I was blessed to attend the Staff Development for Educators (SDE) Singapore Math conference in Las Vegas earlier this month. It changed many of my ideas about teaching math. Most of you know I am passionate about teaching math, however, I was struck with the realization that the way I have taught in the past was not the most effective for creating young problem solvers in our classrooms.
Below are some points I took from the conference. I'll continue to share more that I learned here in this Blog in the weeks and months ahead.
- Teachers should work through and solve every problem in each unit before you plan and teach the unit. This includes the problems in the student textbook, workbook, practice materials, and assessments. Doing this not only helps you understand the problems students will encounter but will give you a bigger picture of the unit.
- When you work through the problems before hand you may realize the need to use more manipulatives in your instruction. You may also realize the need to slow your pacing and you may find word problems that are harder. You, as the professional, will need to decide how to best proceed with those problems with your class.
- Don't assign homework and send it home if the students don't have a solid understanding of the concept or how to complete the work. This will save frustration for parents, students, and you. It can also help prevent parents from showing students "tricks" or algorithms before the students completely understand the process.
- Often the last section of a chapter is an extension of the topic covered and may not be on the chapter test. While stretching and enriching our students is a good thing, if you are short on time, this could be a section you skip or use as enrichment.
- Keep parents informed of what their child is learning. This type of problem solving math may be new to some parents. You may need to "pre-teach" parents so they can help their student. You can send home the papers from Math In Focus:School to Home Connections before you begin each chapter. You could also look for YouTube videos that show how to solve problems using the Singapore method and send those home to parents.
There was so much information from the conference it's impossible to share it all here and there were many sessions that I wanted to attend, but the schedule just wouldn't allow it; however, below you will find a link to SDE's complimentary webinars. There are some excellent webinars you could watch to give you some new ideas for our new math curriculum.
http://sde.com/Knowledge-Base/Complimentary-Webinars
Enjoy the rest of your summer!!
Shari
