Learning Math Together

That's a lot of strips. I looks like more than 5 to me.
Can I count them to find out how many there are?

I'd like the children in my class to feel that we are learning together. I don't want to spend time asking them questions that sound like I am assessing them.

Questions like:
How many?
Show me one more?
Can you hold up 3 fingers?

The question "Can you hold up 3 fingers for me?" is one that makes me cringe. Why would a child want to do that? Would they want to do that to please the teacher (for me). It's not showing that we are learning together.

There are questions we can ask which are more collaborative.

Instead of: Can you count the apples? I prefer to ask something like: Do we have enough apples for everyone? (in a group of 5 or 6).
I think there are 5 triangles. Am I right? Let's find out.
I think you've got more than me?

Let's see if we can make the train tracks go all the way to the door. I wonder if we'll have enough track to do that?

Let's show how many different ways we can show the number 6 using our fingers.

Let's write the number 6, six times.

Let's play a game with the dice. How many rolls does it take before you get a number 6?

Sometimes I model the type of talk that I want to hear the children doing: Your shoes are the same, but a different color.

I'd like the children to feel that the classroom is a place where we all learn together, finding answers together.

Comments

Tape Man

Some of the children put blue tape over their mouth. Usually I would have said something like, "Take the tape off your mouth. It's not for putting on your mouth." Instead I thought of Tape Man (with some pride, being from New Zealand). I thought of creativity. I thought of art. So we sat together for whole group time, some with tape on their mouth. I said, "I've got something to show you." When they first say him one of them said, "It's scary." I reassured them that it's not too scary and that he's being funny. So they started to laugh. Pretty soon there was no more tape on mouths (not that I minded if there was, it's just hard to laugh). Thank you Tape Man for reminding us that creativity begins with exploration in play.

Making Black Blacker

It started with small jars of water for the children to use to wash their paint brushes while using the blocks of water color paints. It turned into a color mixing experiment. I asked if I could change the water "because it's only going to get blacker." "That's what we want," was the reply. They wanted the experience of adding more and more to get darker and darker black.

Light Table OHP Needs to be Repaired

It's an old Over Head Projector (OHP) that we use for our light table. It has provided hours of learning - exploration in light and shadow, color combinations (using the transparent color blocks) as well as lessons in cooperation. The children have been "repairing" it with tape, winding it round and round. The top part of the OHP broke off so they needed to repair it with tape. (It now has a plastic top, after the glass broke). Experiences in collaborative repairing.

NZ Teacher

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