You gotta give all students even students that are not good at math an opportunity to feel success!

Today in math class we were challenged to create a giraffe using tangrams. Now you can call me crazy but I have never seen or used a tangram before. I found it very challenging to create the giraffe using the tangrams. I was the first one at my table to almost create the giraffe I almost had it with a little more manipulation I got it. My table group then created the giraffe twice its size. Once we created the first giraffe doubling the size of the second one was still challenging and took some thought.

This was an excellent opportunity to see how working with shapes to create something was challenging for some and easy for others and is a great way to explore the individual strengths of ones peers.

We also talked about backwards design and the idea that it was teaching to the test we decided backwards design is not teaching to the test it is away for the teacher to focus on what she wants to learn from the students and what she wants the to learn. If the math is not beneficial then it should not be on the test. You have to find out whats important to you.

Math journals are and excellent way to  provide a possible entry point for students to work through their understanding and provide a deeper reflection on what they comprehend about the concepts and ideas they are learning. Math journals provide learners with a place to put math into words and give all students the opportunity to be successful at math.  There are numerous way a teacher can use a math journal they can be created as an online document that allows a teacher to touch base and discover a students understanding almost instantly and away of checking in with students who are struggling or might have misconceptions as they are trying to explain something.. Especially if the math journal is an open ended assignment that is not necessarily graded can provide an access point for multi-ability learners.

Combining math with literacy is an excellent way to combine math with other subjects. mathmatizing literacy is an excellent way to get here and another great way of incorporating group work. Allowing a student that claims I am not a math person but I am a creative person to thrive in math especially if this is a group assignment. When students struggle and flounder as a group they are more likely to discover each others strengths and a lot of learning can come out of that.