point in the unit there are absolutely no marks or levels communicated to students, only descriptive feedback: peer and teacher. I invited students to use the learning log and specifically self-evaluate their progress. I must say that I was stunned when I compared the first retrospective reflection they wrote during this year and I compared them to the exit point.
