Field Experience Assignments Fall 2014

Observations:

Observe several math classes. Ask your cooperating teacher how you can best be helpful while observing the lessons. Post observations to each of the discussion boards, and be prepared to discuss your observations in class. Please make your posts long and detailed enough that we can all understand and learn from what you're seeing in the classroom.

How does your cooperating teacher help children make sense of math?

Look for things that your cooperating teacher does well that you can learn from. I'm hoping that someone in the class will have helpful observations to share about how their cooperating teacher helps children make sense of math. This might include:

• using manipulatives to represent math concepts and processes
• using pictures to represent math concepts and processes
• facilitating discussions among children about how they solve problems
• facilitating discussions among children about how to make sense of the math in a lesson or figure out strategies and patterns in mathematical situations.
• choosing games, problems and activities that help children understand math concepts and processes

How does your cooperating teacher show respect for children and encourage children to show respect for each other?

Every teacher needs to establish classroom rules and norms that help the classroom run smoothly. These rules and norms need to be reinforced throughout the year. Look for ways the teacher keeps things running smoothly. Things you might look for include big ideas like:

• paying attention to students thoughts, ideas and needs
• creating a culture where children feel safe to share their ideas
• managing students working together (make sure everyone contributes, gets a fair turn, and feels respected)

or smaller strategies like:

• how does the teacher get everyone's attention?
• how does the teacher intervene or manage the problem when children are not getting along with each other?
• what does the teacher remind children to do during class discussions? (Listen to each other? Not call out? Not interrupt?...)
• how does the teacher manage "wait time"?

How do children learn and think differently?

All classes have special needs students, though they may not have IEP plans or obvious labels. (One could make a good argument that all children have special need). Look for the children who struggle with numbers or need a challenge. Tell us what you notice, and how you've interacted with these children. To be respectful of their privacy, you can give them a pseudonym, or use only a first name or initials when writing about them. If you notice that the teacher is doing things to differentiate instruction for students, let us know what you see.

Number talks/math talks:

Plan and conduct two number talks.

• Each number talk should have a question your are planning to ask the children, and some related follow-up questions you could ask if you have time.
• Each number talk should be focused on learning how children solve and think about a particular type of math problem.
• Each number talk should involve at least 3 children, and should take 5-10 minutes.

When choosing a problem to ask, consider:

• What problems the children are doing in class now, what problems they should be able to solve at this grade level (think about what we've talked about in class, look at their textbook, or look at the Common Core Math Standards).
• Think about different ways children might solve the question you are planning to ask (use your own number sense, things you have read about and seen other people do, and strategies we've talked about in this class)
• Think about whether it would be more interesting to ask the problem using a word problem, a number problem, or a diagram.

For each math talk, you should:

1. Make a plan.

• In your plan, I want you to tell me the questions you're thinking planning to ask. If you're going to show the problem with pictures or manipulatives, describe what you're going to show.
• Write a few sentences telling me why you picked the problems you did (be as specific as you can--you should be picking problems based on things you have seen children doing, things you know they should be learning at this grade level, or some other particular reason).
• Think about how you're going to explain your expectations about behavior to the children: how should they show you when they have an answer? Make a plan so that all of the children will have a chance to think about the problem before someone else blurts out their answer
• Turn your plan into the dropbox.

2. Conduct the math talk:

• Sit down with the children in a quiet area, and ask the question(s).
• Try to understand how each child thought about the problem. If you have time to ask more than one question, vary which child you ask to share first. After you are done talking to the children, write down some notes about how each child solved the problems.

3. Report on what you learned

• First, tell me what you saw: Write about the strategies each child who answered the question used. (You can use initials or pseudonyms for the children)
• Next: Use what you've learned in this class to describe the sorts of solution strategies you saw: did any children use direct modeling? Did children use counting or thinking about number facts they know to work with the numbers in your questions?
• Finally, tell me how as a teacher, you could use what you learned: What else would you like to know about these children's math understanding? If you were going to create a math lesson or activity for one or more these same children, what would be a good topic for the lesson based on what you saw of their understanding in this discussion?

Math read aloud

Math read aloud: plan a math read aloud. Either do the math read aloud with the entire class or with at least 2 small groups.

Your math read aloud should be a mini-lesson consisting of reading all or part of a chidrens book, several math questions that are tied into the book, and an extended activity or discussion that follows up on the math questions inspired by the book. You should plan this to last about 20 minutes.

Lesson plan template

Reflection:

Write a reflection on teaching the math read aloud.

Video recording:

Video record yourself working with students in one of the fiels experience assignments.

If your recording is more than 10 minutes, please edit it down to one or two smaller clips (10 minutes total or less)

Watch your video recording, and write a reflection (at least 500 words) addressing how you managed the teacher-student interactions and student-student interactions in the clip, with a focusing on respect in the classroom: do the children feel that you are treating them with respect? Are they showing respect for each other? Discuss things that you did that helped establish a respectful tone, and also childrens behaviors that did or didn't show respect for each other. Discuss what could be done to increase or reinforce respectful behavior in the future (this can be continuing with things that are already working, or it can be ideas for improvement).